Bull (2016) s03e13 Episode Script

Prior Bad Acts

1 Hey, Mr.
Weeks.
How's this download interface coming, Sai? It's not terribly elegant.
Let me try something.
Look at this.
You see? Much more seductive.
Much less for the user to think about.
Cleaning those for me? Hey.
What are you doing here? I need your help.
This thing isn't working, see, I keep calling and texting my boyfriend, but he just doesn't answer.
Maybe it's not your phone.
Maybe it's your boyfriend.
Maybe is doing it on purpose.
Maybe he just finds you too damn distracting.
So he's ignoring my calls and texts? He's ignoring his phone, not you.
Why don't we, um, step into my office and we can hash this out? You all right? I'm a bit breathless.
Mission accomplished.
Actually Chest pain.
Mmm.
I think I should take a nitroglycerin tablet.
Top drawer, right-hand side.
Sexy, huh? A little romance, nitroglycerin to open up the blood vessels.
What do you want with an old bastard like me? I'm not gonna marry you.
Good.
'Cause I'm not gonna marry you.
I'm just gonna love you to death.
Now get out of here so I can get some work done.
Promise me.
You won't work all night? Okay.
I promise.
But don't wait up.
Surf's up.
Do me a favor, remind me to book airfare for Diana this weekend, round-trip, Houston to JFK.
- Will do.
- We all set for our meeting at 10:00? Kevin Weeks is waiting in the conference room and Benny is waiting in your office.
My office? Are you telling me the the surviving brother of the late founder of Weeks Dynamic, the second-largest technology company in the world, is sitting alone in the conference room? While Benny sits in my office? These people were very specific on the phone.
They want to hire us to represent them in court.
I am not a lawyer.
Fine.
Here.
I will go straight to the conference room and do me a favor, tell Clarence Darrow the pleasure of his company would be much appreciated in this meeting.
You should go see Benny first.
I'll go sit with Mr.
Weeks, then I will get Diana's ticket, but you should go see Benny first.
Benny.
I'm not sure what's going on, but we got a big deal, big money client sitting all by himself in the conference room.
My dad died this morning.
Died in his sleep.
I just got the call 20 minutes ago.
Diego.
Yeah, I just just needed a couple of minutes in private.
Pull myself together.
I know all about the Weeks meeting; I'll be right in there.
No Benny.
Go home, Benny.
I'll handle this.
Dr.
Bull.
Uh, this is Kevin Weeks.
- Mr.
Weeks.
- My deepest condolences.
Unfortunately, our principal attorney, Mr.
Benjamin Colón, couldn't be with us this morning.
So I have asked Chunk Palmer, an attorney we work with quite a bit, and his co-counsel Taylor Rentzel to sit in with us during this meeting.
I'm just gonna go take care of that other little thing.
When my older brother died last week, I was shocked.
But not surprised.
We didn't talk about it outside of the family, but he had a heart condition that he discovered shortly after he turned 40.
I remember thinking at the time, uh, "What is it about "these visionaries that so many of them seem to leave us so early?" Is that the trade-off for getting to be someone who changes the world? I won't lie.
Uh Holding together a company that always seemed to have the next great idea is quite daunting when the idea guy has left the building.
What is it we can do for you, Mr.
Weeks? I received a call from my brother's primary care physician the other night.
He had received a call from the hospital that treated my brother after they found him unconscious in his office.
Turns out, my brother did not die of heart failure.
He died of a nitroglycerin overdose.
Obviously, this information has not been made public yet.
I don't understand, how can we be of help? The treatment plan my brother followed only called for him to take nitroglycerin with the onset of angina or chest pains.
He did not take it on a daily basis.
Sometimes months or weeks would go by and he would not take it.
The point being? That m my brother lost his life because his cardiologist apparently prescribed a lethal dosage of this drug.
But isn't it possible he simply took too much? More pills than he should have? My brother was a famously fastidious person, especially about his health.
He followed instructions, particularly medical instructions, to the letter.
And he was a world-class germophobe.
There is no chance in hell that he took more of this drug than he was directed to.
