“I thought that was insulting,” Todd Hollis says of a defense offer of $500,000. His client agreed, and Todd went “guns banging” to trial. The case involved a woman who was killed when the driver of a rental car, who had a suspended license, hit her head-on. In this breakdown with host Brendan Lupetin, Todd describes how the rental car company acknowledged that 15% of their 525,000 annual rentals potentially go to drivers without valid licenses. When the defense argued that the legislature doesn’t require electronic background scans, Todd argued that the legislature does say that a rental car company can’t rent to anyone who they know is incompetent to drive. Tune in to hear how the jury responded with “millions” in punitive damages.

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1. Todd Hollis describes “jumping” from criminal defense after a painful moment waiting for a client to pay him $200 that he would use to buy Christmas gifts for his son. After a humbling experience selling hotdogs for a year, and after his daughter was born, he switched to the plaintiff side.
2. In the Everson case, Todd sued a rental car company after it rented a car to a driver with a suspended license. That driver killed a woman after he crossed into the opposite lane and struck her vehicle head-on.
3. The rental car company charged drivers under 25 an additional $25 per day because they're "higher risk" but did nothing to ensure these drivers were actually licensed or safe to drive.
4. Todd’s theme in the case was community safety: How many rental cars on the road have been rented to a driver who is not legally safe or competent?
5. Todd and his client rejected a defense offer of $500,000 before trial. “I remember what you told me, and you said you form a reputation when you start to accept unreasonable numbers,” Todd says of host Brendan Lupetin. “I had made a conscious decision that I was not going to allow that to happen.”

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Welcome to Just Verdicts with your host, Brendan Lupetin, a podcast dedicated to the pursuit of Just Verdicts for Just Cases. Join us for in- depth interviews and discussions of cutting-edge trial strategies that will give you the keys to conquering the courtroom. Produced and powered by LawPods.

All right. Welcome back to Just Verdicts. Today, psyched to have attorney Todd Hollis from Todd J. Hollis Law on the show to talk about great verdict he got in the Everson case. And as I was telling you, Todd, I'm looking at a case kind of like this, so I'm kind of interested, a lot interested to hear about the facts of this and how you pulled this verdict off. But first off, thanks for joining me on the podcast today.

Hey man, thank you for having me. I watch your podcasts all the time and I've even looked at a lot of your stuff on YouTube to help me prepare for some of my cases. So thank you for having me.

My goofy YouTube channel where I had my buddy who would make all the crazy add-in videos and edits to my videos to try to jazz them up, but I should get back into that.

I'm a fan for sure.

Well, I appreciate that. And I say this frequently when it's friends of mine that get to come on the show and we get to talk about a great verdict that they got. I like talking with all my guests, but it's particularly fun with people who I got a past relationship with. And you in particular, I give you a ton of credit because over the last several years, we've periodically talked a lot. And I remember very distinctly probably, I don't know, four or five years ago, you were saying to me, "I am committed to trying cases. I really haven't tried a lot. And you just told me I'm committed, I'm going to do it. " And here you are. A lot of people kind of say that or they have that in their mind and they find ways to kind of, I don't want to not chicken out, but just find ways to settle their cases.

And it's hard, honestly, to get into trial and actually get to verdict win or lose. I've been noticing you've been doing that a lot lately and now you're really seeing some great results. So kudos to you, man.

Amen. Thank you very much. I do recall some of the conversations that I had with you. And one of the things you said to me is you have to commit. You have to commit to making sure that your case goes to trial. I mean, obviously you don't just want to waste time, but you want to do it on the cases that have value and merit. And I took that to heart. I've had a trial background, but as many people know, it's always been in criminal court. So being at a civil trial was very different, but in many ways it was the same. So I really enjoyed the opportunity of presenting in front of a jury, the preparation, the planning, the creativity that goes into it. It's something that I feel very comfortable at, and I like to do it a lot more. So thank you for that.

And thank you for all your help. I was lost at one point, and because of you, you gave me the confidence to actually jump, and that's what I did. So thank you.

Yeah, no, I love it because I'm sure you're now doing this a lot too. You talk to a lot of people and try to give advice. And at times I can't help myself. I kind of realize that, because I like trying cases a lot and it's just kind of one of those personal passions. And someone will bring it up and I want to try cases and I realize I'm projecting myself on them. And it's like not everybody is me. Everybody is their own unique person. And going down whatever path it is of trying cases is not necessarily what everybody's meant to do. But I get excited when somebody ... I could really tell when we would talk that you really were, to use the term I apparently said to you, committed. You were like, "Look, I did the criminal thing. I'm shifting to plaintiff's side." It's like it's the same, but it's different, I can imagine.

I've never tried, I've never done any criminal defense. And I think sometimes the plaintiff lawyers and the criminal defense lawyers kind of get lumped in together as similar, but I would imagine, you know better than I, that the dynamics of how you try a criminal case when you're defending somebody versus prosecuting a plaintiff's case is there's a lot of overlap just in how you try a case and how you prepare for it, but they got to be very different, I imagine.

