News Scrapbook 1988

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VSD back ho.......-- f or Cal Lutheran Young Toreros 2-0 aft1 ~ing 'Pit' By Ric lucher Stall Writer fit, f~r~ally called University rena, is ~pressive for several rea• sons. One IS UNM's percentage tbere :- .800_ (294 wins in 367 games) enter- ing th1S season. Another is that it could be described as a miniature Rose Bowl, stuck in a 56--foot--d

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Tuesday, November Zt, 1988

Profile I

Insuranc, Reform Could Threaten Lawyer Coverage .J-1-1 'co~ed from Page 1 malpractice and the filing of a ~- . Fellmeth said higher underwntlng stan- have no rates to which the rollback would be dards would not necessarily be bad from a applied. consumer standpoint. New r.otopanies, Fellmeth said, "are not af- "If you have higher underwriting standards, fected, except to the extent that they actually coupled with mandatory insurance " he said, will be f.ubject to prior approval (of rate "people who are super, super high risks won't changes).'' He indicated insurer aversion to be practicing.'' . regulation may be ll?-e re8! ~n for any re- Of the possibility insurers would reduce cov- luctance to opera!8 10 California. . erage, Fellmeth said: "It would not necessar- The backed lnl~tlve could force msurers to ily be detrimental. The attorney would have to toughen underwntlng standards and stop cov• bear some of the risk " ering attorneys in high-risk areas of practice, Attorneys unable to·find malpractice Insur- according f-? Hadfield and ~th~rs. That could ance could become more selective in taking have 8: ~cularly damagmg unpact on per- cases, some attorneys say, to reduce the expo- sonal JDJury and real estate attorneys, who sure oftheir personal assets to claims That in accounted for 32 percent of the malpractice tum could reduce access to the c~urts for claims reported in the state between 1980 and cons~ers. 1987. S "d S " , . ''We would have to very carefully under- aJ cott: It s gomg to affect consumers write " Hadfield said He added that that could no matter what. Attorneys would become more m~ the company .;,.ould write no new busi-Selective." But _he ~dded ~e P.ropos tion could ness "or only good (lower risk) business." ~ve a beneficial unp:ict if more ~es are O'Regan agreed, but said: "There are other referred to ~ore qualified attorneys. options. You could rewrite a policy so that it is Culhane said ~wyers "may be more selec• not so broad." tive in taking cases.'' He predicted that while As an example, he noted Home Insurance cases involving serious iltjuries and strong li• offers it.s client.s a "tail period" ofbetween one ability would not be affected, attorneys could and three years after expiration of their poll• be more reluctant to take "novel cases" or cies. Under such a provision, the insurer cov- those in which liability is marginal. ers any claim filed within the tail period, if the Consumers could be affected in another way, act occurred while the policy was effective. too. If lawyers do not carry malpractice Insur- Home Insurance could reduce its tail cover- ance, consumers ~t find it difficult to ob- age in reaction to Proposition 103, O'Regan tain monetary compensation for legitimate said. claims. Most California lawyers do not have as Lawyers who wouldbe especially affected by much personal assets as many people believe. reduced tail coverage.iJ?.clude estate planning, U an attorney is not covered by malpracti~ estate'._and se_EUnties attome_YS, Ha~eld insurance, in many cases ''you can get ajudg satd. He satd those areas of practice typically ment, but it might not be collectible, Culhani have a longer gap between the act of alleged said. .

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Growing up in Brooklyn also taught Levine something about jury selection. "Picking juries is like working at (my) Un-

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•nMz.Jou . You've got to have values in

