Alligator Park (38 page)

“Yes, I do.”

“You should, because it’s all
over the Internet. But even more disturbing is your speech at a rally in Miami
against GWI. You accused them of coercing South American farmers to use more
pesticides on their crops.”

“I strongly believe farmers
should be the ones to decide what pesticides to use and how much.”

“And we agree on that point.
But let the court note that GWI never coerces farmers. They make a product
available at the lowest possible price and it’s up to farmers to buy it.”

“Objection, Your Honor. Not
relevant,” Berkeley says.

“Sustained.”

Fullbright approaches the
jury, leans on the railing.

“My point is simply this: Dr.
Kelly is predisposed to discredit GWI, so I believe that makes him unqualified
to make an impartial judgement. Don’t you agree?”

“Objection, Your Honor.”
Berkeley says.

“Sustained.”

“No further questions,”
Fullbright says.

Brad gets up and returns to
the sequestered room.

It’s late afternoon so the
judge calls a recess until the following morning. Berkeley takes our group to
an exquisite Spanish restaurant with a harbor view. The eight of us sit around
a large table, tell tall tales, laugh, and enjoy a feast. After dinner, we had
intended to walk the inner harbor, browsing through boutiques and gift shops,
but the wine has made us all mellow and tired, so we just head back to the
hotel and call it a day.

Berkeley asks me to join him
in a vacant conference room near the lobby to go over strategy. We compare
notes, and then I go over the science to make sure he is well prepared to
present the issues. Up to now, it’s been a simple task of setting up the jury
to understand the problem. The next phase will be to convince them all this
happened because of a defective product. It won’t be easy to relate to them all
the subtleties of microbiology, but we have to give it our all. Flub this and
we have no case.

The trial reconvenes promptly at 8:30 AM
on Tuesday and I notice Dean Haas sitting next to Eldridge Broadhamton in the
public viewing area. I know they are old friends, but I wonder what motivated
her to drive the hour to be here. Does she have some perverted desire to
witness my final undoing?

The judge greets everyone and
then turns to Berkeley.

“Counsel for the plaintiff,
you may call your next witness.”

Berkeley stands up and
announces: “I would like to call Doug Carpenter, PhD, to the stand.”

Doug sits in the witness box
and Berkeley begins.

“I have only a few questions.
Would you explain to the jury how you test the water samples.”

“We use a technique called
‘High Performance Liquid Chromatography Mass Spectrometry.’”

“And what does that do?”

“Basically, it allows us to
look into complex compounds and determine what makes them up, the basic
elements.”

“And how do you do that?”

“We use a machine called a
MSQ 9000 EVO with Triple Quadrupole Sensitivity.”

“How do you know it’s
accurate?”

“We are on a six-month
calibration cycle. Twice a year, someone who is tied in with NIST checks the
machine and makes sure it works correctly.”

“NIST?”

“National Institute of
Standards and Technology. It’s a government agency that oversees calibration
standards. They make sure everyone in the country is working to the same set of
weights and measures.”

“Are you satisfied that the
water samples Indigo processed and the results she obtained are accurate?”

“Absolutely.”

“No more questions, Your Honor.”

Berkeley takes his seat and
then the judge addresses the court: “Counsel for the defense, you may
cross-examine.”

Fullbright walks to the
floor.

“Dr. Carpenter, my learned
colleague may not be interested in your credentials, but I am. Would you
briefly state your education for the record.”

“I did both my Masters and
PhD at Stanford.”

“California?”

“Yes.”

“Why California?”

“That was the best place to
get some experience.”

“Why did you go back to
Florida?”

“My family and friends were
there.”

“What else have you done that
qualifies you as an expert witness?”

“I’ve performed analysis for
billion dollar agri-businesses for over twenty years with no complaints. I’ve
also published three papers on the subject.”

“I see. Okay then, I’m
willing to concede you are well qualified to speak on these matters. Moving on,
are you aware Indigo Wells has made some rather shocking allegations about GWI
and its flag-ship product Farm-eXia?”

“Yes, I’m aware.”

“Are you also aware that
sloppy lab practices can contaminate samples and give erroneous results?”

“Yes, of course.”

“So if Ms. Wells had used a
dirty sample jar, or worked the machine incorrectly, the results she obtained
could be bogus and her allegations would be completely without merit.”

“If that were the case, yes.”

“So you’re saying there’s
room for doubt that her results are accurate?”

“What I’m saying is this: if
she did what you said, yes, it’s possible. The results could be inaccurate.”

“This is not a trivial
matter. On the line here is a product that generates over fifty billion dollars
in sales, every year. There’s no room for guess-work. What assurance do I
have?”

“I personally supervised
Indigo during her use of the machine and can say without question, her lab
skills are impeccable. I have no doubt the results of her experiments are
one-hundred percent valid.”

“One-hundred percent valid?
That’s a remarkable statement. How do you know it’s not ninety-eight percent
valid, or ninety-five percent valid? You’re saying she never makes mistakes? Is
that reasonable?” Fullbright retorts.

“In my business, you have to
be one-hundred percent accurate, all the time.  Otherwise, companies could be
liable for millions of dollars in fines. There’s no room for error, ever. I
have had the privilege of supervising Ms. Wells for several months now, and in
that time, never once observed a mistake. Yes, I reiterate, without
qualification, her lab skills are impeccable.”

“No further questions, Your Honor,”
Fullbright says, and shuffles back to his seat.

“Witness is excused,” the
judge says, and then calls a fifteen minute recess.

Berkeley gathers us together
in the break room and tells Fargo, Doug, Brad, and Sandy their testimony is
complete and they may fly back if they choose. They take him up on it and
promptly leave the courthouse for the next available flight.