The fact that you said that to me, it brings up an interesting situation that I had. It was actually a funny moment. I was trying a federal case not very long ago and I was talking to the judge and I mistakenly referred to myself as the defendant. And the room kind of chuckled. I mean, most of them knew that I had a long criminal trial history and we kind of laughed for a moment. And then I said to the judge, I said, "Man, I'm not used to being on his side." He says, "You're doing just fine, Mr. Hollis." We all laughed about it. But yeah, in response to your question, the dynamics are different. I mean, when you're trying a criminal case, you have a client whose life interests are at stake, right? You have someone who they may or may not understand the system.

I mean, typically they don't, so they're relying on you to help guide them through that. And at the same time, they're also adhering to the things that they brought up believing. A police officer, he can't arrest you unless you read you your rights, and then you have to explain to him that he can, you know what I mean? A police officer has to do this and he has to do that. And many times what you're telling them is something different than what they understand. And sometimes that creates conflict all by itself because they think, "Oh, well, maybe you're working with them. You're not really on my side." So a criminal defense lawyer at certain times may be adverse to almost everyone in the room, even their own client. Imagine doing that for 20 years, you know what I mean? So it's different. Whereas the civil side, you're arguing about money interest.

The defense is arguing that whatever happened to your client, either it wasn't their fault or to the extent that they're being asked to take financial responsibility, they're suggesting to you that it's not as much as what you want. And then you have the feeling of what happens when I present this information to a jury? Is a jury going to see it the way I see it? Are they going to see it the way the defense sees it? And you have your clients and your clients are depending upon you, depending upon the injury, you may be how this person exists for the remainder of their life. I mean, depending on what their injuries are, you make a mistake, you don't present something, a jury doesn't understand it, and maybe the damages are minimized. And now you have to tell your client that this is the best that you can do if we don't appeal.

So there's a lot of stress involved. There's a lot of money involved. It's different in many ways, but when you're standing in front of that jury and the butterflies that are in your stomach, that nervous feeling that you have, I mean, you could either internalize it or you can use it to help tell your client's story. That for me is the same. And I love it. I love that energy. When I first started, I think I wasn't comfortable with it and because I wasn't comfortable with it, I didn't really know how to use it, but now I've been practicing almost 32 years and I enjoy it. I mean, if I don't get it, I'm upset. I want it. I'm looking for it.

So you talked a minute ago about getting your clients' stories across and you have an interesting story from what I know. I mean, I know some of your background, but I don't know a lot. I know these bits and pieces and they're very impressive to me. Yeah. So I mean, so you've been practicing for 32 years. You've footstrapped your firm, you're doing really well now, but one of the many things as a guy, I got three kids and I'm fortunate, my wife holds down the four to the kids a lot. I mean, I'm there and I'm as present as I can be and everything, but you're a single dad, right?

Yeah. Yeah. I'm a single dad. Man, you know what? That's the best thing that ever happened to me. My daughter, in many ways, she saved my life. I think as a young man, we exist, but I don't know that we always have purpose. For me, my daughter is what gave me purpose. I mean, I believe this. I believe that God gave her to me for a reason. And I promised myself that I was going to be the best father that I possibly could be because God had given me this gift. So I cleaned my life up. The mistakes that I realized that I was making because I was making bad decisions, I did everything that I could do to learn from that. And I got deeper into my practice. I had to take a jump. The criminal defense bar for me wasn't the direction that I saw my practice going in the latter part of my career, but I had no experience in practicing civil law.

I in many ways had to rely on people like you and other lawyers that cared enough to give me tidbits of information that would allow me to move my case, my practice to the next level. I just kind of jumped. I mean, I just jumped. I didn't know if it was going to work out, but I just jumped. What

Did you see when you, single dad, trying to provide as good of a life as you can for your daughter? You're obviously a driven guy. You know you have the capacity to do more, expand and so forth. What was your exposure to plaintiff contingency work that even tipped you off to say, "Hey, maybe there's a whole different avenue of my law practice I can get into from criminal defense."

Man, you asked some great questions. So I recall a Christmas where I was trying to buy Christmas gifts from my son before he passed away. I didn't have much money, but I was doing the best that I could with what little I had. I didn't want to practice criminal law anymore. I was kind of disenchanted with the whole process of being in and out of the jails and begging clients for a couple of hundred dollars here and there. I had just had enough of it. So I was waiting in the parking lot at AutoZone for a client to come and bring me $200. He showed up, he brought the money, I bought my son a gift. And at that point, Brendan, I had just had enough. I stopped practicing law.

I stopped for a year. I bought a hotdog cart and I set up on Carson

Street and I sold hotdogs for a year. At this point, my daughter hadn't been born. So I think I was just in this place where I was depressed. I didn't see a future practicing law again. I was just looking for a way out and that was it. So I did that for a year and then my daughter was born and I realized that I could no longer sell hotdogs on the south side and support her. I had gotten a call from a former client and he had been pistol whipped by a city of Pittsburgh police officer. I didn't know anything about 1983 actions.

