It all started as I was waiting at a pedestrian crossing minding my own business. I would not be able to tell you clearly what happened next even if I tried. One moment everything is fine and then the next moment one vehicle in the intersection slams into another, which caused a chain reaction. One car came flying my way, missed me by a matter of inches and killed the woman that was standing next to me.
I was so stunned I lost my balance. I fell on my ass and even though I was not hurt at all I felt like I could not move. I remember touching my face and not being able to feel it. My breathing was not doing its normal thing. I was frozen in place unable to run up and start helping anyone even if I tried.
I completely forgot where I was going, what I was doing, and I even had to think for a moment when the first responders asked me for my name. This just fucked up my whole day.
When I got home I remembered thinking that life was short. Life was way too short. I could have died. The images of all that blood and ... I don't want to think about it. But those images kept coming to me. My mind kept playing back that moment when the car flew past me and I heard the woman scream. For the next few days I would wake up in the middle of the night feeling like I was in a panic.
But I wasn't injured. So I got on with my life. I finished my undergrad degree. I searched for a job and found one. I even met a nice girl that I thought I might want to ask out and maybe it would go somewhere.
Then I started getting calls and letters from lawyers wanting to meet with me and they fucked my life up more. Well, not really but it felt that way for a while.
Now, maybe some of this is not entirely correct. I'm just trying to put it here the way I understand it. Keep in mind that I am not a lawyer.
Ok. So it seemed to be the case that after the accident a bunch of people all started suing a bunch of other people. There was this complicated web of law suits. Somehow they all got packaged together but there was a question about if it was going to state court or federal court.
Now I have no idea what the difference between the two is. Why do we even need two different court systems? That just seems like a waste to me. But anyway, we have two different court systems with two different sets of laws and rules.
Now as I understand it, there was a group of people who wanted to move the collective group of cases from state court to federal court but you can't just do that. There has to be some reason for moving it and they didn't have a reason. But they really, REALLY wanted to move the case to federal court and they were grasping at straws to find a way to get it there.
Now it turns out that all the people involved in the accident were all residents of one state. But I was not a resident of that state. Why would being a resident or citizen of different states matter anymore? I couldn't tell you. I thought we were all one nation under God but I guess in the law which state you call home still matters.
Anyway, the lawyers came after me. They wanted me to join them in the suit so that they could move the case to federal court. They told me if I helped them do that then they could get the insurance companies to pay millions of dollars more and we'd all be rich. But in order to join them in the suit I had to do something I didn't want to do. I had to lie.
Yes, you read that right. I would have to lie and say that I was injured in some way during the accident. But I wasn't. All that happened to me was I fell on my ass. I still had nightmares about what happened but I didn't really think that counted.
Not only did I not want to lie under oath, I also did not want to go to jail. It is illegal to lie under oath after all. And as for those millions of dollars; even if we won, and there was a chance we might not, but even if we did win, all that money would go to the families who actually had injuries. You might say that is exactly as it should be but from my point of view I would be putting myself into a very risky position.
If I lied then I would get zero reward and I would have a huge target on my back. Not only that, but if I went to the families and asked for a bit of gratuity for helping them get rich, they could blackmail me and I'd end up having to pay them.
Their lawyers could see that I was not feeling their offer so they presented me with papers saying that they would pay me ten thousand dollars but only if they got a settlement or a judgment from the courts over a certain amount. Besides the money, they tried to impress upon me the morality of helping them. The rich guys and the insurance companies were evil and it would be a good thing to stick it to them. I thought that kind of argument was funny coming from a lawyer.
On Friday morning I got a call from the lawyers representing the insurance companies. They wanted to talk to me. I met them for lunch. We didn't talk about the case right at first. I think they were trying to feel me out before they tried to get any information from me about the other side.
They were very interested in keeping the case in state court.
Anyway, the meeting ended without them asking me for anything but late on Friday afternoon they called me up and said that they wanted me as far away from the case as possible. They threatened that if I joined the suit they'd sue me and keep me from ever being able to get a job. They wanted me to sign some nondisclosure agreement and they wanted it returned to them first thing on Monday morning.
I did not feel like being intimidated. I told them over the phone that if they were going to treat me that way, then no matter what they asked of me, the answer was no. I didn't need to wait until Monday.
