Transcript of Episode 44, with Debbie Taussig

Scott Glovsky:

Welcome to Trial Lawyer Talk. I’m Scott Glovsky. I’m your host for this podcast we speak with some of the best trial lawyers in the country. Today, I’m very happy to be sitting with my friend Debbie Taussig, Debbie’s a great trial lawyer who practices in Boulder, Colorado and she’s going to share with us today a story relating to school bullying. So let’s get started.

I’m very pleased to be sitting with Debbie Taussig, who is a phenomenal trial lawyer in Colorado. Debbie is an excellent teacher, an excellent caring and loving human being and I’m very glad to call you my friend.

Debbie Taussig:

Thank you Scott. I’m glad and call you my friend too.

Scott Glovsky:

Thanks for being with us.

Debbie Taussig:

Thank you.

Scott Glovsky:

Can you tell us a story of a case that’s had a profound impact on you?

Debbie Taussig:

I have a case I’m working on right now that, I’m very passionate about, and it’s a new area of law for me, which I’m also excited about. And my client is in 11. He’s 12 now. When he was 11 years old, he moved to Colorado from Texas with his mom. And they came to Colorado for medical marijuana cause his mom, she had epilepsy. And so coming to Colorado was like a re birthing of this family because she had epilepsy really bad and got multiple seizures per day And they found that medical marijuana was the one thing that helped her.

And so they had come to Colorado, and had started this new life. And they moved to this neighborhood that unfortunately is very poor. And the schools … I don’t quite yet know exactly what all of the background of these schools are, but unfortunately, there is a lot of bullying that goes on in this school. And my client happens to be white. And the school, most of this students in this school are Hispanic. And he starts school there, and he starts getting bullied right away.

And on top of that he had this, walking condition I think it’s called idiopathic toe walking, but it has something to do with the growth of the legs, and how you’re the tendons or the ligaments grow. But he had to walk funny and wore out his shoes. And so he was teased a lot and bullied physically and verbally bullied. And was called names that reflect as color of his skin, he was called white trash. And then he was teased about the way he walked and eventually he got some walking casts on, so to correct this issue that he had.

And so this bullying went on for all of his fifth grade. And then he started sixth grade and he was, I think he was about maybe six weeks into a sixth grade. And meanwhile his parents had complained a lot. They’ve gone, they’ve shown up to the school. They tried to show up at the superintendent’s office, but they had some policy where you had to fill out every complaint that you have online. And the parents didn’t have a computer and they had trouble doing the complaint on their phones.

So my client was walking down the hall one day and this kid was, that had been bullying him, walked by him, and had a pencil in his hand and stabbed my client in the chest. And he ended up having a punctured lung. But he didn’t know it. The severity of his injuries, he was gonna go to his class actually. And friends of his prompted him to go to the nurse’s station. And so he goes to the nurse’s office and they tell him that he has to go back to the class and get this pass. And so he goes back in to the nurse’s station and they have the sign that says they’re out to lunch.

So he waits in the hallway for a while, until finally somebody comes to his rescue and knocks on the nurse’s door and insist that he gets attended to. And they just put a band-aid on it and called his mom. And so when his mom came, she realized something was serious and fortunately rushed him to the hospital. And physically he’s okay. He recovered, they fixed the punctured lung. And, but he’s got some pretty significant PTSD issues. And all of what I’m saying is actually now public record because I filed a complaint. So this is not, anything that I’m saying is not privileged or private information.

And so he’s being home-schooled and he’s just been having significant PTSD issues. And I just think there’s this systemic problem in some of these schools, where they … I don’t, I’m just starting the case. I have gotten a little bit information from some of the experts that I’ve talked to on school, but I think that they have problems. They are not dealing with this. So anyway, that’s the case.

One of the hurdles and at least in Colorado, and I believe that they have these similar hurdles in other states, there’s immunities that government entities have. And so the school districts have a lot of immunity. So you have some high hurdles in order to bring a lawsuit. And, but we were able to bring the lawsuit so far under some of the Federal Statutes and the Civil Rights Statutes. So some of the claims I’ve made are discrimination based on race and disability. And so I actually filed the lawsuit. The government or the school districts filed a motion to dismiss, which they always do and I filed my response. And so we’re in that process right now to see if we’re gonna get our day in court.