We return to the courtroom
and the judge tells Berkeley to call his next witness.

“I wish to call Dr. Tom
Benson.”

The bailiff brings Benson
into the room and swears him in. Berkeley approaches him.

“Dr. Benson, what is your
position with GWI?”

“I’m Chief Scientist and
Director of Product Development.”

“You already gave me your
qualifications the last time we met so there’s no reason to repeat them here,
that is, unless the judge has some objections.”

“No objections,” the judge
says.

“You also told me last time,
you tested Farm-eXia on aquatic wildlife at concentrations up to twenty times
the safe limit without adverse effects. Would you confirm that.”

“Yes, that is true.”

“Dr. Benson, what is an
isomer?”

“I know where you’re going
with this.”

The judge interjects: “Please
answer the question.”

“Isomers are compounds with
the same constituents and same formula, but with a slightly different
structure.”

“What is significant about an
isomer?”

“Most of the time nothing.
But sometimes they can react differently with living proteins.”

“Can you give me an example
of an instance where the isomer reacts differently?”

“The best example I know of
is L-methamphetamine, a relatively harmless over-the-counter nasal decongestant
with few side effects. But the isomer, D-methamphetamine, found in street
drugs, is psychoactive because it fits in certain receptor pockets in the brain
causing a state of altered consciousness.”

“Could you restate that in
laymen’s terms?”

“Okay, let’s say your right
hand is a molecule and the left hand is the isomer. They’re both identical
except for the position of the thumb. Inside your brain is a pocket that
perfectly matches your left hand. If your right hand tried to fit in that
pocket, it wouldn’t go, because the thumb would get in the way, thus no
reaction. But if the left hand, the one that causes an altered mind state,
tried to attach, it would fit perfectly.”

“So the L-form is good and
the D-form is bad?”

“In this example, that would
be true.”

“Okay now, Indigo agrees the
R-form isomer of Farm-eXia is relatively harmless as you say. But her research
has shown the S-form is the one that causes aggressive behavior in alligators.
What do you think about that?”

“You won’t catch me on that
one. We already know about the isomer thing. We told you that before.”

“So you knew and did
nothing?”

“Not exactly. We were fully
aware at the time of the original trials the S-form isomer of Farm-eXia was destabilizing
to aquatic wildlife. To combat this, we modified our production methods to
prevent it from ever being generated. And not only that, we test for it on
every batch.”

“Indigo here, has tested the
lake water and found it contained 40% S-form. The question is: where did that
come from? We, the plaintiff, propose it was a defective batch and therefore
GWI was negligent of releasing untested product to the marketplace.”

“Not a chance,” Benson says,
and points to a large box on the defense table. “Those are the test records for
the last ten years of every batch produced, all recorded by an independent
laboratory, and not a one shows the slightest evidence of S-form isomer. Nice
try, but I’m afraid you’ll have to do better than that.”

Berkeley walks the floor with
his head down, deep in thought. He then approaches Benson.

“Are you aware of
photochemical reactions?”

“Yes, that’s a condition
where UV light will break covalent bonds.”

“Is it true the only
difference between the R-form and S-form isomer of Farm-eXia is the location of
the oxygen atom?”

“Yes, that’s true.”

“So if the bonds on the
oxygen atom were broken, and then, it reattached in another location, wouldn’t
that change the isomer from one form to the other?”

“Theoretically, yes. But that
would require a lot of energy.”

“Like the ultraviolet energy
from the sun?”

“Afraid not. To break a
covalent bond requires a wavelength of at least 290 nano-meters. The ozone
layer absorbs practically all the 290 nm UV radiation. Any UV that gets through
the atmosphere would be too weak to break a covalent bond. It would be
impossible.”

Berkeley winces and I realize
he’s in trouble. He walks over to me for support. I do my best to reassure him.

“I know what I saw. The
Farm-eXia in the sunlight changed. Doug even saw it.”

Unconvinced, he turns to face
the judge.

“May I request a twenty
minute recess for conference with my technical advisor?”

“Let’s break for lunch. Court
will reconvene at 2:00 PM,” the judge says, and bangs his gavel on the bench.

As we exit the courtroom,
Berkeley takes me aside.

“I’m dying out there. This
guy’s unflappable. I need something better.”

He invites me to lunch, but I
decline telling him I need time to think about the problem. We go our separate
ways and I make my way back to my hotel room.

I flip open my laptop and go
over the graphs. I double check the data, but everything seems correct. Then I
do some calculations and discover he’s right. It would take more energy than
290 nm to break the bonds and move the oxygen to the other side. Why didn’t I
see this?

But I have concrete proof it
happened. The Farm-eXia dissolved in tap water changed from 99.98% pure R-form
isomer, the safe one, to the psychoactive S-form, just by being exposed to the
sun’s radiation. How could this happen?

An hour goes by as I search
through screen after screen of data looking for answers, but nothing stands
out. I lie on the bed face down with arms outstretched, like a fallen cross, and
wonder why I ever got involved. This whole thing is insane. I feel like getting
on a bus to somewhere... and never coming back!

But I can’t leave my friends
hanging. If we don’t make a convincing argument, present solid facts to
reinforce our suppositions, the judge will declare the case frivolous, and slap
Berkeley and the Stewarts with Rule 11 sanctions, and I’d never be able to live
it down.

I search my computer one last
time looking for something, anything, that would get us out of this, and then I
see it, right there, under my nose, a tiny blip on the screen. It was always
there, so ubiquitous it was insignificant, but now makes all the difference in
the world. How could I miss it?