In this episode of Trial Lawyer Talk, Scott speaks with John Gomez, an accomplished trial attorney from San Diego. Mr. Gomez tells Scott about a recent traumatic brain injury case with a big outcome.
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Transcript of Episode 41, with John Gomez
Scott Glovsky:
Welcome to Trial Lawyer Talk. I’m Scott Glovsky and I’m your host for this podcast where we speak with some of the best trial lawyers in the country. Today, we have a special treat. We’ve got John Gomez. John is an excellent trial lawyer who’s incredibly talented, incredibly genuine, and authentic, and real. And he’s gonna share with us some of his experiences in a case that he recently tried. And John also has an incredible personal story from his very humble beginnings, to Yale Law School, to becoming one of the preeminent plaintiffs’ lawyers, preeminent trial lawyers in the country. So let’s get started.
Welcome to Trial Lawyer Talk. I’m Scott Glovsky and we’re here with a phenomenal, amazing trial lawyer, John Gomez, who tries cases all over the state, and probably all over the country, and has a phenomenal firm in San Diego. And is a graduate of Trial Lawyers College and a truly successful and real trial lawyer.
Scott Glovsky:
John, thanks so much for being with us.
John Gomez:
Thanks for having me, Scott.
Scott Glovsky:
John, can you share with us a story of a case that had a profound impact on you? And as I look across, I can almost see the smile on your face, knowing that a couple of days ago, you had an amazing, heroic result for clients, and I can feel it on your face.
John Gomez:
Yeah, thanks, Scott. It was actually just yesterday morning. We got the verdict at about high noon in Bakersfield. And so, that’s the case. It’s near in time to today, and it came at a good time for me, and the result really will make a profound difference in our clients’ lives. So that’s the case that I would like to talk about.
Scott Glovsky:
Okay. You mentioned that the case came at a good time for you. What do you mean by that?
John Gomez:
The last couple years have been challenging for me. I went through a divorce. I just ended a relationship with someone I was dating after that. We, as a firm, had gone through this horrific losing streak of trials. I, personally, had lost, I think, four trials in a row. Which I’m not really accustomed to. That really hasn’t happened for me before. And I can look back and kind of understand why each of those trials were lost. I’m looking at them sort of objectively, but I was kind of in a place where I felt a little snake bitten. Like, that I had lost it, or that I just wasn’t gonna get another big win again. And it’s kind of how I define myself professionally. I feel like it’s the best thing I do. And then to get loss after loss after loss after loss, is tough.
And so, going into this one, I felt great about the case. I finally had a good case to try. I’ll still try really hard cases, and maybe that’s not good for me, but I’ll still do it. And then we get in the middle of the trial and we’re doing well and we start to believe that we can pull a rabbit out of a hat and sometimes, you just can’t.
Scott Glovsky:
So, how did you get up, you know, when you lose several trials in a row, which all real trial lawyers have done, because they try cases. But how do you deal with that?
John Gomez:
I think it’s tough. It’s easier for me now, because I have a much closer relationship with God, and that’s helpful to me. I just place faith in Him and kind of His design for my life. I also just have a core belief in values. In the sense that if I just keep trying cases and doing well and doing good for good people, then over time, things are gonna work out for me. And so, those two things kind of kept me going. In this circumstance, I’d just finished a trial that Wednesday before I started this trial, and we had lost, predictably. It was an impossible case, but I thought maybe we had a shot. So we try it, we lose, and then … we lose on a Wednesday and we start this other trial on a Monday. So that was good, just to jump back in the saddle. That was helpful to me.
Scott Glovsky:
So, tell us the story of the case that you just tried.
John Gomez:
So, I meet this guy, Matt Faulkner, in Cambria at a TLC Regional. And one day, he calls me up, and he says, “John, I know that you tried this Starbucks slip and fall case with this mild traumatic brain injury and got a great result.” I go, “Yeah.” He goes, “Well, you know, I got this case with this guy who slipped and fell in an El Pollo Loco.” And I go, “Okay.” You know, like, you’re a TLC guy, sure, you know, let’s do it.