Scott Glovsky:

So how do you go about discovering the story of your case?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, with the 11 year old boy, it’s a little hard because the first time I went in there with the clients, of course his parents were very forthcoming and telling me what happened, but he wouldn’t even talk to me. And so I have spent a lot of time with him now. So, and I can’t remember what order it did, but I’ve done a couple things. I had him go meet. Actually I think first I had a meet with the local psychologist. I found this person who is specializes in trauma for children. And he also specializes in a thing called EMDR, which is a treatment for trauma. But what I wanted to accomplish were two things. I wanted him to be evaluated. It’s just close to the event as possible just to have someone understand and be able to testify about what happened. But I also asked the psychologist to interview my client and get as much information about what happened because I didn’t feel like it was appropriate for me to force him to tell me what had happened.

So I had him first do that, and got some information. And then of course that psychologist will be an expert. And but then what I did is, some point after that, I had what we use at the trial lawyer’s college were introduced to this psychodrama and the tools of using psychodrama to discover the story. And as lawyers we can use some of those tools. In our own practices and reenact events. But when you have a client who’s been significantly traumatized, you don’t, we don’t do that ourselves. So I had one of our psychodrama tests come to Colorado and work with him and we reenacted the actual stabbing incident and then we reenacted just some things, other things that were, surrounded the part of discovering the story. And so, it was, it was pretty astounding and impactful that to just to see him tell us his story and to discover the story of what had happened.

Scott Glovsky:

How so?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, it’s just like seeing something through a child’s eyes I think is a little bit different in general, and the innocent eyes of a child and what had happened. And I think when you discover the story, it’s very spontaneous. So, you just pick up on things that you hadn’t known about. But I think what the real beauty about psychodrama and reenacting the story is it almost puts you there, you’re part of the story.

Scott Glovsky:

So what did you learn through that, that was impactful?

Debbie Taussig:

Well I think …. One of the things I learned about my client has, his mom is married not to his father, another man who has stepped into the role of his father. And his mom had to… I couldn’t remember, but she couldn’t be there that day so his Stepdad came. And so I did learn a lot of the dynamic of the family. And when my client, the boy was reenacting the story would look and notice his stepdad was getting tears in his eyes by watching him go through this, it was very sad. And just to like see my client lying. And when we reenacted that he was lying in the hallway waiting for the nurse to come. Kind of holding his chest, cause he instinctively knew something was wrong cause he was having trouble breathing.

And so whatever he was doing was probably perhaps saving his life because he was able to breathe. But, I mean, I guess it’s just learning what had happened. So, and just the impact of him. I mean, he’s just an innocent little kid, and he’s really … The other thing is he’s really, he’s lonely because he’s not in school. And at that age, 11 and 12 years old, he’s missing out on an import part of just being around other kids. And to see, he kept talking about I just want to go back to school, and because there’s some of the people I still like. But he doesn’t, he’s afraid to go back there, but he wants to. What he did, I don’t know if he said he wanted to go back to school, but he said he just wished if he could just see some of the people that were nice to him again. And there were a couple of teachers that he liked and he just, he wanted to show him his new shoes. I mean, that’s, that’s how kids think.

Scott Glovsky:

Have you found a connection with you, Debbie Taussig, in your case?

Debbie Taussig:

Oh boy. I haven’t thought of that. I do feel in a way that I’ve had times in my life where I felt lonely and sort of the underdog. And I don’t remember specific instances of being bullied as a child, but I think that I can relate to that, the bullying part and just being ostracized. And I think even today in our practices we’re sort of ostracized and we’re the underdog. So to represent the underdog and the ostracized is kind of a, fighting for them is it fulfilling. I mean, I don’t even know if … What the court’s gonna do with this case, but-

Scott Glovsky:

What brought you to represent this young boy?

Debbie Taussig:

It is just totally happenstance with. He was referred to someone that I know, a retired lawyer that moved to Colorado, is living up in Aspen. And years ago she had a case up there and she had called my stepfather Bill, and it was a wrongful death baby case, and medical malpractice case. And so he had me work on that case. And so I got to know her and occasionally she gets referrals and then refers them to me. And I would have never thought of doing a school bullying case or anything like this.