b11 cle Sol's store," said Levine. He recalled shop- vine said he likes to take cases that pit pers would ask him to select the best "profitsagainstlife,safetyandhappiness."He canteloupe in the store, and he would thump nrlded, "I don't think I've ever (handled) a and smell the stock in an effort to please the where, If someone had been a little less customers. inter ted In profits, they could have prevented B t d it all this Le • the h rm." . u esp e, , vine noted, "Some- times you don t knowwhat you've got until you Advic From Paul Simon (The Singer) open the sucker up." Levine also approaches tort litigation with a But Levine's "first and_ best job" ~as whe~ sense of determinism. He likes to quote three he was 7 or 8 and helpe~ his father drive a taxi. lin s from Paul Simon's "Slip-Sliding Away" Levine was dUlrged With two tasks: throwing winch read, "God only knows. God makes the th e flag down to start the fare and making pl n. The Information is not available to the change for customers. mortal man." "I saw every kind of person in every kind of Said Levine, "That's the way I feel about setting," Levine said of his days cruising jury trials." around NewYorkinhisfather's taxi. "It was a The case of which Levine Is most proud real nice people thing. As a child, it's nice being Hay s v Prudential, 819 F.2d 921 (1987), n:. exposed to different kinds of people." veals much about him as a lawyer and person. Regarding the importance he eventually A football iajury rendered teen-ager Kip placed on education, Levine said, "I watched H ye a quadriplegic in need of around-the- my mother pull us out of the slums" by return. clock nursing care. But the federal govern Ing to college. ment had made ch nges to the fathei-'s health Levine Is renowned for his sense of humor, a in urance, provided by Prudential, that de- quality he often demonstrates as a lecturer. letcd nursing care from the coverage. Steven Daitch, executive director of the Rutter A trial judge Issued a summaryjudgment for Group, said, ''Harvey is recognized as the pre- Prud ntial, but Levine appealed to the 9th U.S. mier one•man show on insurance litigation top- Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate court ics. He's entertaining and lively. His war eventually upheld the trial judge's ruling, but stories are an integral part of his lectures. not before Levine negotlat d settlement that People sit there mesmerized." requlred Prudential to fully pay for Hayes' Levine said that when he lectures, "I feel a nursing care. Levine says he received no lotoflifeinthecontextofthelaw.lhavealotof compen atlon. comedy in my lectures. We're part of the hu- His adversarie have included Ed Chapin of man comedy." He added that much of his lee- Ch pin & Brewer in Snn Diego and Guy 0. turing style "comes from the animated feeling Kornblum ofKornblum, Kelly & Herlihy in San I get when synthesizing the law with human Fr ncisco. "lie' a very ten clous advocate," behavior." Id Kornblum, "and he should be recognized Levine count.s among his friends people from as such. I eajoy litigating against Harvey. It's both sides of Insurance litigation. Among them a Jdck. l like Jitlgating against a good lawyer." ls Tony Prezioso, a senior account agent for "Holy h 11," Chapin joked when a ked to Allstate who has known Levine for 25 years. !ive his views on Levine. Chapin recalled the "Harvey is a good all-round person," said Pre- flrst case In which he and Levine matched wits zioso. "Alongwith being sympathetic, he's em• w a p on l·irtjury action Involving an in- pathetic. Growing up with Harvey was never sunmce coverage i5sue . "He wa more merci- serious. It was always fun . Sometimes when ful th n he would b now," said Chapin. you're growing up with someone, there's con- He added, "Harvey's bard-charging plain- fllct. There never was conflict with Harvey." tiffs lawyer. But he can be diplomatic when the Levine assumes the CTLA presidency at a chips arc down, if that's what it takes." time when the association once again is pre• One of Levine's partners, Carl J. DePas• paring to defend against another round of ef- quale, observed, "Harvey has an energy level forts to enact legislation establishing no-fault• that just scares me. If th re r two words to auto Insurance and limiting contingency fees. describe him, they're 'focused energy.' He And, of course, there's the perennial problem mov like a motion-picture reel.'' of trying to Improve the image of lawyers. DePasquale said Levine "is going to bring to Shernoff added, "Harvey is coming into the who is now with the Claremont firm Shernoff, CTLA presidency at the right time. We do need Scott & Bidart, added, "I'dwork on some trials a leader who is going to tum around the image with himwhere he'd g t killed one day. Yet, the oflawyers. U anyone can do that, it's Harvey. next day he would tum things around. He He will be a great CTLA president. He has a eems to capitalize on the flow of things as they global vision. He's not myopic.'' go along." Michael I. Greer, presiding judge of the San CTLA Priorities Diego County Superior Court, observed Levine Leytne sa!d one of his top priorities as (!I'½\ from the bench during the General Motors president will be to do as much as he can m his case. "I've never quite seen as good a presen- one-year stintto enh~nce th~ image oflawy~rs. talion of damages," Greer recalled. "He had But he ~tressed, I don t want a Madison the clerk and bailiff in tears, and I guess I have Aven~e, slick-~!: approach. I _want to explore to im ginc I had tears In my eyes, too.'' ~~vew~ys ~unprovetheunage. Onepo~- Levine's Brooklyn background also has s1bility, said Levme, would be to tell the public helped fashion his approach to litigation. that the tru ".alue of trial lawyer work is." (in• "GrowingupinNewYorkgivesyouacompeti- jury) preventio~, rather than compe~!ion." tive edge," Levine once told an interviewer. LcVJ_lle also said he wan~ to workwith msur- "It makes you want to beat the big guys. It ers to mcrease the emphasis on Injury preven- makes you want to beat 'em bad.'' tion as a way to cut legal ~o~ts. "Theway to cut To avoid getting beaten up ns a kid, Levine legal c~s~ 1s to,preven~ 11\)ury, not take away said he used to negotiate deals with tough guys peopl~ s nghts,. he _satd. . under which he would let them cheat on tests Levine and his wife, Judy, have two chil- by looking over hls shoulder. In return, Levine dren - Adam, 11, and Alyssa, 7. in ss." Cun Change in Mid-Case the presidency a newmission and orientation." Levine' former partner, William Shernoff,