That's gonna be difficult to prove.
That's why I'm here.
I want to sue this doctor.
I want to put him out of business.
I want to make sure he never does this to anyone else ever again.
And I know I'll need some great lawyering and a sympathetic jury to help me do that and those are the two things you people specialize in.
Aren't they? Take this case.
That is a $1 million retainer to get you started.
Just let me know when you burn through that and I'll send more your way.
Thank you for your time, I'll let myself out.
Boy, that is some fierce kind of grief.
Think we're gonna take the case? For what it's worth, I vote yes.
I like being a lawyer.
I don't like funerals.
Are you one of those people who wants to talk to take your mind off of what's going on or are you one of those people who just likes to be left to their own thoughts in a moment like this, 'cause I can go either way.
What do you want to talk about? I don't know.
Your dad? I don't really have much to say about my dad; it hasn't sunk in yet.
You know what has sunk in? There's just my sister.
No mom, no dad, just my sister.
Just starting to feel lonely.
I don't know how you do it by yourself.
I have you, sir.
And you have me.
So it turns out, the front and back of Mr.
Weeks' hands were saturated in extremely high levels of a nitroglycerin ointment.
I believe it was that, in combination with the nitroglycerin pill that he took that night that proved fatal.
Well, this is the first time hearing about nitroglycerin ointment.
Well, some people do take their nitro in ointment form.
Was this something that was prescribed? That's part of what took so long.
I needed to confer with Mr.
Weeks's MD and the answer is no.
Wait a second, I'm confused.
Was he self-medicating? I honestly don't think so.
There was no reason for him to be using that ointment, certainly not all over the front and back of his hands, let alone in such a lethal amount.
So what are you saying? What's your official finding? My official finding is this was a homicide.
You know, Izzy's going to be here.
Well, I assumed as much.
Don't worry; I'll keep my distance.
Ah, it's not necessary.
It's my sister.
She's very fond of you, always asks about you.
Was married to you, for goodness's sake.
Be that as it may.
Besides, isn't she gonna be with her new husband? Nah, actually, I don't think so.
Something going on there.
I keep my nose out of it.
Oh, Izzy.
I'm so sorry.
Uh - Bull? - Go into my office.
Are you all right? You sound strange.
It's been a strange morning.
Well, I can't wait to hear.
So, who starts? You do.
And take your time; the sooner you're done the sooner I have to go back out and mingle.
Well, let's start with the easy stuff.
Diane is all set.
I went ahead and booked the tickets and the cars.
She's gonna be here Saturday morning and she sounds pretty damned excited to me.
Excellent, I'm counting the hours.
What else you got? Well, the big bulletin is: the results from the independent autopsy are in.
And while everybody is certain it was nitroglycerin that killed Mr.
Weeks, it seems pretty unlikely it was his doctor.
Ah-ha.
Does our client know? Well, I was waiting to tell you.
Well, have Chunk see if he can set up an emergency meeting with him today to bring him up to speed.
Next? You're up.
I saw Izzy at the funeral.
Well, that couldn't have been a surprise.
She looked so fragile.
That couldn't have been a surprise, either.
I didn't know what to do.
I didn't do any of it very well.
What did you want to do? I wanted to save her.
I've always wanted to save her.
I got to go.
Dr.
Bull extends his apologies for not being here personally, but we, too, had a death in our family.
Mr.
Colón, our principal attorney, and the man who will be calling all the shots for your case should it go to court, um, he lost his father this week.
Sorry.
And thank you for coming to us.
No thanks necessary.
I prefer it.
I have a very dispirited company on my hands.
Our stock is cratering, our sales are suffering.
So, any excuse to get out.
Well, we have some news.
We conducted a second independent autopsy on your late brother and he definitely died of a nitroglycerin overdose.
But the overdose had nothing to do with the pills he was taking.
Excuse me? We don't think your brother's cardiologist was involved at all.
Is there a chance that you could give us a list of those close to him? We'd like to do some research, see if we can find someone who might have had a motive to do this.
