Remember when Atty. Gen. Henry McMaster was all fired up to keep the campaign contributions that were given to his campaign by attorneys and their firms that were given a no-bid state contract? It was so long ago — almost a week and a half.
South Carolina’s attorney general says he will not return thousands of dollars in campaign donations from private lawyers he hired to pursue a case against drug maker Eli Lilly & Co., arguing Friday that a state law prohibiting those kinds of contributions does not apply to him.
“That’s obviously a no,” said Mark Plowden, a spokesman for Attorney General Henry McMaster, adding that the contributions were proper under state law.
Oh, those halcyon days. Well, investigators with the State Ethics Commission said the contributions were illegal, and on a Friday dominated by the Olympics hoopla, McMaster said he would return the $32,500 in contributions. Funny how the Sept. 24 bluster turns into an Oct. 2 turnaround.
Atty. Gen. Henry McMaster‘s people have been pimping an opinion rendered by former Atty. Gen. Travis Medlock. It’s understandable, since they have to be grasping at straws these days. Numerous commentators and reporters, including this site, have explained why McMaster’s situation with attorneys he hired for a suit against Eli Lilly was a little off-kilter. Now, the Wall Street Journal has weighed in.
Mr. McMaster, first elected in 2002 and now (surprise!) running for governor, sued Eli Lilly in 2007 to recover state money used to treat medical problems that he claims were caused by the antipsychotic drug Zyprexa. The suit is one of a new wave of Medicaid-related lawsuits, in which states target pharmaceutical companies to fill their health-budget holes.
More interesting than the suit’s dubious merits are Lilly’s recent court filings about the AG’s ties to trial lawyers. Mr. McMaster in 2006 chose three private lawyers—John S. Simmons, John Belton White, Jr., and F. Kenneth Bailey, Jr.—to prosecute Lilly on behalf of the state. The no-bid contingency contract—which Mr. McMaster refused to produce to Lilly for nearly a year—gives the private lawyers a sliding-scale cut of any judgment or settlement, a jackpot potentially worth tens of millions of dollars.
About a month after filing the case in 2007, according to the Lilly documents, Mr. Simmons’s law firm had turned around to contribute the maximum amount allowable ($3,500) under state law to Mr. McMaster’s re-election. Mr. White’s law firm contributed the same amount on the same day, and Mr. White later added a personal maximum donation. All told, the law firms, their lawyers and spouses have contributed more than $60,000 to Mr. McMaster since 2006. The AG can transfer this money to his gubernatorial account.
This sweetheart deal is rife with conflict of interest, and Lilly’s filing also lays out the legal and constitutional problems. Consider due process. Both the U.S. and South Carolina constitutions make clear that the state and its lawyers must be guided by justice and the public interest, not monetary gain. South Carolinians would be outraged if Mr. McMaster won a personal financial cut of any case he won as Attorney General. How is it better that his lawyers get it instead?
Sweet. Special favors for everyone, as long as you get no-bid contracts with the AG.