I didn't even know how to file a complaint, but this client wanted me to be a part of this case. So I just called friends. I called friends that I knew and I just said, "Can you help me? " And on that case, I remember it like it was yesterday, I made $16,000, which was more money than I had ever made in my life as a criminal defense attorney. And I said, "God, I don't know if this is going to work." I said, "But I have to make it work because I don't have any other option." And I think when you look at life that way, you know how people say, "I'll try. I'll see what happens." For me, it was either you do it or you don't. So I literally would just, I'd call everybody. I probably called you. I'd call everybody. "Can you give me a complaint?

Can you explain to me what this means? "Getting on the internet, trying to understand how to do certain things, doing everything that I possibly could do, not to even let my counterpart know that I had no idea what I was doing, but I didn't. I had no idea what I was doing, but I was able to make enough money or I was able to provide a better situation for my daughter. And I said to myself," I need to make this work. "So I just kept reading, I kept investing in myself, I kept learning, I kept trying. And the grace of God, I think thus far it's worked out.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm not a particularly religious person, but I mean, that kind of sounds like, and this will come off corny, but divine intervention. I mean, given at that sort of crossroads and the fact that you had kind of given up on law and then this person calls you out of the blue and that becomes your foray into the work you're now so well known that you do. And also, I'm sorry to hear about your son. I didn't know that about your background.

Yeah. I don't tell many people. I haven't talked about it for years, but that was a big turning point in my life. I walked out of the criminal courthouse and I said," I'm never coming back. "And I mean that. It's been 15 years. I said," I'm never coming back. "I'd retire before I took another criminal case, unless it was something I believed in, but short of that, it's just not for me anymore.

So your initial foray in the plaintiff's side is civil rights. And as I know you, that's a lot of what your expertise is, but I also know that you handle more and more frequently, you're handling all sorts of significant personal injury cases and you clearly have a, I don't know what I would call it, a following or something, but you have a network of people that know, like, and trust you with their problems, like that first gentleman did. And I watched you as you've kind of grown and grown and moved into these different areas of the personal injury realm. And it's impressive, especially when you've got the humility to say that you didn't know what the hell you were doing at the beginning because so many people, especially lawyers, seem to want to front and not admit like, " Hey, I'm kind of lost here.

"It's like you always have to fake what you're doing and you've got all the answers. In reality, most people don't.

I had no clue what I was doing. Man, this brings back a lot of emotions, but I was just doing my very best to honor my relationship with my kid. I didn't want to be the kind of person that she didn't look up to that gave up. I didn't want to be that person. And I'm humble enough to say," I need help. "And many times I had to have those conversations with my clients. I had to say," Listen, I don't know everything and I can't promise you what's going to happen if you allow me to take on this case. "I said," But one, I'm honored that you're even allowing me to be a part of this journey, this very important matter in your life. I'm honored that you're allowing me to be a part of that. One, two, I promise you I'll do everything that I can do to make sure that I tell your story and I honor you.

"And I think if you talk to average ordinary person, that's really what they're most concerned about. You know what I mean? They want to know, are you going to take me seriously? Are you going to be available for me when I call or are you going to feed me a bunch of bullshit that I hear when I'm watching these TV commercials and lawyers are being verbose and they're not really saying anything. So I've been fortunate, you know what I mean? I've been very fortunate and Pittsburgh is my home. I've been practicing here my entire life. I left the public defender's office very early in my career through the grace of God I've been able to feed my family and I'm still learning. So I'm grateful for all of that.

Before we get into the Everson case, in addition wisely, because again, that's another thing that I think a lot of younger lawyers or people that are new to a particular industry, they're like afraid to ask people for help, peers or other people that may be doing it longer. And it's such low hanging fruit. And yeah, sure, you'll meet some assholes who blow you off or don't care or they see you as a competitor, but a lot of people you'll meet are really good people in this industry that'll bend over backwards to help you. But in addition to goodwill of fellow trial lawyers that were happy to help in any way they could, as you look back 15 years on the plaintiff's side, any books in general that have had the biggest influence on sort of how you see or practice trying cases and working cases up or just other influences like that, like how you view and what you think is important in trying a case.

Right. I don't know that there's any particular method. I mean, I know that there is a method, but I believe the most important part, at least as I'm telling your story, is feelings. I can see a story a whole lot better than you just reading me the facts, right? So passion comes from stories. So when you're listening to your client tell his or her story, I don't necessarily just want to have to ... On January 26th, 2004, my client pulled out of Washington Boulevard and was hit in the back as a result of the defendant's negligence, we think you should award compensatory and punitive damages because she was on her cell phone when she did it. So that's just telling the story, you know what I mean? But being a part of this story is something very different. I pulled out the parking lot, I was on my way to see my daughter and I looked both ways and about to go into the lane.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, this woman who I can see in the rear view mirror, she's looking down at her dad on cell phone and before I can make some kind of move to get out the way, the last thing I think about is, "Oh my God, am I going to die?" And then she hits my car and she hits my car so hard that my head bumps off the front dashboard and now I'm losing consciousness. And the next thing I realize is that the police are breaking in my window and they're telling me everything's going to be okay, but I can't feel my legs and I know it's not. And in that moment, I'm thinking my life is over. So that's an exaggeration of a common set of facts, but the point I'm trying to make to you is, as I'm telling that story, I think most people can relate to it a whole lot better than an explanation of the facts.