Scott Glovsky:

So Debbie, now that you’ve told us part of your client’s story, tell us your story. Tell us who Debbie Taussig is. How you became you.

Debbie Taussig:

Well I grew up in Boulder, Colorado, family of lawyers. Well my father and my stepfather were lawyers and for all of my childhood and the first part of my adulthood going to law school didn’t occur to me at all. I spent the first part of my career in retail. So had just totally different goals in mind, and ended up getting a decent, fun job for a while. I lived up in Vail, Colorado and I did that for years. But I got bored with my life and board living up there and wanted to do something more meaningful. And it still didn’t hit me like going to law school. By then my brother was a lawyer also all doing plaintiffs, different variety of plaintiff’s work.

I went to the speech by Ralph Nader and he was talking about just how Ralph Nader is, talks about all the consumer issues in our society and what we need to do to overcome them. And I remember he said something about, as a society and in this country, we have safer cars, we have safer products, we have safer toys. And he said something about it, but it’s not because our lawmakers have gone out and decided that we need to make laws to protect the people. This is because we have trial lawyers who have brought these lawsuits against the auto manufacturers and the corporations and the government.

And because of that, that’s why we have so many, safer products and cars and, and just, and civil rights obviously. It’s because of lawsuits, not because of our, I mean I know that we have great lawmakers, but just that was kind of his speech and I think that was kind of what the first step in me thinking that I want that, perhaps this thing that’s like right in front of me is maybe what I should do. And I really, literally, I lived in Vail at the time and I had this, I owned a town home up there and I just thought, okay, I’ll just do all this stuff and if it falls into place that’s meant to be.

So I ended up in law school. I ended up passing. And then I was fortunate enough to go work for my stepfather, Bill Trying who had a small law firm in Boulder, Colorado. And he practiced primarily medical malpractice. And that was very interesting and an awesome education. He had, he just like threw me out to the wolves. He didn’t, I mean, just right away I was in the battlefields doing this type of work. Tried some cases right away with him and worked for him for seven years and then started my own practice with some partners for a while. Now I’m on my own. And that’s kind of where I’ve ended up, but-

Scott Glovsky:

Right. In your bullying case, I want you to reverse roles with your client. What’s your name?

Debbie Taussig:

Tyler.

Scott Glovsky:

How old are you Tyler?

Debbie Taussig:

12.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you care about most in the world?

Debbie Taussig:

My dog, my mom, my dad.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you do for fun?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, I like to fish and I like to play with my dog. I like to play with other kids.

Scott Glovsky:

And what are you most afraid of?

Debbie Taussig:

Being made fun of by other kids.

Scott Glovsky:

How does that make you feel?

Debbie Taussig:

Mad.

Scott Glovsky:

What happened to you?

Debbie Taussig:

I was made fun of and teased and kick and bullied. Nobody came to my rescue for months and months and months.

Scott Glovsky:

Did you tell anybody about it?

Debbie Taussig:

Yeah.

Scott Glovsky:

Who did you tell?

Debbie Taussig:

Some of the teachers and the principal and my parents, my friends, sometimes I fought back.

Scott Glovsky:

How tall are you?

Debbie Taussig:

Maybe about four feet now. Right now.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you like to watch on TV? What else do you like to do?

Debbie Taussig:

I don’t know. What else does he like to do?

Scott Glovsky:

What else do I like to do?

Debbie Taussig:

Just like to play with friends and my dog and watch TV.

Scott Glovsky:

I understand you’re being homeschooled now. How does that feel?

Debbie Taussig:

I don’t like school that much.

Scott Glovsky:

How come?

Debbie Taussig:

Just don’t like it, and I don’t like homeschool.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you like?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, I wish I could be around some friends more. Go on, but we’re going on a road trip. We bought a camper and my parents were taking me on a trip. We’re going to go visit my grandparents in California.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you like to eat?

Debbie Taussig:

Hamburgers, chicken nuggets. French fries.

Scott Glovsky:

You usually get the kids’ meals in the restaurants?

Debbie Taussig:

Sometimes, but I can eat a lot.

Scott Glovsky:

Do you have any, you have a dog?

Debbie Taussig:

Um-hmm.