One last thing, were you ever aware that your brother was using this nitroglycerin ointment on his hands? On his hands? No.
Like I told you, James was a germophobe.
A world-class germophobe.
Only thing he ever put on his hands was sanitizer.
He put it on by the boatload.
Good morning, Izzy's voice mail.
I was thinking maybe we should talk.
I left a voice mail for you last night, but you never got back to me, which I completely understand, I just It is a new day.
The sun is out, I would love to hear your voice.
I hope you're okay.
And one other thing, I'm hoping that you didn't say anything to Benny about what happened.
And if you did say something to Benny, I'm hoping you will call me and let me know.
Which is not why I'm calling.
Crap.
Just call me, will you? We were married.
I mean, she's the girlfriend, she's not in the will, she's only known him six or seven months.
So there's no apparent motive, but the deeper I dig, the weirder it gets.
And his girlfriend, this Carolyn, she's on her way over? Within the hour.
Carolyn Kelly? And you are? Dr.
Jason Bull.
I think the more tantalizing question is, and you are? The only reason I ask is this lady, Alice Hatcher, she married her high school sweetheart.
In Buffalo, New York.
He became a long haul trucker.
Left their home one night in the middle of a blizzard to drive a truck full of mattresses to Chicago.
Apparently he had drugs in his system, which surprised his friends because none of them ever knew him to use drugs.
One of them even suggested that the drugs might have been hidden in something he ate or drank.
I guess we'll never know.
Slid off an overpass, went over a guardrail, fell 35 feet to the highway below.
42 feet.
I became a widow at 22.
Worst day of my life.
I'm sure it was.
So here's a fascinating tidbit: the trucker who, according to his friends, loved his wife with every fiber of his being and made $30,000 a year, had a life insurance policy worth $2 million.
Which of these things is not like the other? And Alice Me.
Was the sole beneficiary.
Now, this lady sure looks like you.
But her name is Brenda McConnell.
And her hair is That's me.
You know, all you had to do was ask.
I changed my name because I suddenly came into a lot of money and I didn't want the lowlifes from high school to look me up, track me down and try and figure out some way of getting some.
Hmm.
Makes perfect sense.
Change your hair color, change your hometown.
You met your second husband in San Francisco seven years ago, a lovely man.
Had a trust fund worth over $20 million.
Sadly, was an insulin-dependant diabetic who somehow, despite having cared for himself without incident his entire life injected five times more insulin than needed and died shortly thereafter, leaving Brenda Me.
a very wealthy widow.
Again.
Second-worst day of my life.
- I can only imagine.
- Which brings us to Carolyn.
That's me.
And the death of James Weeks.
Third-worst day of my life.
Don't take this the wrong way, but I'm starting to sense you're a very unlucky lady to be around.
Are you implying I had something to do with James's death? No, I'm flat-out stating it.
I just got off the phone with Kevin Weeks, your late boyfriend's brother.
He has asked us to file suit on his behalf against you, Carolyn Kelly.
AKA Brenda McConnell, AKA Alice Hatcher, for wrongful death, intentional infliction of emotional distress, battery and tortious interference.
Whew.
That's a mouthful.
And we're gonna keep your tab open, just in case we come across any other goodies as we continue to investigate.
You have been served.
Based on what? Let's just say for the moment I'm playing a hunch.
And here's another one: you should get yourself a lawyer.
Come on, admit it.
Fourth-worst day of your life? He doesn't live here anymore.
First time in the big city, fella? Hey.
If I wanted some smart-ass banter, I'd just go home and talk to myself.
Someone's in an excellent mood.
How many times are you allowed to leave a message without getting an answer before you move from concerned acquaintance to potential predator? Give me a time frame.
36 hours or so.
And how many calls or texts? I'd rather not say.
You should just drop everything and register as a sex offender right now.
Hmm.
Diana? I'd rather not talk about it.
And this can't be what you came in here to discuss.
No, but this is so much better.
You win.
Wanted to tell you Danny called.
All the hand sanitizer in James Weeks' office is long gone.
Oh.