So what I focus on is peeling back the onion so that I could get at the core of this person's feelings, and then I want to present it to a jury so that I find a commonality. In Pennsylvania, we don't really have a voir dire process like you do in other states. So you don't always get the opportunity to exclude people based upon their income, their political affiliation, their sexual orientation, their color, their dynamic, their this, their that, whatever. I mean, the process isn't really about exclusion, it's about inclusion. It's about being able to identify that one fact or the similar facts that transcend everyone so that anyone, regardless of where they come from, they can relate to that moment. I think that's the process that I use when I'm trying to tell a story, when I'm cross-examining you. And then I'm looking for what they call danger points.

I'm looking for problems in my case. I'm speaking to the jury. As a potential juror, would you have a problem being able to award damages if you can't see my client's injury in a picture? Would that bother you? And if it does bother you, tell me why. So again, it's not like me trying to convince you to see it my way, it's me trying to understand you and trying to honor you for sharing your story with me. You're using this process of inclusiveness as opposed to me saying, "Well, if I were to call you and you sit on this jury, do you think you can be fair and impartial? Listen to the facts and be honest." Of course I can. You know what I mean? Who's going to say, "Well, I don't think so. I really think your client's faking it. This is a waste of time me being here." Nobody's going to say that to you.

So you want to use whatever opportunity that you have to communicate to a juror, a potential juror, and even the ones that are listening, you want to use that opportunity to build a relationship with that person in hopes that that relationship will carry you forward to when they're deliberating and they're trying to decide, one, will they see it in your favor and two, how much will they give you? So I try to do that as early as possible.

I love it. I love it. I think you dropped so much good stuff right there that I'm kind of making mental notes of because I definitely read so much and read all these different things and get caught up on different stuff and methods as you mentioned and so forth. And at the end of the day, a lot of it has to do with, like you said, getting to the freedom calls at the moral core. Joe Freed talks about that light switch issue, that idea you mentioned, what is the issue in the case that kind of wherever you're coming from, whatever your perspective is, everybody's going to understand this issue and it's going to resonate with pretty much everyone I think is something that I've been really trying to focus on lately, especially with the jury selection in Allegheny County, which doesn't allow you to, in my estimation, get to know a ton about people.

And so your case better have a pretty unifying issue that you're framing it around in the central core concept of what matters to people or you're probably going to be in trouble. So can you explain how you found the story and got to what the core issues are in this case that you tried ... And was that this year that you tried that case?

Yeah. Yeah. So I tried two cases this year and Everson was the first case. Yes. So contextually, Everson was about a woman who worked for the federal court system and she was on her way to work and she had gotten hit by a driver who was coming in the opposite direction, who I believe had fallen asleep, entered into her lane, hit her head on, and she passed away either in that moment or shortly thereafter. I can't say for sure. However, the person that was driving the oncoming car did not have a valid driver's license, and he was given that car by one of the reputable rental car companies in the city. He apparently had gone to the rental car company and the rental car company did not do a license check. They did not verify his driver's license to determine if he was a competent driver.

Now, the rental car company acknowledged the fact that they did not do a driver's license verification. Well, there's a statute here in Pennsylvania that says that you cannot knowingly or intelligently lease or give a vehicle to anyone who you know or should know is incompetent to drive. And based upon this person's age, based upon the fact that this person did not have a driver's license, it's our position that the rental car company should have known and should have done more to ensure that this person was competent. Now, the question that you asked me is, what was the thing that we believe bound everyone together that created this tribe? And that thing is, how many cars are on the road from a potential rental car company that could be operated by somebody who is legally determined not to be a safe or competent driver? You can't break the golden rule and say, how would you feel if you were coming down the road and in the opposite direction, there's somebody that's coming, that's gotten a car that doesn't have a driver's license and could potentially kill you.

Although we didn't say that, that was the common theme. It may not just be you. It could be your aunt, it could be your sister, it could be your daughter, it could be your son, and they could be going anywhere. And I think during the course of the trial, the rental car company didn't do themselves any favors because they said that they believe that 15% of the total cars that are leased in a year are potentially leased by people who do not have valid value. They brought that

Up. That's not good. They

Did. So 15% of potentially 525,000 rentals in a year by this company, how many cars is out on the road throughout this country? What are you doing to ensure that these people that you're giving these cars to are safe to drive?

Yeah. There's a reason you're supposed to have a driver's license, right?

Right. And then they're charging ... So let's say that I'm under the age of 25, right? I want to rent a car. If I go to this rental car company and I ask to rent this car, they're charging me an additional $25 a day on top of the regular rental fee because I'm under the age of 25. And the reason why they're doing that is because they realized that my age group, I represent a higher risk category. So we changed, we refined our trial strategy and we said, "What are you doing with that money?" The 525,000 multiplied out by 15% and now add $25 to that. That's millions and millions of dollars that you're receiving from this age group category that you've already identified as being in a higher risk category. What are you doing to ensure that this category that you're giving these cars to, that they're safe to drive?

The company had no response.

