Remembering Judge Enrique Romero

Once upon a time I was a lawyer representing the oil and chemical industry in toxic tort and environmental litigation. A client would say, "We want to get this case settled. We need a mediator who can get the plaintiff on board. Who do you recommend?" The inner voice in my head said, "If you want this case settled, we need a mediator who can get you on board." I then said aloud, "Well, there is a mediator who almost certainly can deliver a settlement -- he is Judge Enrique Romero." "Great", said the client. "Let's check his availability."

I then went into full-lawyer psychoanalyst mode. "Listen, Judge Romero is a master, but it will not be a wholly pleasant day for any of us. He says what he thinks. In plain language. Sometimes colorful language. Sometimes, well, profane language. This is not going to be a day of mediation chit-chatting, drinking fine coffees, and eating pastries until five o'clock when things get serious. So, if you want Judge Romero, you need to ready to hear his unvarnished views."

Said the client with the wave of a hand, "Not a problem -- we want this settled."

On more than one occasion, the mediation day started like this. I was huddled up in a conference room with my client, usually a deputy general counsel who had flown in from, say, Houston. At 9:05 a.m., in would walk Judge Romero, broad smile on his face, and his first words were something like, "Riff, I read your brief. You don't actually expect an L.A. jury to buy all that bull*&^, do you? That may sell in the C-suite in Houston but you're going to be laughed out of the courtroom." And then he would stop talking to see what would happen next. Once, my client walked out at 9:07 a.m. and the case did not settle. A dozen other times, the client stayed, and the case settled that day (or night).

And then he would dig in for the hours-long struggle. He was always totally prepared and had mastered the details. To demonstrate to my client that he was more than just brusque and rude (he was neither; he was a very nice man) and understood the defense position, he would say something like, "I know, I know, the confidence interval on the key epidemiology study contains the value of "1" and therefore is not statistically significant. And if your trial judge were X, Y or Z, there is a good shot that the opposing expert's testimony would be excluded but your trial judge So-and-So is almost certainly going to deny your MIL. You need something other than statistical significance to talk about to your L.A. jury. What's it going to be?"

Now my client is listening. I had told her the same thing two weeks ago but now its Judge Romero saying it. At some point during the money offer exchanges, the client would lean over and say something like, "We probably need to put some more money on this, don't you think? I need to make a call." I wouldn't say a word; I didn't need to.

Why was he so successful? The Harvard or Pepperdine mediation programs can teach the theory, but Judge Romero had skills and traits with which he was born and were not the result of book-learning. He understood human emotion. And he was relentless in pursuit of the deal. I remember a day when the case did not settle, and we all departed at 7:30 p.m. At 9:15 p.m., in walks Judge Romero to the restaurant in the hotel where my client was staying. He said, "I hoped I'd find you here. I have the plaintiff's signature on this deal memo. Now I need you to sign it." Yes, it was more than my client's alleged "best and final" -- but she signed. He was a closer!

I'd like to think Enrique Romero was my friend. When I thought about applying to the bench, his was the first advice I sought. He was a warm, brilliant, hilarious, colorful, and lovely man. I will miss him very much.