Pal Tipped Plaintiff Attorney about 'Flea'
One question remained unanswered – until today – about “Flea,” the once-anonymous physician whose biting blogging about his ongoing medical malpractice case recently led to a Perry Mason moment at his Boston trial. How did the plaintiff lawyer learn that the defendant doctor might have authored the blog?
Another lawyer told Elizabeth Mulvey, after recognizing that Flea had outed himself, writes attorney Eric Turkewitz today in New York Personal Injury Lawyer. The fellow attorney realized Flea must be the defendant, Robert P. Lindeman, after he described on his blog details of a talk given by Mulvey, who was identified as the opposing counsel in his own case.
What happened next is now history, thanks to the Boston Globe: Mulvey asked Lindeman on the stand if he was in fact Flea, and he admitted that he was. While the import of this answer may well have been lost on the jury, it signalled to the doctor and his counsel that comments from the blog could come out at trial. The case reportedly settled for a substantial amount the next day.
