It’s All Pffftgrkt to Him

My friend Carl is a lawyer. More specifically, Carl is a plaintiff’s attorney, the kind of sue-happy barracuda most people detest--until it is their gas tank that explodes, or their surgeon who says, “Oops.”

Carl has done well. He’s got the blue BMW with a “Malibu Is a Way of Life” license frame. He’s got the Pat Riley haircut-suit combo. And the waiters at the Pacific Dining Car all know by heart his favorite drink and cholesterol count. Carl and I grew up together in Fresno, and as Valley boys at sea in the city we help each other along when we can. For example:

“Carl,” I was telling him last week. “I’ve got the perfect case for you.”

“I’m all pffftgrkt is it?” he replied. He had called me back from his BMW--and so, as always, about every third word was lost to static.

“Car phones,” I said.

“Hmmmmm.”

He sounded wary, as though I’d suggested he sue his own mother.

“Let me pskppt about it,” he said. “Uh-oh. Wait a flkjkt. Tunnel.”

A minor mystery. Here we are in Southern California, cradle of car culture, playground of Gloria Allred, with seemingly more lawyers and car phones per capita than anywhere in the land. And yet, the best anyone can tell, there’s never been a single lawsuit filed over a traffic accident involving a car phone. And for that matter, according to the Highway Patrol, car phones have never been found culpable in a single wreck.

“It is difficult to substantiate,” said a CHP spokesman. “People aren’t going to admit they were on the phone and not paying attention.”

Certainly, the anecdotal evidence is there. We’ve all dodged the exec-u-jerks who, looking down to dial, weave into the next lane. Or crept along at 40 m.p.h. behind some oblivious chatterbox. My latest encounter occurred on the Santa Monica Freeway just last week--yes, the day I called Carl. A woman in a white Honda drifted across four lanes, receiver to her ear, not once looking up from what appeared to be an appointment calendar.

Of course I gave her the horn. People who don’t own car phones rarely cut much slack for the people who do. My theory is that California motorists are creating a new model for class warfare. On the high end are the car phone people; at the bottom, motorists who pack guns. And in between is the vast majority, shaking fists and hoping no one shoots back.

Carl is familiar with the perils. He’s had many near-misses while dialing and once, deep in conversation, lost track of his speed and stacked up a lot of traffic on Pacific Coast Highway. Finally, one of the trailing motorists pulled around and threatened to run Carl off the road. Another time, Carl was in mid-conversation on the Hollywood Freeway when a carload of kids pelted the BMW with eggs.

“I’m not sure why I got egged,” he said later, hurt.

“Carl,” I told him gently, Fresnan to Fresnan, “it is because they hate you, and they hate everything you stand for.”

“Yes, I know that” he said. “But it also had something to do with that phone.”

With cellular telephones less expensive and ever more popular, there’s been a mild public buzz about the potential hazards: a couple of calls for legislation in obscure states and, out here, a CHP study that documented the obvious--drivers yakking on a car phone are more likely to miss their off-ramp or blow a stop sign.

The cellular industry is keen on promoting safety. The phones come equipped with hands-free speakers and one-button dialing--not that many people bother to use them--and industry officials are well-stocked with press releases about car phone users who save lives by dialing 911 and so forth. This is inoculation. Cellular is now a $6-billion industry, and who would want to expose that gold mine to some hotshot lawyer?

Still, our own eyes and the skid marks don’t lie, and I return to Carl with the question: Doesn’t it stand to reason that, somewhere here in the great freeway city, there sits a golden, groundbreaking car phone case, just waiting for the right lawyer to run with it? My faith in plaintiff’s attorneys as the only true counterweight to corporate irresponsibility has been shaken. Perhaps, I suggest, they are just too enamored of their own car phones.

“That’s interesting,” Carl says. “Let me ffkhttt it. Oh Jesus. Hey lookout! You son of a fjkffjt. “

Silence. Carl? You there, Carl? Oh well, he’ll be back.