So a couple different things. First off, was the defendant driver in your case under ... Were they under 25?

At the time of the rental, yes.

Yeah. And did you find out why they didn't have a license or an active license?

They had a prior DUI.

And had their license been revoked?

Yes, suspended.

Wow.

I mean, that had to be Mark Mandell, kind of the I can't get over issue in the case. I mean, to me, as I'm sitting here, it's like, well, if they're not allowed to legally drive themselves, how are you okay, car rental company, giving this person a vehicle without knowing if they're licensed and permitted by law to drive? That's crazy to me.

Because you put profits over people. I mean, let's face it, young people, they like to rent cars. Young people like to rent cars. So if that is a large income base for your company, it's hard to say no to that, I guess, from their standpoint. So our position was, well, we're in 2025. What attempts has the company made to do license verification checks? The rental car company says, "Well, we're not obligated to do that. The legislature didn't say that we had to do that. " Well, the legislature may not have specifically said that you have to do a licensed background check, but the legislature did say that you cannot give a vehicle to a person that you know is incompetent to drive. You can't give a car to that person. And what steps have you taken to make sure that, again, the people of Pittsburgh, wink, wink, the people in our community, wink, wink, are safe.

So obviously the jury, they're members of our community. They're members who drive up and down the streets of the city of Pittsburgh in outlying areas and they have family members. So that was the way that we were kind of able to get into how this rental car company's actions were not just making our client unsafe and ultimately led to her death, but it was also a regular practice that they were doing where they were placing profits over safety. And the biggest part of our damages came from punitive damages, It wasn't necessarily compensatory. I think we got 300 plus thousand dollars in compensatory damages and was it 500,000? I think it was 500,000. And we got millions in punitive damages. And I don't want to give you the numbers. I don't necessarily remember the exact number, but we got millions of dollars in punitive damages because I realized that was the connection that we needed to make.

And our situation, we had to tell the jury, this is not about enriching our client, but it's more about punishing the defendant for what they didn't do when they knew they should have done more.

I got a whole bunch of questions for you about this. So some sort of fact specific ones and then some more strategy and case specific questions. So defendant driver causes this crash. You say they think probably they fell asleep in order for them to cross over the midline, hit your client head on, right?

Yes.

Can you tell me a little bit about your client as much as you're comfortable telling us like age, lot in life, that kind of thing?

Yeah. So our client was older. I mean, she was in her early 60s. If I remember correctly, she worked as a housekeeper for a company that cleaned the federal courthouse. She was the matriarch of her family. She was like a homemaker. Very handy. She loved to embroider. She loved to sew. You might drive by her house and see her putting up a fence or putting concrete down. I mean, she was hands-on. She was that grandmother that you can envision when you come over for Thanksgiving. She was that person. Everybody loved her. She's just a beautiful soul. I think because she didn't have a lot of hard numbers when she was a little older in life, I think the compensatory damages were conservative. And I think we could have probably done a better job with laying that out. But I think that where we kind of hit home was the punitive side.

So you learn a lot in every trial. Cumulatively got what, four million bucks. I think maybe this case is being appealed to ... I think we do a better job with explaining to the jury just how valuable her life was. We do a better job of explaining to the jury why this company should be punished for what they did.

But I can see trying to put myself in your shoes in that case. It's like, because going back to you're telling me these facts and I'm like, dude, this is crazy. So to me, I'm just focused on that company. This is reckless. You got to pay. And I think my sights are set on the punitive aspect of it. Somebody needs to punish them and make an example that this is not okay in our community. Which again, trying cases is tough because you don't even realize that you're getting so focused on one thing. And then maybe in hindsight, you're like, "Well, I did that and we did a really good job of that case in point the verdict." But man, in hindsight, maybe we could have worked up the story of her life more on that front. And again, that's like part of trial. It's hard to keep all the plates spinning at the same time.

Yeah. I remember something that you said to me a couple of years ago, you said it's life-changing money. I mean, we obviously put this family in a position where they are going to receive life-changing money. It may not have been the amount that I saw in my mind, but maybe it puts this family in a position where they no longer have to work. They can now forecast an education for their grandchildren. They can pay off the house. They can create generational wealth. So to that end, maybe it didn't go exactly the way I wanted it to go, but even though we fell short of that mark, I still think we did a good job.

Dude, and I'm not even remotely suggesting you fell short. I'm just imagining, you know what I mean? Every time I try a case, win or lose, there's always aspects of it where I'm like, "This went well. I got lucky there. This was a nice break that we caught. This went bad. I should have done this differently. Boy, I completely overlooked." You know what I mean?

Right. You always second guess yourself.

Yeah. I mean, I don't know if it's even second guess so much. I mean, it's just you're kind of always looking. I mean, if you're trying to improve, then you're looking at, well, what could I have done better also? It's an amazing verdict, end of story. I just think it's interesting on that one where you have those two competing things. You had the death of this woman in this story, but from my perspective, I'm seeing red of this company and I'm in there and all my focus is going to be on lighting them up on the punitives. And I have a question, I have lots of them, but what was the defense? I mean, we do this with 15% of people, so it's just the way we do business and no harm, no foul.

