Customer Reviews

Cape May Court House

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I started to write that this was a very good true crime book and then realized that it is up to the reader to decide if in fact a crime was even committed. This book tells the story of a young pregnant mother who is killed in a very minor auto accident. Her husband who is also in the car blames Ford Motor Co. and their air bag. Ford looks at the facts in a different light and accuses the husband of murder. This book is for the reader that enjoys the nuts and bolts of how lawyers work their trade. It also shows how a seemimgly obvious story can have quite a different side. I liked the fact the author sticks to the facts of the case and doesn't wander aimlessly into the distant past of the characters and the town, etc. as I find some authors do.

This book kept me up late at night because I couldn't put it down. At first, it seemed obvious that the husband committed murder. But deeper into the book, one begins to wonder what really happened. Highly qualified experts disagreed with each other, which was a major point brought out by the prosecution. If experts can't agree, they said, how does the prosecution go forward? What fascinated me most was the detailed look at both the legal system and the medical system. The author is extremely careful to list all of his sources, quoting newspaper articles when needed, to avoid a slander lawsuit. He also notes statements made by the people he interviewed, especially when they are contradicting statements by lawyers, media, the police, etc.

Cape May Courthouse: A Death in the Night. Cape. Until a minor traffic accident in a snowstorm one evening in Cape May Courthouse, New Jersey, not many people had ever heard of Tracy and Eric Thomas. Lawrence Schiller recounts this tragedy in light of legal twists that tossed Eric Thomas into a wrongful death action at the helm of media frenzy. While Cape May Courthouse does a good job detailing the nuts and bolts of the legal proceedings, it is, at times, dense with legal jargon. If you are though, as I am, a fan of All Things Legal, you may enjoy this true crime book.

The book gives an excellent insight into the machinations and interactions of lawyers and the legal system. But the lack of a resolution detracts from the reason one escapes into books for entertainment. After reading about the inconsistencies in other reviews and editorials about the book, since I wondered if any of it was based on some facts, (I drive an Explorer, previous year of the one in the book) that I feel my car is safe. I just felt such a let down at the end. It tends to keep you interested that something "juicy" will happen and then your back to the dry legal interactions. So I mainly found this an entertaining form of education.

This book contained an interesting look into our legal system, and all the wrangling that goes on between lawyers in a high-profile lawsuit. I found that the book was bogged down with details occaisionally, and thus dragged a bit. However, if you're intrigued by the legal system, you'll enjoy this book. If you're looking for closure, you won't find it here, as the book forces you to make the final decision for yourself.

Suppose someone sued a major corporation for product failure and the plaintiff ended up looking like the bad guy. That's the premise here. A grieving husband sues Ford claiming that his wife, Tracy, was killed when an airbag suffocated her in a low speed accident. Naturally Ford fights the suit all out - no company wants to be accused of causing the death of a pregnant woman.

Except the facts never quite add up. What 6 month pregnant woman drives her sick 2 year old to the hospital on a snowy night while her perfectly healthy husband sits in the passenger seat? What kind of idiot plaintiff lies under oath during depositions about the amount of insurance he received as a result of the accident? What kind of lowlife tells his in-laws they can't see their grandchild unless they agree to remove all the pictures of their dead daugher and agree not to mention her to her own child?

Eric Thomas, the idiot plaintiff and lowlife in question, makes you want to go out and kiss a class-action lawsuit lawyer. Why? Because in addition to the jerkiness noted above this cretin started a lawsuit claiming lose of companionship due to the death of his wife when he a) was having an affair during the last 6 months of his wife's life and b) remarried less than a year later. Because he took his wife's $400,000 life insurance policy and spent it on a pool, two new cars and other goodies without putting a dime away for his child. Because even if he didn't actually murder his wife he let her drive in a snow storm when she was six months pregnant while he sat in the passenger seat.

Ford uncovers enough evidence to at they very least question the circumstances of Tracy's death. What happens next is a battle of the experts and a little old-fashioned detective work. At first Ford looks like the corporate behemoth beating up on the little guy, but as the inconsistencies mount the Plaintiff begins to look more like a defendent.

As books on product liability lawsuits go, this one won't be giving A Civil Action a run for the top spot. I'll give Schiller credit for managing to eek some drama out of depositions. I've sat through depositions and believe me you're more likely to fall off your chair because you've fallen asleep than be on the edge of your seat with excitement. Usually books told from the lawyers' POV bore me to tears but this one held my interest. Still, it's hard not to get the impression that Schiller could have done more original reporting and a lot less ample quoting from the court record. This book may leave you frustrated with the incompetence of so many who should have properly investigated this accident from the beginning.

Finally, Schiller could do with turning down the volume on his own publicity machine. "One of our best investigative journalists"? And "an esteemed motion picture director"? What's next, his old SAT score?

Yes, Schiller has written an interesting insight into how lawyers work, and one must admire his diligence and attention to the details of the legal machine. However, other details are important, for instance, the practicalities of getting from Point A to Point B. In this book, Schiller has the victim's parents driving quite often from Cape Cod to Cape May. This is not a 2-hour jaunt in the country. Anyone who's ever tried to get on or off either Cape in tourist season can tell you that. He's also got said parents making the trip from Cape to Cape in 6 hours. Six hours!? I live 2 hours north of Cape May and it takes us EIGHT hours to get to Truro, on Cape Cod! Were these people flying? Petty detail? Perhaps. But when I find mistakes like this, I have to wonder what mistakes the author has made that I haven't caught, and that makes me doubt his or her attention to detail and common sense. And I still don't know if this is a novel created in Mr. Schiller's mind or his accounting of a true-life event (of which I've never heard, by the way).