No doubt our girl swooped in there and made sure she left no evidence behind.
But Danny did find a bottle in his locker at the company gym.
She dropped it off for testing, and we should know something by morning.
So, if Diana's not taking your calls, should I perhaps cancel her flight? Yeah, you probably should.
I probably should.
I'll call her.
And it's Izzy who's not returning my calls.
Oh, my.
I'll call Diana.
Forget I said anything.
And after testing the bottle of hand sanitizer found in Mr.
Weeks's gym locker, what did you find? That it contained an extraordinarily high concentration of nitroglycerin ointment.
And in your expert opinion, Doctor, is there any medical basis upon which to believe that perhaps Mr.
Weeks himself might have mixed this ointment into his hand sanitizer? No, none whatsoever.
For one thing, Mr.
Weeks was under the care of one of the city's finest cardiologists.
For another, his prescription was for pills, not ointment.
And thirdly, his prescription clearly indicated that he was only to use the drug upon the onset of symptoms, not as an ongoing course of treatment.
And another thing that strongly suggests that Mr.
Weeks had no idea the hand sanitizer he was using was tainted is that those who do use nitroglycerin ointment know full well that it is not meant to be massaged into the skin.
Vigorously rubbing it all over your hands, as one does with sanitizer, would significantly increase the potency of an already potent drug, a drug that must be precisely dosed in order to be helpful and not harmful.
So, based on the concentration of nitroglycerin found in the hand sanitizer and the manner of application, how many squirts of sanitizer would it take to cause heart failure for a man in James Weeks's condition? In combination with one of his pills? Just one.
Thank you, Dr.
Barnes.
No further questions, Your Honor.
Good morning, Doctor.
Just for the record, the Medical Examiner for the City of New York ruled James Weeks's death an accident.
Isn't that correct? That's correct.
And you don't have the authority to overrule that finding, do you, Dr.
Barnes? It's not a question of overruling.
I was asked to formulate my own independent scientific opinion.
Which I did, based on an examination that was significantly more thorough.
And again, for the record, the plaintiff and his lawyers paid you a generous sum to formulate this opinion.
Isn't that right, Dr.
Barnes? Yes.
Just as I'm sure your client is paying you handsomely to ask me these questions.
Now, in the interest of being thorough and to be doubly sure that the Weeks family gets absolutely everything they paid you for, did you find any evidence of any kind to indicate that Carolyn Kelly is the person who mixed this deadly nitroglycerin into James Weeks's sanitizer? No, I didn't.
No further questions, Your Honor.
Izzy.
I heard you don't drink anymore.
Well, don't believe everything you hear.
You remember where Glassman's is? Want to meet me there tomorrow at 8:00? I'd like that a lot, actually.
Great.
Now stop calling me.
I have to be honest with you.
I don't know what to do with this.
There's no evidence.
There's no nothing.
The most damning thing about her is that it appears she's done this two other times to two other men, but we can't even bring that up in court.
Why not? Well, to begin with, she was never charged.
And even if she had been charged, the court would almost always disallow it.
But why? Relevant evidence is evidence tending to prove or disprove that someone did something.
But it The fact that they did it in the past doesn't actually prove that they did it in the present.
If only we could prove that it was Carolyn who put that stuff in the hand sanitizer.
By tomorrow, when we basically have to rest our case because other than the accused, we have no other witnesses.
So that's it? We're done? Is this woman some kind of criminal mastermind? I mean, all of us, all of this technology and we still can't prove anything? We still don't even know why she did it.
She kills for money.
Why can't we find the money? I was reading in the paper this morning about all the people losing their shirts because of Weeks Dynamic stock going into the toilet.
Well, hey, well, the world believes that without James, there is no Weeks Dynamic.
And they're probably right.
What did his brother say that day he came in here? "Holding together a company "that always seemed to have the next great idea is really hard when the idea guy has left the building.
" Wait, wait.
What is that old expression? "For everybody who makes money in the stock market, someone has to lose.
" I never understood that.
My ex-husband.
He's a stockbroker.
He understands it.