Of course all weekend long I worried about what I had said. I thought that it was amazing how each side felt threatened by me saying I wanted to tell the truth. Do people just automatically lie when they go to court? Is it that strange for someone to tell the truth? I thought that's what we were all supposed to be doing.
On Saturday, the lawyers tried calling me so I set my phone to not accept any phone calls until Monday. My phone didn't ring but I kept seeing the notifications of how many times both sides tried to call me on Saturday and Sunday.
On Monday I called the lawyer for the families and the first words out of his mouth were "25 thousand".
"Up front?"
"If we get a judgment."
"I'll think about it."
I hung up.
Then I called the lawyers for the insurance companies.
"You're going to be in a lot of trouble." the man said.
I didn't even answer him. I just hung up.
Then I thought better of all this. I was going to tell the truth anyway. I knew I was. When I went to go give the deposition I was going to tell the truth. I didn't need all this hassle.
So I didn't answer my phone for a while. I went to work and focused on my job.
When I was leaving to go home a white man approached me. He seemed to already know who I was.
"How much?" he asked.
I didn't even know who he was or which side he represented. I mean, I figured he was a lawyer, I didn't know which team.
They thought I could be bribed? Well, bribery is illegal right? And I don't want to go to jail. So I would not be taking a bribe. I was going to tell the truth. So I spelled it out for the man in as plain English as I could.
He listened and then countered. "Supposed you sued us and we wanted to settle with you out of court. How much would it take to make your law suit go away?"
"I'm not suing anybody."
"Suppose we sued you. How much would it take for that law suit to go away?"
"I don't understand. You can't sue me for nothing."
"We can sue you for anything. We can make it up and the courts will at least hear it. So, how much is it going to take for our law suit to go away?"
"You really want to bribe me?"
"I want to settle out of court with you."
"Fine. One million dollars, up front, free and clear."
"Let me make a phone call."
"You do what you gots to do."
The guy got on his phone and I went to the bus stop to catch my bus. The man ran over to me. "One hundred thousand. We can wire it to you today."
"I said one million."
"They won't pay one million."
"Then forget it."
The guy got back on his phone.
My bus came and the guy followed me on the bus even thought he had arrived in a nice car. The bus had a rule that you couldn't talk on the phone on the bus so the lawyer was reduced to texting.
He turned around in his seat to talk to me. "They'll pay you 150."
"No."
"Come on. You have to negotiate with us on this."
"No I don't. You asked how much and I gave you a number. What's wrong with the number I gave you?"
"It's too high. It's just way too high."
"Fine. Half a million."
The guys started texting. The bus came to my stop and I got off. I was walking down the street to my apartment and the guy followed me without a care in the world as to the kind of neighborhood he was walking into.
"200." the guy said.
"Dude, do not just yell numbers out loud. What's wrong with you?"
"Sorry. Duo Centos." I guess he was hoping I was educated enough to figure out what he meant by that.
"Quingenta." I said.
I thought for a moment as he tried to figure out how much that was. Then it was back to the phone and then back to me as I was getting my key out to put into my door.
"Tre centa." he said.
"Quingenta. No less."
"Come on. That's a good deal."
"If you don't want quingenta then deciens is on the table."
He had to go look that word up. Then he was a surprised and shook his head. I invited him in and he made a call. I sat in my bedroom, which I guess was also my living room, wondering if I should go ahead and go around the track on the racing game I had in my console. They guy got off the phone and addressed me.
"They moved the offer back down to 100. They told me to tell you to take it or leave it."
"Then I'll leave it. Bye."
"That's it?"
"Yeah. I have company coming over."
"We're going to sue you. You do know that."
"I have it on good authority that it is illegal to ask someone to lie to a judge. You aren't asking me to lie are you?"
"No. Of course not. That would be unethical."
"Then you better just go before you prove to me just how unethical you really are."
The white man left and I tried to relax with my game.
My sister came over to get my college textbooks. She was going to try to use as many of them as she could. As she was leaving I saw the white guy arguing with another white guy over on the corner. I walked over to them.
"Wo. Both of you shut up. You can not be arguing like that in this neighborhood. Somebody gon call the police."
Even with me there they just kept going at it like two preachers arguing over which translation of the bible was the best one.
"He's going to join with the families and do the right thing." said one.