Scott Glovsky:

Tell me about your dog.

Debbie Taussig:

Oh, I forget what type of dog it is. I don’t want to get it wrong.

Scott Glovsky:

Yeah. So how do you feel about your lawyer, Debbie?

Debbie Taussig:

I like her. She’s great. She, we’ve spent, she’s come down to see me a lot and she’s really nice.

Scott Glovsky:

What do you guys do together?

Debbie Taussig:

Mostly just hang out and just takes me out to lunch, talks, but she may … We laugh and she has a nice dog too.

Scott Glovsky:

And do you know what she’s helping you with or what she’s doing for you?

Debbie Taussig:

Yeah, she’s trying to go after the school for me getting hurt.

Scott Glovsky:

How does that make you feel?

Debbie Taussig:

It’s kind of scary ‘cause I don’t really want to talk about what happened, but, I think I feel like she might help us.

Scott Glovsky:

If you could put your feelings about her in one word, what would they be?

Debbie Taussig:

Awesome.

Scott Glovsky:

And has Debbie met your mom?

Debbie Taussig:

Oh yeah. Yeah. Lots. She’s come to our house. We’ve met at her place.

Scott Glovsky:

Okay. Now Debbie, I want you to reverse back to being Debbie. Now I want you to reverse into your client’s mom. What’s her name?

Debbie Taussig:

Sharice.

Scott Glovsky:

Sharice. Sharice, what do you look like?

Debbie Taussig:

I’ve got long my brown hair. Got a big smile, big eyes. Pretty cheerful looking most of the time, but I think, yeah, that’s all.

Scott Glovsky:

So what are three things you’re most afraid of?

Debbie Taussig:

Seizures. My son getting hurt again and just the everyday struggles, getting ahead in life. We’ve struggled a lot.

Scott Glovsky:

So I imagine with your seizures, you must feel at times powerless?

Debbie Taussig:

Yes.

Scott Glovsky:

Tell me about that.

Debbie Taussig:

Yeah, I mean I can have them any time. I mean the marijuana has done wonders. I guess what I call it, it’s cannabis, usually referred to as cannabis, but it has been great. It’s been the first time in a long time that I can get through a day without seizures.

Scott Glovsky:

So how does it make you feel as a mother knowing you can have a seizure any time?

Debbie Taussig:

Well I don’t like them, but my son has seen that and what I didn’t like is that he couldn’t have a normal life before that with his mom constantly having seizures.

Scott Glovsky:

Has He, has he seen you have seizures?

Debbie Taussig:

Oh yeah.

Scott Glovsky:

What, what is he seeing?

Debbie Taussig:

I just start shaking and kind of get out of control and lose consciousness and fall usually. And, I’m sure it’s scary for my son to watch that.

Scott Glovsky:

And how does that make you feel?

Debbie Taussig:

Sad. So, but we’ve had, it’s been better and we’ve had a lot of support in Colorado from other people.

Scott Glovsky:

So how do you feel as a mom knowing that you weren’t there to protect your son when he was bullied?

Debbie Taussig:

I’m so mad at the school. And I tried to get help.

Scott Glovsky:

So how do you feel about having to homeschool your son now?

Debbie Taussig:

Part of me is glad that I don’t have to leave him at that school. I mean, I’m obviously glad that I don’t have to leave him at that school anymore. But it’s sad that he is not, having to … That he can’t be out there with other kids. And it’s a burden, but not my, never say burden about my son though. It’s hard because we don’t have money and both my husband and I, we need to work to make ends meet. And I, it’s hard to work and be there with my son because we can’t really leave him alone much.

Scott Glovsky:

How do you feel about this lawyer Debbie? That took your case?

Debbie Taussig:

We love her.

Scott Glovsky:

Why?

Debbie Taussig:

Because she’s so smart and she’s championing for us and she’s there. She’s done a lot for us.

Scott Glovsky:

And what is your hope for bringing this case?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, I hope that it doesn’t happen to anybody else. I want the schools to do something about this, and hope that we can make a better life for my son and do better for him and get him some help and just, get into a place where we can send him to a school that’s safe.

Scott Glovsky:

What else do we need to know about you?

Debbie Taussig:

Just that I love my son, I love my husband. My family means everything to me.