The defense seemed to be that the legislature did not require this company to do electronic background scans. That seemed to be their defense. Didn't make sense to me, but that was what they presented.

Yeah. It seems sometimes like, I think there are situations, like when I do focus groups and stuff like that, I do find that there's a group of people that, well, what was the standard and did they violate it? But I think that sometimes when the overall balance of ease with which you could mitigate the risk versus the potential consequences if you don't, a defense like that is just never going to work because you're talking about giving people basically a weapon to go get out on the road with and they could maim and kill anybody. So then you've got reptile, reptilian brain, edge type theory in there with spreading the tentacles. I mean, a jury's easily going to just imagine themselves or their loved ones and they're going to want to send a message to the rental car companies. "This isn't okay. I don't care if the legislature says that you could do this or not do this.

You know better as a company.

"And that's essentially what the jury said. When we talked to the jury after the case was over, that's essentially what they said. I think they probably would've given us more if our compensatory damages had been higher. One of the jurors, believe it or not, he said we were concerned about how much to give and punitive damages because we knew that the punitive damages couldn't be more than 10 times the compensity.

How the hell do they know that unless they did some research?

I was blown away. I was blown away. I was

Like- Because dude, their number was like 10. It was

10. So yeah, it was 10. That's wild. They were very smart. They put a lot of thought into the number. They didn't put a whole lot of thought into determining whether the company was responsible. That was very quick and immediate. They put more thought into determining how much they were going to give us because they wanted to make sure that it was in the bounds of the law. How this young man knew that, I'll never know, but he knew that.

And as you bring that up, I imagine another sort of, whether it was a direct or implied defense was also dump on the driver. Ultimately, the person that's responsible here is the person who's behind the wheel that caused the crash, right?

Yeah. So they found the driver to be 70% responsible. They found the rental car company to be 30% responsible.

So the rental car company was found 30% or 35% responsible?

70 / 30.

Okay. And then because of Spencer, I'm assuming you can probably recover all from them, right?

Absolutely.

Because your client obviously was not found in any way responsible.

Oh, and that was another thing. So we learned that they were potentially going to call an expert who was going to say that our client was driving one mile over the speed limit. And because she was driving one mile over the speed limit, they were going to somehow try to say that she was responsible and she should also be held contributorily negligent. And we were going to lean into that. We were hoping that they presented that, but I think somewhere along the line they realized just how absurd saying that would be, potential inflammatory response that they might get from the jury. So they didn't. Did

You try the case with anyone?

I did. I tried the case with David Therusalum and Keith West. Both of them were Philadelphia attorneys.

And how was it trying a case? I imagine, had you ever tried a case with other them before?

First

Time.

I'll try cases with different people from my office. I don't think I've tried a case with a completely different lawyer outside of my firm. I mean, clearly you guys must have worked well together.

Yeah. Everybody works differently, right?

Yeah, right.

Everyone works differently. I mean, the way that I prepare is a little bit different from the way they prepared, but we were all very experienced lawyers. And to that end, there may have been some times when we were just all a little stressed and maybe somebody was a little snappy. But at the end of the day, I mean, these guys were just very good at what they did. They were just awesome. And we all kind of picked something that we believed that we could do. Now, again, I didn't have a whole lot of civil trial experience. So at least for that trial, I relied a great deal on them to kind of help walk me through procedurally how civil trials are run as opposed to how criminal trials are. And we got along great.

Yeah. I mean, to be fair, Greg's my main man I try my cases with. And if we don't have at least a couple annoyed exchanges with each other, me in particular, I'm the difficult one. Greg is a prince to work with.

You're the problem, not him, right?

I am. No, no, no, no. Totally. And we know it all at times, even though I don't know it all. But that I think just kind of goes with the process. And then I think that's good for memories. And if you guys can work through it, then I think it just kind of adds to the passion of the case because it's like despite whatever else is going on, you're working through it and getting that message across to that jury. How did you guys approach the opening? And also I'm curious, were punitives in from the jump and it was always going to be punitives. So there was no bifurcation on punitives or

Anything? No.

Okay. So you must have explained that to the jury that there's basically kind of a couple different things they have to consider. I mean, there's wrongful death and survival components to the extent there even was survival, but then there's also this punitive aspect for them to consider, right?

We focused on damages. We focused on stories. We told the jury who Mrs. Everson was. We explained how the accident happened. We talked about how she must have suffered. We talked about what role that each defendant played that led to her death. Obviously, the focus was not as much on the driver as it was on the rental car company. We were very deliberate in our presentation of that story so that we could show the jury, not necessarily tell the jury, but show the jury how she died, how long it took before she died, and what she meant to the family. And the family was there throughout the entire trial.

So you used that for calling up exhibits throughout the course of your trial?

I used TrialPad for everything. So we had a screen that was probably 20 feet. It looked like a movie screen,

Right? Oh, I know them well. Did you guys get it yourself or did you have a company bring it in?

At that time, it was the first opportunity that I had ever seen a screen like that. I since bought one.

I bought one.

Yeah. Oh,

Damn.