And the case kinda sat around forever. But then, finally, it’s getting a little bit closer to trial, it’s like a couple months out. So I drive up to Bakersfield, I’d never been to Bakersfield. And I was like, “Okay, can you give me a flight to Bakersfield?” And they were like, “There’s no flights to Bakersfield. You’ve gotta drive.” And I’m looking at the drive, it’s like five hours. I go, “This is brutal.” You know, I heard about Bakersfield, too. I’m from San Diego, so I wasn’t looking forward to it.
But I drive up there and I meet this couple, Bill and Elaine Kidd, and they’re the most salt of the earth, solid people ever. And I just fall in love with them, instantly. And I get so excited about the case. I’m like, I think this is one where we could really make a difference. And so I go up there, I meet with them, I visit with them a while. We break them back down to San Diego. We have a courtroom here and we do some exercises with them. Kind of recreate some scenes, and I start understanding the case a little bit, and the impact on them.
And then, it’s Wednesday, we lose that case, and Thursday, I drive up there. And I check into this hotel, and Matt’s firm is right down the street, and we start working on this case. And it just … it starts happening. We get into jury selection, and the judge lets me do a mini opening statement. That’s a mistake for the defense. And I get a feeling with this jury, that they’re gonna be able to listen.
Scott Glovsky:
You mean your opening statement is what? 90 seconds?
John Gomez:
I think he gave us … I remember I timed it, and he wanted three minutes, so it was like three minutes. It was like 180 seconds.
Scott Glovsky:
Okay. Give us that mini opening.
John Gomez:
Man, how did it go … I think I said something like, “We represent Bill and Elaine Kidd, lifelong Bakersfield residents and husband and wife. One night, Bill and Elaine shared a bottle of red wine at home and decided they’d go down to El Pollo Loco to get something to eat. And you’ll hear that when Bill got up to go to the bathroom, he slipped and fell and hit his head. He went to the ER, but went home that day. But then, later on, he started having problems, and you’ll hear that those problems got worse and worse and worse to the point where he needed a surgery to drain excess blood from his head. So in this case we’re gonna be asking you for many millions of dollars to make up for the harm that he’s suffered as a human.
We also represent, separately, his wife, Elaine Kidd, and despite the fact that Mr. Kidd’s seeking millions of dollars, she’s also bringing a lawsuit. She’s bringing a lawsuit for harm to the marriage that she has with Bill and will be asking for many millions of dollars for her case, as well.
And so, how do you feel about a case like that? In a little while I’ll get to talk to you, and I’m hopeful that you can be real honest. Hold on to whatever feelings you have right now and share them with me honestly. A slip and fall, how do you feel about a slip and fall? How do you feel about a guy that drank wine, then bringing a lawsuit? How do you feel about a guy who looks perfectly well as he sits here today, yet I’m gonna be asking you for many millions of dollars? And so, does it sound suspicious? Does it sound like too much money? Does it make you feel uncomfortable or like I’m trying to do something I shouldn’t be doing? Whatever it is, just hold on to it, and share with me honestly when I get up to speak with you again in a little bit.”
Something like that.
Scott Glovsky:
So, tell us the story. How did you go about trying to discover the story of the case?
John Gomez:
We brought Bill and Elaine down, and their daughter, Sarah. And we just … First, I was having a hard time understanding how he fell, because there were conflicting accounts that didn’t make sense to me. I’ve done a lot of slip and falls, and there were some suggestions he had like, fallen forward, hit his head, and then fallen back. And so that did not compute, for me, with a slip and fall. And so, we just set up the scene. Like here in the courtroom. And he kind of walked through it, and he couldn’t go down like he did, but he recreated it as best he could. And that helped me understand kind of the dynamics of the fall, which was an important issue in the case. And then, we just started doing scenes of life before, and then life after. Kind of doing some little exercises about all the various ways his body and mind were being affected by the brain injury.
Scott Glovsky:
What kind of exercises?
John Gomez:
We’d kind of like … I don’t know. Psychodrama type stuff, where, I think, one point he’s … I don’t know. I do a weird thing with a mirror, and he’s kind of looking in the mirror. Like it’s him looking in the mirror before he gets hurt and then him looking in the mirror after he gets hurt, and what’s the mirror saying back to him, and stuff like that. And kind of different pressure points on his body, with all the kind of participants in the drama, kind of participating to replicate everything going on with his body and mind.
