The legal storm brewing around Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson, with more than a dozen women now accusing him of conduct ranging from inappropriate touch to sexual assault, features two prominent Texas lawyers who could hardly be more different in their approaches.
Tony Buzbee, the plaintiffs’ attorney, has made headlines daily on social media and gave a press conference about the lawsuits, while defense lawyer Rusty Hardin said almost nothing. Chris Tritico, a Houston lawyer who represented Moses Malone, Gary Sheffield and Oklahoma City suicide bomber Timothy McVeigh, said the contrast would be brought to trial if Watson’s cases were brought to court.
“There is no doubt about it,” said Tritico, foreseeing a confrontation of “the extravagant, in your face, loud and clear. [Buzbee] against the more methodical and southern gentleman, more friendly style [of Hardin] and it would be a real juxtaposition between the two, no doubt. “
Here’s a look at the lawyers who are ahead in this high-profile case:
For plaintiffs: Tony Buzbee
Buzbee grew up in eastern Texas and studied at Texas A&M, where he was part of the school’s famous Cadet Corps. After graduation, he joined the Marine Corps, serving in Somalia and in the first Persian Gulf War. He then went on to law school at the University of Houston Law Center. While there, he became the editor-in-chief of the Houston Law Review and graduated summa cum laude in 1997. Buzbee was a lawyer for a federal judge and a law firm in Houston before opening The Buzbee Law Firm in 1999.
Since then, he has shown a tendency towards big cases against powerful opponents. Notable cases include several against British Petroleum after accidents such as the Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2009. He won a $ 100 million prize, but was later reduced on appeal. Buzbee represented former Texas governor Rick Perry against accusations of abuse of power in 2014 – the first time Buzbee defended a criminal case. He won a case for Jimmy Buffett when it was alleged that someone was using the singer’s trademark illegally.
After Hurricane Ike in 2008, Buzbee helped win a $ 189 million settlement against the Texas Windstorm Insurance Association for damage compensation. “I like being an agent of change. A disturber,” said Buzbee in a 2019 interview on the Houston Chronicle. “I like to help someone who hasn’t been treated fairly and try to fix it. That’s what I like the most. So normally, if I don’t feel like we’re in that position, I don’t take the case. If I believe a customer has been harmed , I’m going to look at the case to resolve this. I think everyone wants to believe that there is still justice; I want to believe that too. “
Buzbee’s style is bold and daring. The doorknobs of his law firm, located on the 73rd floor of the JP Morgan Chase Tower, the tallest building in Texas, are shaped like sharks. He has a shark tattoo on his right forearm and a shark on the tail of his jet. And Buzbee lives a public life. He slept on the streets of Houston for one night in February to draw attention to the homeless and ran for mayor of Houston in 2019. One of his promises was to give his mayor salary to a random voter every year. He ended up losing a second round to Sylvester Taylor. In 2013, he became a conductor for Texas A&M and, the following year, bought a billboard begging Texans to choose quarterback Johnny Manziel (they didn’t, instead they caught Jadeveon Clowney with number one choice). He also asked the school to fire football coach Kevin Sumlin in 2017.
He once bought a World War II-era Sherman tank – called Cheyenne – and initially parked it on the street in front of his Houston mansion before moving it to his ranch and eventually donating it to his alma mater in 2018. The tank was parked in the same neighborhood as River Oaks where the McNair family – the owners of the Texans – lived. Buzbee said Friday that although the McNairs live nearby, he does not know Cal McNair and is not a Texan fan.
Buzbee’s approach in a particular case was similar to his actions so far in relation to the lawsuits against Watson. Stanley Marsh 3 was part of a family of oil tycoons and a patron of eclectic arts best known for subscribing to Rancho Cadillac near Amarillo. In 2012, Buzbee sued Marsh on behalf of teenagers who said they had been sexually abused, compiling 10 cases to present to the court.
Buzbee was a huge success, according to a Texas Monthly story from 2013, carrying full-page ads on the Amarillo Globe-News that said “our company represents several young people who were allegedly sexually abused by Stanley Marsh 3. If you information about these allegations, or any similar conduct by Mr. Marsh, no matter when it occurred, we want to speak with you immediately. “
Marsh 3 liquidated the 10 lawsuits filed by Buzbee for an undisclosed amount.