It's the only thing he ever wanted to talk about.
The thousands of ways he could make you money.
Taylor there's a free piece of pizza in it for you if you will call him and ask him two questions for me.
One: so, if everybody in the world loses money when James Weeks dies, who makes money? And two: what would it have been worth if someone knew exactly when he was going to die? Um I'll try.
I'll call him.
I don't know if I'll get him.
It's okay.
I'm here all night.
He sometimes doesn't want to speak to me if it's not about our son.
Make it about your son.
Do you mind if I use the conference room? Use anything you want.
Uh Yes? Can I get you anything? Can I bring you anything? A motive? Psst! Hey.
What are you so happy about? This has all the makings of a pretty horrible day.
I got the world on a string.
I got three hours of sleep.
I got a hot date tonight, and I know what that black widow did and how she did it.
If you're messing with me, this is so cruel.
And I think I have a way we can talk about her first two victims without the judge throwing the book at us.
Good morning, Ms.
Kelly.
I know you've been through a lot, so I'll try to get this over with as quickly and painlessly as I can.
Thank you.
Now, if I can, I'd like to go back 24 years to the death of your first husband.
Objection.
Relevance? In fact, may we approach the bench? You read my mind.
How red is it? It's like a forest fire in here.
All red.
No green.
Your Honor, I think we all know what this man is trying to do here.
Allow me, please.
Mr.
Colón I know all about this woman's two previous marriages.
And I know all about her husbands meeting untimely ends.
But as you well know, none of that can be considered admissible.
And none of that is actually relevant.
Your Honor, if you'll allow me, I did not ask the question as an avenue to explore how her husbands may have died or her possible involvement in those deaths.
I'm simply going down another road here.
And if you'll just give me a little room Fine, Mr.
Colón.
But the operative word here is "little.
" And you don't want to push me.
Not I.
Not ever.
Proceed.
As I was saying after your first husband died in that horrible traffic accident, you went back to school, didn't you? Yes.
And what was it that you studied? Personal finance.
Personal finance, okay.
Any particular reason you chose to study personal finance? I-I'm guessing it's because you were young and you didn't have much experience with money.
I believe your husband had some life insurance.
Objection again.
What does this have to do with Mr.
Weeks' death? The ice is getting paper-thin where you're standing, Mr.
Colón.
And the sun is coming out, and the temperature is rising.
Am I being clear? Crystal clear.
Thank you.
So, again, why did you choose to study personal finance? It's very much what you said.
My husband died unexpectedly.
Thankfully, he had quite a bit of insurance, and I needed to find ways to make that money last as long as possible.
That makes perfect sense.
Now, in the course of your studies, I'm sure you spent some time learning about the stock market.
It was part of the curriculum, yes.
And just to get the obvious question out of the way, do you own any stock in Weeks Dynamic? No.
Not a single share, not ever.
James kept encouraging me to invest.
I think he thought it would secure my future, but it made me uncomfortable.
Well, that's very admirable.
Yeah, Bull, I don't see where you're going here, and neither does the jury.
Just remember what the young doctor said to his mother when she asked what he wanted for Christmas.
Patience.
Do you know anything about "shorting stocks"? "Shorting stocks.
" Are you familiar with that? I've certainly heard of it.
I'm sure in the course of the four years at school we talked about it, but honestly, I I don't remember very much.
So if I asked you to explain it to the jury, you couldn't or wouldn't? I haven't been to college in over a decade.
Ah.
Well, that's funny.
Because according to my notes, you took a course in "Alternative Earning Strategies for the Stock Market.
" "Shorting.
" Wouldn't you consider that an alternative earning strategy? I suppose you might.
- Your Honor! - What, Counsel? He's heading down a road, and I'm sensing we're almost there.
Are we almost there, Mr.
Colón? Oh, we are, Your Honor.
Great.
Continue, then.
Thank you.
Now, as I understand it, this "shorting" stuff, you could make a lot of money doing it.
You just have to know some things and be willing to take some risks, right? - In theory, I guess.
- Okay.
So, help me understand.
Say there's a really successful stock.