Scott Glovsky:
Say more about that.
John Gomez:
So say, you know, he’s got a headache. So he’s got a headache, and so one of the actors is the headache, and the headache feels like blah, or makes him feel like blah, and so they’re doing that. And then at the same time, he has a convergence problem with his eyes, so his eyes see all kind of weird. So someone’s doing that. And he can’t filter noise, so someone’s doing that. And then you can just see that whole confluence of things that he’s dealing with all the time. It just helps you, as you know, if you can see it, you can understand it better and you can present it better. And so, everybody’s got a little role. Someone’s the overwhelming noise. Someone’s the blurred vision. Someone’s the headache. Someone’s the can’t remember. Someone’s the biting your tongue. And just doing that kind of stuff.
And I think … I like to just spend a lot of time with them. Like I’m sure many of the people you talk to do. And so, just … With a brain injury client, it’s a little hard, because you don’t want to wear them down too much. They have limited reserve. And so, you can only do it in chunks, it’s like peeling an onion back.
So, we did that for a couple days. Then we did a couple focus groups where they would actually, you know, we’d do a little mock testimony. ‘Cause we put them up in the witness chair, and they get to get used to communicating with a jury.
Scott Glovsky:
Yeah, because we’re actually sitting in your courtroom, which is a full courtroom in your office with a gallery of, what, 30 chairs for the audience, and council tables, and a jury box, and the witness stand, and the judge’s chair … We are essentially in a courtroom.
John Gomez:
Yeah. And it’s good for witnesses like our clients, because we can do exercises with them where they’re connecting with the jury. We try to create the feeling in them that these jurors are their friends, and each little story that they provide to the jury is like a little gift to them. And so they may do like a human connection, like shake their hand. Go down the line and shake their hand and tell them a little story. To the point they get really comfortable with that concept. They’re not scared of the jury. They’re not trying to hide from the jury. They’re really connecting, they’re recognizing that the jury just wants these little gifts of knowledge so that the jury can help them. And so, we’ll do little exercises like that. When we bring in the actual jurors, like the mock jurors, they’re not gonna go shake their hand, but they’re in that zone.
So we use the courtroom for that. And the courtroom’s a good place to do the psychodrama, ’cause it’s big and open. But then, we can actually bring them in and put it into action in front of strangers. And that’s helpful.
Scott Glovsky:
So, you get to trial. You’ve done your mini opening statement. Take it from there.
John Gomez:
Yeah, so, the judge really doesn’t put any time limits on us for voir dire. And I think under the new law, you can’t, but some of them still do. But he just kind of lets us go. And I wanted to talk about safety rules and how some employers will look the other way with safety rules to save money. And I got a lot of traction with that up there. There’re a lot of kind of blue collar workers that have had that experience. So on liability, I really got a lot of good traction with that. On the money … I had a few that really tore into me pretty good. Which is always fine. I don’t care. Whatever.
Scott Glovsky:
You’re talking about in jury selection?
John Gomez:
Yeah. Some jurors.
Scott Glovsky:
Well, what did they say?
John Gomez:
There was this guy, because I was starting with the burden of proof and I’m saying, “Well, that might be kind of tough. It might seem unfair that we don’t have to prove that much, especially if we’re asking for millions of dollars.” And so this one guy is like, “Yeah, that doesn’t sound fair. That doesn’t sound right to me. If you’re asking for millions of dollars, how can you just prove it by 51%?” And he was just kind of digging into it pretty good. He got excused for cause.
But for the most part, like this veneer was way less hostile than I’ve seen. It was like, what I hear was, “The good old days.” Or what I hear sometimes in Los Angeles is like … It was a relatively friendly group.
So we talked to them about slip and falls. We talked to them about alcohol. We talked to them about brain injuries and lots of money for a guy that looks fine. We talked to them about a wife bringing a lawsuit for money. And a few women don’t like that.