Scott Glovsky:

Okay. Now, Debbie, I want you to reverse back and become Debbie. How did that feel?

Debbie Taussig:

There was a place reversing roles with them. I feel like I do know them, but there’s things I don’t know.

Scott Glovsky:

Do you feel like you were in a role? We’re true to who they are.

Debbie Taussig:

Yeah.

Scott Glovsky:

And does that help you feel connected to your client?

Debbie Taussig:

Yeah.

Scott Glovsky:

And how might that be helpful in trying this case?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, it’s definitely helpful in being able to tell this story and relate, and in a relatable way. But I think that if I’m not feeling the emotional impact of my story, I’m not gonna to teach it in a way to the jury that they’re gonna be emotionally impacted by it. And that’s one of the things we learned at the Trial Lawyers College is to, is that the emotional content of the story is what makes jurors connect. I mean, I don’t know if things go so far. I mean, obviously we want to save, we emotionally get them involved. They’re gonna give a verdict for us. And, but it’s certainly, I feel like it’s the way they connect to us and connect to our clients and connect to the story.

Scott Glovsky:

How do you deal with the feelings of stress and anxiety and struggle and often feeling powerless as a trial lawyer?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, reaching out to other lawyers and people, my friends who can relate is obviously helpful. And knowing that I’m not totally alone in what I’m doing, that others are in this same struggle. And that’s whether they’re in my community or through the larger trailers, college network or other plaintiffs’ trial lawyers, organizations.

And then I have a great supportive husband who is always there for me. I don’t know how he does it, but he’s solid and there for me always. And then I think that what I do, the healthy ways I do it or either to do some yoga and meditation and some breathing and some journaling. And I mean I do that for, to reduce the stress of my job or go on a walk.

Sometimes I go home, well I actually never, I was going to say as trial lawyers, there’s a high incident of alcoholism and sometimes there is that inclination to drink and I’ve, I used to do that more but I don’t do that now. I mean I don’t drink to what I call to relieve stress or self-medicate. I usually I try something else.

Scott Glovsky:

Yeah. In fact, I mean there’s very few people in our profession who never do at some point in their career try alcohol or drugs or some other, let’s just say not constructive way to deal with the stress. And sounds like you have some great tools in yoga and meditation and nature.

Debbie Taussig:

We need that. I mean it’s okay. I don’t mind having a glass of wine or for fun is one thing. But yeah, I think that’s what I think that we need to find other ways to relieve the stress, not just to avoid becoming an alcoholic, but just because that’s, it’s just more organic. I mean, I think that it’s the way we, that we can deal with life in general too.

Scott Glovsky:

What advice do you have for young trial lawyers out there who are looking to learn and grow?

Debbie Taussig:

Well, you got to take risks and you’ve got to just go out and do it. And not take … There’s so many things that are going to be thrown at you and so much adversarial, the process is just so adversarial. Do not take it personally, and not buy into the, not get baited into a war with your opposing counsel over something. Always take the high road, but I also think just you had have some passion about your cases. You got to love your clients.

I mean, I guess there’s cases where you don’t always love your clients, but you gotta at least find some passion at what you’re doing. I personally would have a hard time representing somebody that I couldn’t want to be around for very long. And I generally grow very fond of my clients. But, and then I guess lastly, most of the us who do this type of work are very giving people, and I think that we’d always help somebody. So I think ask somebody looked fine. Find not just one person but people that you like what they do that you admire and reach out and get some mentors.

Scott Glovsky:

Debbie, Thank you so much for joining us. This has been a real pleasure. Thank you so much.

Debbie Taussig:

Thank you Scott.

Scott Glovsky:

Thank you for joining us today for trial lawyer talk. If you like the show, I really appreciate it if you could give us a good review on iTunes and I’d love to get your feedback. You can reach me at www.scottglovsky.com, that’s s-c-o-t-t-g-l-o-v-s-K-y.com and I’d love to hear your feedback. You can also check out the book that I published called Fighting Health Insurance Denials, a primer for lawyers that’s on Amazon. I put the book together based on 20 years of suing health insurance companies for denying medical care to people, and it provides a general outline of how to fight health insurance denials. Have a great week and we’ll talk to you in the next episode.