This wait helps creepy company

By Monica Yant Kinney

Inquirer Columnist

Slots players aren't the only ones out of luck. Courts are closed all over the Garden State, again delaying a decision on whether M. Smith gets to live in peace with a company that would rather she die.. Regular readers will remember Smith, a local AIDS patient who, years ago, sold her $150,000 life insurance policy to a company for $90,000. Had she perished as predicted, Life Partners Inc. would have made a 66 percent return on the investment. Instead, Smith lived on, costing the company $100,000 or more.

Why? Because the contract also bound LPI to pay her health insurance as long as she walks the earth. More than a decade later, she's still kicking, and LPI's still screaming. Over the years, LPI has repeatedly tried to renege on the deal, threatening to stop paying, or waiting until the last minute as if hoping to get her policy canceled. Once, a man called Smith on behalf of investors wondering how she was feeling. Fed up and freaked out by strangers with such a keen interest in her death, she went to court. Smith found fierce advocates in Jacob Cohn, a Cozen O'Connor "Super Lawyer" handling her case pro bono, and AIDS Law Project veteran Ronda Goldfein.

'Callous Disregard'

When I first wrote about M. Smith v. LPI back in January, readers around the world weighed in with disgust over the company's sick stance. When the case went to court in February, Judge Allan Vogelson seemed similarly disturbed, saying it was all he could do to restrain himself. At the hearing, Vogelson showed no sympathy for LPI. A contract is a contract. In any business, he said, "you win some, you lose some." Worried that LPI would keep wiggling, Cohn asked the judge to order the company to set up a trust to pay her premiums. In April, Vogelson did just that, noting LPI's "callous disregard for the contract."

Vogelson ordered LPI to set aside $837,357 to keep Smith alive, factoring in her age (50), life expectancy (28.79 years), and the current cost of her health insurance ($29,085 a year). If Smith dies, the money goes back to LPI. Again, LPI balked. So Vogelson withdrew the order and gave Cohn the green light to seek summary judgement. In May, Cohn filed papers seeking $837,357 for Smith's health insurance, $1,674,714 in damages for "unconscionable commercial practices," and payment for his legal work. LPI's response? More balking. More stalling. And a last-ditch effort to get out of paying by getting Vogelson tossed from the case.

Let the gamesmanship begin

In court papers filed late last month, LPI'sattorney Joseph Kenney of Ballard Spahr, accused Vogelson of being "prejudiced" in favor of Smith because of his "strong comments" about the merits of the case. Funny, I thought the judge was just doing his job, being a judge and all. Goldfein told me she had never seen a judge "so mindful". Cohn was similarly distressed, filing a response saying, "LPI has sunk to a new low."

This week Cohn fired another round that rivals John Grisham's work as an entertaining legal read. In it Smith's lawyer refers to LPI's legal strategies as being "written in a bizarre Newspeak that woiuld boggle even Big Brother's mind." He called the company "sociopathic" and dubbed its dancing "gamesmanship" that is both "transparent and a trifle pathetic." My favorite zinger: "Whoever came up with this argument should not be permitted to drive cars or operate heavy machinery."

The case was scheduled for court Monday, before the state government shutdown. Now it's anyone's guess. As Cohn pointed out, "There's nobody I can call to ask." So Smith awaits her fate. And her lawyers, who try to keep a gallows humor about the dispute, hope their client stays close to home. As Goldfein puts it, "There's such a creepiness to this case. LPI could get lucky and she gets hit by a bus."

Contact Monica Yant Kinney at 856-779-3914 or myant@phillynews.com.