But for the most part, you know, and the group that I’m left with to choose from is pretty good. Which hasn’t happened to me for a long time. And so I’m thinking, “I have a pretty good group here. I have a good plaintiff. The facts are pretty good. This could line up.” I was thinking that, right there.
And so we get into strikes and we pass four or five times in a row, and so the defense is in a big hole. And then we start … ‘Cause we wanted to get a few on that were a little bit deep, and we were able to do that. And so, the way that the 12 were configured, man, I’m like, “Man, I could work with these people.” And I have this one dude up in the corner, this welder, that I had a really good connection with. Who really talked a lot about employers looking the other way with safety and how important safety was for him, ’cause he also taught welding. And so that guy stayed on, and a number of other jurors that I thought were really good stayed on.
I talked to Danny Rodriguez, ’cause he’s from there. I went out to dinner with him. And I went to breakfast with him before trial. And we were talking about correctional officers. And you would think, “Oh, you don’t want correctional officers,” but he’s like, “These guys are okay. ‘Cause they’re always bringing claims.” So there’s this one C.O. in the front. I had a good conversation with him and I was like, “Okay, I can work with that guy, too.”
So, yeah, I liked the jury a lot. So that was a good start.
Scott Glovsky:
So, was there a time in the trial that was memorable, or meaningful?
John Gomez:
Yeah, you know, the most memorable part of the trial was the very last piece of evidence. Because our theory was, they would start using these hoses in the kitchen prior to closing, and that was against the rules. Because then, they would use them to clean the grills, and then they would get water and grease all over the floor. And that was immediately adjacent to a walkway for customers. There was this little door that went from the kitchen right to the walkway. And so, in our case, our theory was that the cook had been hosing down and then had walked out to clean a table, and that’s what my guy slipped on.
And so, all these managers were just denying it, that they ever broke that rule. And I set them up, and so, we kind of thought they were still doing it. And so, the first or second day of trial, we sent an investigator over to the store, before closing, with a video camera. And he videos them spraying the grills at like 8:30 and they don’t close ’til 10:00. And then he catches them the next day. And so every one of these managers, I’m like setting up the impeachment. I’d be like, “So, in fact, it’s happening to this very day. Cooks are spraying the grill. Right?” And they go, “Nah, never.” I go, “You deny that’s happening to this very day?” And they’d go, “Yes.” And so that happened like four times. But the judge was kind of giving us a hard time, and so I didn’t put that in, in my case in chief. You know, our sub rosa.
But then, in their case, they called this district manager, their corporate rep. And I kind of thought they would. That’s why I held back on it. And they call this guy, and he denies it. And so then, defense rests, and they go, “Do you have your rebuttal?” I go, “Yeah, I do.” I go, “We should probably discuss it.” So I go in the back, and the judge is like, “It’s coming in. It’s impeachment.” And I go, I was thinking to myself, “Whoa. When’s the last time a plaintiff ever got a good ruling?” Like, I had sub rosa shoved up my ass so many times. And we finally get to use it. So the defense lawyer’s going crazy. But there’s nothing she can do. So I had the investigator in the hall, I put that guy on, and the jury’s like, looking out like, no, they can’t believe, you know?
So that was pretty memorable. That’s how we ended the evidence. With them with their pants down. Like getting caught lying. So, that was nice.
Scott Glovsky:
That’s beautiful. So, why was this case meaningful to you?
John Gomez:
Meaningful … because I needed the win. I had not won for a while. I’d lost a number of trials in a row. And it went in so well that I thought that if it didn’t go our way, there was something wrong with me or the system. I was about ready to give up. Even though I’m pretty confident I’m pretty good. I just was at that point where I’d just been getting kicked in the head for so long.
So it was meaningful to me in that sense. It’s also meaningful in the sense that this family really needed this. They were on fumes. I had a similar case with a couple, had a brain injury, too. And it was the same thing, and I saw how the verdict just changed their lives. And so, for them, it’s a huge life changer. And they gave him … He had 177,000 dollars in medical expenses, and they gave him 13 million in noneconomic damages, and they gave the wife three million. And that’s gonna make such a difference for them. And I see, especially with people with these mild traumatic brain injuries, how a successful resolution or litigation can empower them. Because they think a community believes them. And it can just help them get their life back on track.