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Somehow, facing Cal Lutheran on your _home court can't compare with me_eti_ng the University of New Mexi co Tinh,ts howling hole of hoops known· as e Pit. E Which is exactly what has Hank t gan, the USO_£oac1k._uneasy. The een-age~ who make up the better part of his roster surprised him b :?w they reacted in The Pit. It ha; ,m _wondering now what will ha pen in a ~ompletely opposite en.Jt ronment hke tonight's 7-30 ame Sagamst Cal Lutheran (4•2) in th/usn

hole, ~ith a lid. All of which me:! th~ noise from the 17,000-plus fans swirls tornado-fashion around the court, much as it does around the Pasadena stadium's field, but with• out blue sky as an exit. The first.year Torero who handled ~he cacophony best may have been _om Iannacone, USD's new athletic director. Iannacone, who succeeded th~ Rev. Patrick Cahill on Se t 1 pointed out a relatively new JcAA rule to Egan t~at prohibits pep bands from performing while the ball is in ilay. Eg~n passed the information on o the off1c1als, who put a halt to ·t Now, the Lobos fans hardly n~d help numbing eardrums but talti the b?nd out of the gam~ was one !f E~~n s pregame objectives. We had three things we wanted t do" Ega ·d " o ' n sa1 . We felt we had to get back and stop their break S td, we had to play good positi~n :i~ ense to keep them off the bo d because they're so big. And thirt s, ha,~ to stop the band from playing we (Iannacone) took care of one. f our objectives." 0

ports Center. "That's got me

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worried for very

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h v1ous reasons," Egan said ave to take th· is one very seriously l e ve got a lot of things we've got t~ ;a.:n to do well and consistent] ou~e~ a long way from establishi~ team/es as a really gOOd basketball tha~u\hthe Toreros are closer today w k ey w~re when they left last buee for their season opener in Al• l'k querque. Then they were simply ~ui~ ~arts of the USO campus - re- ding. How good they could be wasn't certain. Few expected much ;nor; from _their entourage of seven .res men, five sophomores, one jun• wr and two seniors than steady im• provement - no matter how tha translate? in wins and losses. Two_ victories and one weekend lat:, _it matters. Beating the Lobos ;~ ~!r home court in the champion- wili d:a:h o~ thBeir _own tournament eating them by 11 r:.~~ ! 4• 53 ), after spotting them a " ea , may have done too much 'Werrett·ll ~ent_ on the trip thinking .' is IS going to get these ' ~apti~~ into basketball and theg~r time, Egan said "Th g · . a ·

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!'-8 for the freshman players E a said: "Maybe the fact that they'regs~ b~~n~, maybe they didn't realize how it :vas. They've never been through it before, so what the he k : they have to compare it t~? aybe they thought 'All · games are like this.' " , college . Cal Lutheran, being an NAIA Oivi• ;~;~i!_~ s~!: 1 • tf;ef~:s. ~n~~!:~e~: going into the game with a can't l stanc~, th_e T?reros are practicaliyof: a ?,an t-wm-b1g-enough situation. h You have to live through a lot to /vde a good team, and we haven't ive through it yet " E . "Th t' · . • gan said a s still m front of us Th t' . what I'm concerned abo· t a s haven't arrived.'' u . We ro:°'a~u:h _they':e farther down the pec t d is point than anyone ex- e - even Egan. /

