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Chronicle Exposes Houston Business/Real Estate Developer's First Amendment Exploits, Anti-Rights Side to Fight Back with S-E-X  | |  | Coon Motion.pdf
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 | |  | | Applicants to be Beaumont Plaintiff Attorneys' Newsboy |
A minority investor in this publication's parent is affiliated with the Southeast Texas Record.It would seem as if the Southeast Texas Record brought a knife to a gun fight. Beaumont trial attorney, Real Estate Developer and President of Houston's Pacer-PSI, Brent Coon of Brent Coon Associates opened fire - using his own special ammunition, the local courtroom.
Mr. Coon wants reporters for the month-old legal journal Southeast Texas Record arrested. He requested bench warrants against the journalists from local Judge Donald Floyd.
The error-filled motion is worth a read - for future first-amendment scholars and third-grade elementary school teachers.The crime? Reporting on the Beaumont courtroom and the trial lawyers who have been using it as a class action haven for more than a decade.
According to the motion obtained by HoustonRealNews [see attachment], the reporters are guilty of: -"Milling and mingling about the courthouse..."
-"Respondents attempted to ease[sic] drop..."
-"...writing articles about Court Personnel"
-"...featured Cathy McCollum and referenced growth of the asbestos cases" Serious charges indeed.
These tactics, actually covering the events as they happen, sorting through public records and publishing them is, unfortunately, a lost art.
It, in the past, has been called "reporting."
And there is little doubt as to why Mr. Coon does not like it. Frivolous lawsuits, big-dollar class-action shakedowns and more, are commonplace in Beaumont. Attorneys such as Mr. Coon, who we presume has profited handsomely from class-action lawsuits and the BP case, would prefer less sunlight to their practice than more.
And that's the intent of the Record. Report the facts. Write business-friendly editorials, and let readers decide. Place a box of free newspapers at the courthouse.
Mr. Coon suggests that Record reporters distribute the publication to potential jurors in an attempt to taint the jury pool. The Record denies the charge, showing the placement of its box outside the courthouse, where the Beaumont regulars - judges, attorneys, bailiffs and so on can find it on a weekly basis.
Shut out the lawsuit leeches from the publication?
Never.
The Record has offered open invitations to class action plaintiff's attorneys to pen Opinion or Editorial pieces.
A forum does not seem to be enough for Mr. Coon or his allies. Hence the request bench warrants for American journalists on American soil, not accused of any form of treason or espionage.
The motion calls for - get this - to have the journalists "interrogate[d]." By the arbiter of justice? Not good enough for Mr. Coon.
"Plaintiff also request that they be allowed to ask question [sic] because their lawyers have unique and superior knowledge on this issue."
With such superior knowledge, why bother with the judge and trial.
No, the bench warrant for a journalist is not unprecedented in American history, although it would sure seem that way.
Mr. Coon probably does not want to be likened to the "bad guys" in the Peter Zenger trial that helped make Andrew Hamilton one of the great heroes of pre-revolutionary America. Alas, as most 5th graders know from performing the play based on the trial and acquittal of Mr. Zenger, those that stamp out press freedoms...ARE THE BAD GUYS.
Mr. Brent Coon is also known for having developed the aptly-named Brentwood golf course.
The plaintiff's bar has more weapons in its arsenal. According to the Chronicle, plaintiff attorney extraordinaire Wayne Reaud, has another response, besides just squashing press freedoms with a local favorite judge. Reaud said he might just start yet another newspaper.
"I'll go to plaintiffs' lawyers all over America and we'll run story after story about defendants who've lied, manufacturers who've covered up," Reaud said. "And we'll have a pretty girl in hot pants hand ours out." Those will also be some big guns, we surmise.
We doubt Mr. Coon will ask that a bench warrant be delivered to the "pretty girl in hot pants."
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