So it was really good for me, really good for them, and really good for my firm, too.
Scott Glovsky:
John, there’s a lot of lawyers out there that are struggling, and we don’t know each other very well, but I do know that you went to Yale Law School, and my sense is you had a less than privileged background before that. Could you share with us a little about your story, John Gomez’s story?
John Gomez:
Yeah, sure. So it’s true, I did go to Yale. How on earth I got there, I have no idea. I just feel like God has sort of blessed me, both with extreme hardship at times, and bountiful blessings at others. So I grew up here in San Diego. My dad was in the navy. My parents split up pretty early. I just had, what I would call, a series of kind of successively bad males in my life. My mom was kind of bouncing from guy to guy, bikers, you know, type people. And … just grew up dealing with abuse, and poverty, hunger, all those things. And … but, I played sports. That got better as time went on.
So I graduated high school, basically looking to play college football. That was pretty much the end of my aspirations. And I got hurt my senior year in high school, so I had to play at a junior college, and I got hurt there, and so, basically, I had to end up playing at USD.
Scott Glovsky:
University of San Diego.
John Gomez:
University of San Diego, which is a non-scholarship program. But at some point, I kind of got dialed in, academically. I just started caring about school. I mean, the reason is, actually, my dad told me that … he said something like, I was gonna end up in prison. And that made me mad. So I was like, “I’ll show you. And so, I’m not gonna end up in prison. I’m gonna do better than you.” And so, I did well in school. And then, got into Yale. And from there, kind of the rest is history.
When I came out, I worked for a big law firm, Latham & Watkins, in Los Angeles, ’cause I just thought, that’s what you do. That was a grind. But I was making a lot of money, relative to my upbringing. And from there … But I, at some point, said, “Okay, I wanna try cases.” So, I came back down here. I was a federal prosecutor for like, four years. And then, went to the plaintiff side.
Yeah, growing up was rough. It wasn’t super pleasant all the time. But I feel like that stage of life kind of gave me a lot of grit, a lot of determination. And so when things like this happen, when I go through a divorce, and lose a bunch of trials, and the firm’s on fumes, I know those times will pass. Because I weathered much worse storms as a kid. So, in a sense, I think it was a good lesson.
Scott Glovsky:
John, what advice do you have for young lawyers out there?
John Gomez:
I think probably the best advice that I could give, in terms of sort of your practices, I just think there’s no substitute for time in the courtroom, time in trial. All the greats have huge time in. Probably the person who I would consider to have had the most sort of acclaimed success, is probably Nick Rowley. People think that Nick is just this crazy savant, and he is, but he also tries cases like crazy. Brian Panish tries cases like crazy. These people grind. They grind the game. And they sometimes lose a bunch of cases, coming up. But they develop this game. It’s like being a fighter. You gotta have time in the ring.
And so, you can’t go to a seminar and pick up a trick, and think you’re gonna be able to pull that off in trial. You can’t go to the trial order’s cause and say, “Oh, I’m gonna do first person opening and think that’s gonna fly every time at every venue.” It’s really just time in. And so I would say, just try as many cases as you can. Because, like for me now, that case took me three days, really, to get ready for. And I crushed that defense lawyer. Just ’cause I’ve tried now, over 50 pretty long jury trials. So I would say that.
And I would say, there’s really … as a person, just really try to find something other than law that gives you fulfillment. Whether that be a family, or whether that be taking care of other people, or whether that be a higher power, religion. ‘Cause the law’s gonna let you down from time to time. And so, if you don’t have something to fall back on and to validate you, then probably, you’re not gonna be in a good place, mentally or physically. So, those are probably my two nuggets of advice.
Scott Glovsky:
Well, John, thank you so much, on behalf of your clients. I mean, you’ve got an incredibly powerful story. Your use of creativity and spontaneity is obvious. And you’ve given me, and all of our listeners, a great gift today with your words of wisdom. So thank you.
John Gomez:
Thanks so much for asking me to do it. I’m blessed. Thank you.
Scott Glovsky:
Thank you for joining us today for Trial Lawyer Talk. If you like the show, I’d really appreciate it if you could give us 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, dot 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.
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