You bought the big one with the big metal. Dude, you're crazy. I love it. I have it with you right now,

Right? So-

Dude, I'll tell you ... Wait, let me tell you one quick story. So I remember when I was trying cases and just getting my ass handed to me for years, but I was just loving it. I'm like, "I'm going to figure this out, blah, blah, blah." And I would go watch everybody else's trials across the street. And I remember I walked into somebody's trial and they had the big screen up and I was just like, "Damn, look at that. That's amazing." And I was like, "One day I'm going to have a big screen in one of my trials." And I remember the first time I tried a case and had enough money to invest in it that we had the big screen. And I remember walking in, there was nobody else even in the courtroom. And I just kind of stood there and I was like, "Man, I've arrived.

They got the big screen now." But I'm sorry, I interrupted you.

No, no, no. So I tried this case with Erin Weiss and Jeff Ramalli, amazing lawyers. I mean, guess if I ever got in trouble, I want them as my lawyers, but we tried this case with them and they had actually rented the screen.

Yeah. So I come into the courtroom and I see the screen, it looks like something that you would see at a football stadium or it's huge. So I used the screen. I mean, when I first started my opening, I think I said to the jury something to the effect of, "Before I can ... " No, I said, "As I stand here before you, I can't ignore the fact that I'm nervous. I can't ignore the fact that there's butterflies in my stomach." I said, "And my knees might be shaking a little bit, and I'm not nervous because of my inability to tell this story." I said, "I'm nervous because I want to make sure that I honor my client and her story and that I respect the trust that her family has given to me. " And I point to her family. I said, "But before I can tell her story, I think you need to know who my client is.

" And then I take my trial pad and I hit one button and then her face appears on this screen and she's like 30 feet high and 20 feet tall. And you know what I mean? I believe that at that point, you're putting a face to the name. And when they see pictures, they start to form connections or disconnections, I guess, depending upon the person. But that process at that point, that's where it starts. So that was my role. That's what I wanted. I wanted to kind of bring the jury to our side in that moment and I wanted the jury to meet my client as I'm talking about who she is. I didn't get into a whole lot of what the cause of action says and defining compensatory damages and punitive damages because I knew that we would address that during the closing, but at least for the opening, I wanted to build credibility.

I wanted to build a relationship and I wanted to do it as early as I possibly could, and I used those methods to do it. And I believe that to some degree it was successful because we could see the jurors kind of like ... You can recognize facial expressions and you see that in that moment, in that moment, they realized that this case was more than just about us explaining a police report. They had an actual person's life in their hands. That's how we presented our opening.

Love it. Briefly, how did you approach your order of witnesses?

I didn't really as much because the senior trial counsel, who was David Therusalem, he pretty much decided how we were going to go about that process. The one thing that I sort of made sure that we did is I wanted to make sure that our client was sort of like the last thing that the jury heard. So we wanted to make sure that our client connected all of the dots and he told the jury who his wife was and what his wife meant, not just to him, but to his daughter, to his son, to his grandchildren. And we think he did an amazing job in that process. I

Heard you earlier talking about how she must have suffered Mrs. Everson that is. Did you have an expert on survival, on conscious pain and suffering or fear? I'm always interested in that testimony. So how did that play out and what was the general opinion they offered?

So what he said was physiologically, there's a certain amount of air that the heart retains and that even though certain parts of her body may have been mortally wounded, that the heart contained so much liters of blood as it was continuing to pump, it was also

Pumping that blood to her brain. Now it's powerful. That was powerful. And what that told the jury is, is that she was a witness to her own death.

And I'm getting emotional as I think about it, but the car that she was lying outside of on Frankstown Avenue in the cold morning was going to be the final place of her death. She was no longer going to see her husband. She was no longer going to have a relationship with her grandchildren. Her life was ending in that moment and she was a witness to it. And I think we saw tears that were coming out of some of the jurors' eyes. So we honored that. What I mean when I say honor, we didn't flood them with information to kind of like get through a difficult moment. We took the time to give the jury an understanding, I mean, an opportunity to appreciate that moment. I can't imagine as I'm driving down Frankstown Avenue or any street as I'm on my way to work after I've just kissed my daughter goodbye and I said, "Baby, I'll see you later after school." And somebody's going to come around the corner driving 65 plus miles an hour in a 35 mile an hour zone, hit me head on so hard that I'm ejected from the car and now I've got 20 seconds where I'm able to appreciate the fact that I'm dying and I don't have my family there, you know what I mean?

I don't have an opportunity to change anything. I'm dying in that moment and I'm going to die alone. Imagine the gravity of that feeling, not when it applies to somebody that you can see on a screen, but apply it to

Your relationship with your family. I think we did a pretty good job with that.

A couple more questions. From a punitive standpoint, did you either have an economist talk about value of them or their profits and what did that boil down to? What were the financial numbers that the jury could consider as far as how to balance punishment versus not being violative of their due process and so forth?

So we definitely had an economist and our economist was a little higher than their economist. I think the jury, they found the median between both experts that were presented. I feel like we didn't do a great job explaining compensatory damages. I don't think we did a great job in that role because the jury really didn't consider pain and suffering. I mean, they listened to what the economist said to them and the number that the economist assigned, which I believe was somewhere around $380,000, something to that effect.