“I live to fight on behalf of the weak against the powerful,” Buzbee told Texas Monthly at the time. “I like to get a lot of money for my clients and put the fear of God on those who are unfortunate enough to oppose me.”
Despite the bombast, Buzbee knows what he is doing in court, said Tritico.
“A good litigation skill comes because you have it inside you to begin with,” said Tritico. “You can learn to ask questions, but you have to have that inner ability to stand up in a courtroom in front of a lot of people looking at you and have the ability and the ability to overcome the fear of public speaking that everyone else born with and have this ability to control a witness and he has that. “
Buzbee will have as its legal team Cornelia Brandfield-Harvey, Brittany Ifejika and Crystal Del Toro. Brandfield-Harvey was born in Houston and served in the Harris County Public Prosecutor’s Office targeting strip clubs and illegal massage parlors that dealt with prostitution and human trafficking. Del Toro has worked for Buzbee since 2014 and handles civil litigation, including sexual abuse. Ifejika, who graduated in law from the University of Texas, had a scholarship with the Texas Advocacy Project before being hired by Buzbee. While there, she worked with victims of sexual assault and domestic violence.
For Watson: Rusty Hardin
Hardin, 79, is known for important cases involving celebrity clients. On your company’s website, it is listed as one of your areas of expertise. He worked on both sides of the litigation, both in the Public Ministry and as a civil and criminal defense lawyer.
After receiving a bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University in Connecticut, serving in Vietnam and then returning to study and graduate from Southern Methodist University law school in 1975, Hardin worked as an assistant public prosecutor in Harris County for 15 years. A Texas Monthly profile for Hardin in 2002 said he never lost a case as a prosecutor in more than 100 trials. In 1991, he entered a private practice as a partner at Hardin, Beers, Hagstette & Davidson. In 1994, he was a trial advisor during the Whitewater investigation under Robert Fiske and Ken Starr. Two years later, he started his own company, Rusty Hardin & Associates, dealing with civil and criminal defense jobs.
In many ways, he became an advocate for the stars, mostly professional athletes. His best-known client was Roger Clemens, whom he represented in the litigation over the Mitchell report on drugs to improve baseball performance. Hardin’s company also represented Clemens in a perjury case after the Justice Department accused him of lying to Congress. Clemens was acquitted. Hardin represented former Houston Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich in a DWI case (fired); Wade Boggs in a case brought by a flight attendant against Boggs alleging verbal aggression (verdict in favor of Boggs); and Warren Moon on charges of assaulting his wife (acquitted). He also represented Adrian Peterson after his arrest for beating his 4-year-old son with a switch (no contestation, no jail sentence).
Hardin’s most famous case, however, was when he represented the son of billionaire J. Howard Marshall against former Playboy central newspaper Anna Nicole Smith, who married Marshall 14 months before his death.
The inheritance became both a legal case and a secondary tabloid show, especially when Hardin interrogated Smith. At one point, he asked her, “Mrs. Marshall, are you taking new acting classes?”
Smith’s reply, after picking up a tissue, “Go fuck yourself, Rusty.”
In several interviews, Hardin said the line followed him everywhere. But he said to “20/20”: “It never offended me.” Hardin won the case too, playing “You Light Up My Life”, during the closing arguments, because there was reference, at the beginning of the trial, to Smith being the light of Marshall’s life.
“I said I had something I thought could capture the spirit of the trial,” Hardin told The New York Times in 2001. “Then Debby Boone’s voice started to sing and the jury burst out laughing.”
Even in cases he lost – he was the lawyer for Arthur Andersen LLP in an obstruction of justice trial – he impresses. He transformed what many believed to be an easy victory for the government in 10 days of jury deliberation.
“He kept us focused,” Jack Gallo, a judge in the case, told the Wall Street Journal in 2002. “You never know what’s going to come out of your mouth.” Tritico said he shares Hardin’s deceptively relaxed style.
“I’m not saying that Tony is rude, but our style is not aggressive,” said Tritico. “Our style is slow, methodical, getting what we need and smiling at them as we nudge them slowly with knives.”