Say Weeks Dynamic, prior to your boyfriend's death, just as a hypothetical.
Objection! Overruled.
Let's say it's going for a hundred dollars a share, and someone wanted to short it they would call a broker and make a deal to what? Borrow, not buy, say a hundred thousand shares? - That sound about right? - Objection! Calls for facts not in evidence.
It's a hypothetical, Your Honor.
The jury understands that.
The witness studied personal finance.
I'm simply asking her to use her expertise to help us understand a business concept we might otherwise not be familiar with.
The witness will answer the question.
It seems to make sense so far.
Great! So now that we've borrowed these shares at a hundred dollars apiece, we have to turn around and sell those shares at a hundred, a hundred and one, a hundred and two, a hundred and three isn't that correct? I believe that's the idea.
No, but wait we don't actually own them.
So now we've got to make good to the person we borrowed them from.
Right? Of course.
What if what if they were worth a lot less than when you borrowed them five days earlier? What if, as fate would have it, the head of the company suddenly passed away? I'm sorry, what is the question? Did you short 40,000 shares of Weeks stock during the five days prior to James Weeks's death? I don't care what anyone says, him doing that, it never gets old.
Your Honor, the plaintiff would like to enter into evidence this collection of paperwork initiated by the defendant to create a string of shell companies for the sole purpose of disguising Ms.
Kelly's transactions as related to the shorting of Weeks stock.
There's still some connective tissue missing, but I think the evidence makes the defendant's intent abundantly clear.
- Your Honor! Objection! - Ms.
Garfield, you will have your chance to cross-examine.
Objection overruled.
Now according to the employees at Weeks Dynamic, on the night of James Weeks's death, you spent an hour with him behind closed doors in his office.
Isn't that true? If they say so.
And wasn't the purpose of that visit, that time behind closed doors, to get your boyfriend physically excited? Physically taxed enough to trigger chest pains so he would take his pill? And knowing what a germophobe he was, top it off with some of your specially formulated hand sanitizer? Isn't that why the paramedics found James Weeks naked? Come on, Marissa, we're giving 'em sex, we're giving 'em violence you can't tell me that jury's still all red.
I Sorry, I got so engrossed in listening, I forgot to say anything.
Looks like a freshly mowed lawn in here.
The witness will answer the question.
I'd like to plead the fifth.
Excellent call.
No further questions, Your Honor.
Order in this court, please.
Order! It's been a hell of a week.
It's been a hell of week.
I called the FBI they're gonna open an investigation into the deaths of Carolyn's first two husbands.
Insurance fraud, murder, the whole kit and caboodle.
- Excellent.
- Mm-hmm.
What a day.
You must be beat.
Got a hot date.
Wha What about Diana? Never mind.
I don't want to know.
Hey, girl Do you remember that? Being young and stupid? Speak for yourself.
I'm still stupid.
Miss you so much I'm sorry I'm late.
I was almost out the door when my husband called, and since I haven't spoken to him in almost three weeks, I figured I should pick it up.
I tell you no lie I've lost enough men in my life this week, and I'm just, um I'm not ready to lose him just yet.
I'm sorry.
Are you gonna save me? So long If you say good-bye Take it.
I give you permission.
Is there anything I can do? Stop calling me.
If I'm really drowning I will call you.
Your diet cola.
Without you Vodka, rocks.
It certainly does.
Don't mind me.
And hey, girl Now, don't put me on So, that's it? I'm just your lifeguard? I get to save you, but.
.
We never actually get to go swimming together anymore? We did that already.
I'm sorry if I confused you at the funeral.
I was pretty confused myself.
Don't be mad at me.
I'm not mad.
Hey, girl And I won't call.
Sorry about your dad.
Sorry about so many things.
Now sit yourself down I'm not Ashamed to get down On the ground And then Beg you to stay Let's Let's go away Thanks.
I just I suddenly realized I'm alone in the deep end of the pool, and I I got a cramp.
Don't worry about it, ma'am.
That's what we're here for.
Oh, no, please Don't go away Hey, girl
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