And what was that number representing from the economist? Like her earnings or what?

Compensatory damages.

But compensatory for ...

Lost wages.

Ah, okay.

Yeah.

And so that was kind of what they got anchored to, interestingly.

Yeah, that's exactly what they got anchored to.

Okay.

And I think we should have presented it. And I don't want to tell too much. I don't want my opponents when they filed this appeal to know where I'm going with it, but I think I had an opportunity to try this again. I would have put more into how much life means, how much health means. The fact that the expert's estimate as to her lost wages is not the total essence of what compensatory damages include, but I don't think the jury understood that. And I think largely they didn't understand it because we didn't explain it the way we should have explained it. So again, that's one of those kind of things when you look back and you say, "I could have did a better job doing this. "

We're always learning, man.

Yeah. Well, I think we did a great job is explaining why they should be punished. So what they did is they took the number that they were given from the compensatory side and basically just multiplied it by 10.

Did they have a number of the net worth or the net profits for the year in question or was that not given to them?

We weren't allowed to introduce that. Really?

So there was no real net worth discussion that came into the case. So then someone back there knows 10X is the magic number for punitives.

Yeah.

They 10X it. Was it a relatively quick deliberation then?

So they broke basically towards the end of the day. I think the judge kind of allowed them to deliberate to the end of the day, and then we came back the next day. I believe they had a verdict by lunch. That's my recollection.

Yeah. No, that's long enough. And I saw on social somewhere that there had been a 500K offer and you guys pushed forward to trial.

I thought that was insulting, right? I mean, from my standpoint, you're saying that a black woman's life is worth $500,000. She played zero role in how the events that led up to her death. And you're saying $500,000 is the number. Brendan, I've gotten to a point in my career where I believe that accountability is worth way more than money. Accountability is worth way more than money. I spent enough time with my client that he saw it the same way. His family saw it the same way. And there was some freedom in that because we didn't hesitate when we said, "No, thank you. " And when the jury came back with the verdict, I mean, it was gratifying, right? It was gratifying. But to offer $500,000 that basically says, "We don't believe you're going to try this case. We don't believe this woman's life is worth more than that, and take it or leave it.

" So we said, "We're going to leave it. " And that's where we left it. Good

For you, man. Right. I mean, I feel like those were the conversations we were having a few years ago. I recall that.

Yeah. I recall you telling

Me that. But I mean, look, dude, it's easy to tell someone stuff, whatever you do. I mean, at the end of the day, it's you. I mean, it's you and your trial team making that decision and having that because that is not a pleasant conversation to have. I mean, even though your clients are on board with accountability, you still have to bring it home. I mean, there's still always that sort of, at least for me, that sort of unsettled feeling of, what if we lose or what if we get less or what if we get the same? And I think that if you truly believe it, you feel it in your heart that the case is just worth more and the accountability is worth more than what they're offering, then I think that's amazing trial lawyering to be brave enough to go do that. And then the fact that you guys did it and you hit for so much more in a weird way that's almost to me secondary than making this decision from an accountability, from a principal perspective that this is just not a fair and reasonable number for this case and we're willing to accept the consequences of what happens to try to hold them accountable.

And you did. It's amazing.

Yeah. I think they made it easy for us. They made it easy for us to say no. I mean, I don't know. If they had offered $3 million before we went to trial, would we have said the same thing? Would my client have said the same thing? I don't know. I don't

Know, Todd. Maybe it was easier for you guys, and I think that probably speaks to your growing confidence to go try these cases. There's probably not insignificant number of lawyers out there that would have had a serious talk and all of a sudden their client's like, "Okay, yeah, we'll take the 500," and the case never sees the light of day at trial.

I just think that sends the wrong message. Yeah, it sends the wrong message to the client. It sends the wrong message to the lawyer that should have probably tried the case. I mean, just sends the wrong message. And I remember what you told me and you said you form a reputation when you start to accept unreasonable numbers. I had made a conscious decision that I was not going to allow that to happen. And furthermore, I wasn't going to deminimize my client's honor. I just wasn't. I refused. They made it easy for me to go in there guns banging and to present my client. I'll never forget that trial because it was the first civil trial that I ever won. I lost one in Beaver when I first got into this business and it was heartbreaking. So to win one, it feels pretty good.

Yeah, you'll never forget that. Well, well earned, well deserved, man. And I think that's a good place to leave things. So Todd, thanks for sharing your story, sharing the case story, your approach to this trial. I got a ton out of it and just awesome to see and be having this conversation about this topic, given where things were years ago. So just can't give you enough credit. And I mean, we already have another case to do a podcast about. So you're on a roll and I'm sure we'll be having you back as a guest soon, man.

Hey man, I'm so honored that you allowed me to be a part of this show and it meant a lot to me. I've been thinking about it ever since you asked me to be on here and I think the world of you and every opportunity that I get to get some nuggets of information from you. I'm like a sponge. I'm definitely an open sponge. So thank you again and I appreciate your time.

Honors all mine, man. That's Todd Hollis from Todd J. Hollis Law. Thanks, man.

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