!~~re, and we end up havi~~ iiJ~~e:So the you ,star~ w~r.rying about, 'Weu: .Y can t thmk ,ts this easy' We're !;~nfn~od::~ s~~e struggle~, some together." ' ore we ever come Winning against the Lobos in The

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m Diego, CA an (?,ego Co .) n D1eg_o Union ,ir . D. 217 ,089) 1r. S. 341,840)

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- TOM DRESSLAR

P. C. B

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1888

ine LOoo~ nave a highly re.pecteo coach, Bobby Knight disciple Dave Bliss, who left SMU to take over this program. Hmmmmmm. "I can tell you that the two most shocked people in The Pit were Dave Bliss and me," said USO coach Hank Egan. It's not that Egan underestimates the talent at his disposal, mind you. He has been openly pleased with the quality of his recent recruiting classes. But he did not expect results this impressive this soon. There are, after all, seven freshmen and five sophomores on his ballclub. And a lot of them play. That makes for a great deal of uncertainty at the Division I level. "There are three kinds of players," Egan proposed. "There are players who make things happen, players who have things happen to them and players who don't know what the hell is hapJK:ning. With upperclassmen, you usualiy know what category a player is in. A freshman is in category four - all of the above." Nonetheless, Egan's young club rallied from an eight-point second• half deficit to defeat Lehigh {68-58) in its first appearance at the Lobo Classic. Lehigh competed in the NCAA Tournament last spring, one of seven clubs that made postseason appearances the Toreros will face before beginning West Coast Athletic Conference play. "They (the Engineers) played us awfully tough," Egan said. "We really had to struggle. I thought it helped us the next night against New Mexico. We competed pretty well." So it would seem. The Toreros held Lehigh and New Mexico to a combined shooting percentage of .396 and out-rebounded those teams, 80-67. These are marks of a group not afraid to work hard. One of Egan's freshmen, guard Wayman Strickland, made the all- tournament team. Not bad for a young man who has played all of two collegiate games. So did a sophomore, center Dondi Bell and a junior, forward Craig Cottrell'. . "Cottrell finally ended up in the right position," said Egan. "I had too T · obos lost by 11.

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L?ckw6od: Toreros alert rivals Continued from c- 1 _c.. .

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with an awful lot of poise."

was one of those strokes of coaching

h a resul_t, Egan could sense e~ s snapping up all over the West. thi I told our players that I think the :g th at happened most is that we w~de up everybody about us," he tk we alerted a lot of people m ou~ eague. We'll have more hscout!ng passes requested than we sa1 . "I th. .

genius.''

The coach can only guess )Vh his youngsters responded with sucf poise in the face of adversity , smce they're so young they didn't realize how bad it w~ " Egan said. "They've never been ' anywhere before so what the heck 1 they have to compare it to? A good percentage of them playe·d d .d ' "M be . • ay

ave m the past "

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~he_Ttoreros have become a curios, Y, at least. It's a start.

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0 '1:1e people may have missed J t in the blizzard of information that makes up a

Monday sports section after a Sunday of the NFL. But you can bet almost every col!ege basketball coach in the Uruted St.ates noticed, many of-them sp11lmg their coffee in surprise. . USO 64, New Mexico 53. Hey Joe ~t~d you see this one? Do you believ: I • The University of San Diego beat N~w Mexico at The Pit? By 11 points? Out-rebounded the Lobos too? After being down, 13-0? ' No matter how many times they • Toreros play Cal Lutheran in home opener tonight-c. 2 blinked, the outcome refused to change. As a consequence some perceptio~s may ha~e to. Results such as this are difficult to ignore The Lobos rarely lose in the . always-filled 17,000·plus-seat arena !hey ~a_ll home, no matter who the ppo ition may be. It was there that they defeated top-ranked Arizona last season. New Mexico certainly did not

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expect to lose to a rebuilding team whose record was 11-17 last year w:ose leading scorer graduated ~nd w ose conference freshman player of the year transferred The Lobos are gOOd. They were ranked 24th nationally by one preseason publication. The Lobos have two 7-Iooters 7 O Rob Loeffel nd 7-2 Luc Lon 1 ' • not to_mention a 6-7 player, ~h~lie :homas,_ whose leaping abilit aHows him to play well abovJ the nm.

many guards, so I moved him to forward. Now he's playing well. It See Lockwood on Page C-2