See You in Court Podcast
Episode: Georgia’s Nick Moraitakis on Landmark Civil Justice Cases, Mediation, and the Rule of Law
Hosts: Robin Frazer Clark & Lester Tate

Guest: Nick Moraitakis

Sponsor: Georgia Civil Justice Foundation

## Intro & Welcome
[Music Intro] Voiceover: Hello and welcome to See You in Court, a podcast that informs you about the Georgia civil justice system, what it means to you, and how it protects individual rights. During each episode, we dive deep into stories, cases, and insights that matter to Georgians. You can learn more on our website at www.seeyouincourtpodcast.org. Join the conversation on our YouTube channel at See You in Court Podcast and stay connected with us on our Facebook page. This podcast is sponsored by the Georgia Civil Justice Foundation. Your hosts are Robin Frazer Clark and Lester Tate, who are both past presidents of the State Bar of Georgia and who both serve on the board of directors of the Georgia Civil Justice Foundation. And now, this episode of See You in Court.

Robin Frazer Clark: Good morning friends and lovers of the law and welcome to See You in Court. I’m Robin Frazer Clark and with us here today is our co-host, Lester Tate. Hey, Lester.

Lester Tate: Hey, Robin! First show of the new year here. We’re taping on Friday the 13th. Are you superstitious at all?

Robin: I am not. My mom was from West Virginia and that is a superstitious bunch, but Bill and I were married on the 13th, so it’s a lucky number for me. Starting out the new year, we have a great lineup, and the first is Nick Moraitakis, who is with us today. Nick, glad to have you.

Nick Moraitakis: Absolutely. Thank you. Yes, I appreciate the opportunity to spend this time with you.

## Guest Introduction: Nick Moraitakis
Robin: Let me introduce our listeners to Nick.

Roots: Nick is a native Atlantan, attended public schools in DeKalb County, and worked his way through Emory College and Emory Law School. He is the first in his extended family to graduate college.

Early Career: He earned internships in the Department of Natural Resources during Jimmy Carter’s governorship and in the U.S. Congress in 1975.

Defense Work: After graduating in 1977, he spent 14 years representing insurance companies and self-insured corporations, trying dozens of cases to verdict (auto, truck, product liability, negligent security).

Plaintiff Practice: In 1993, Nick and his law partner Glenn Kushel began a plaintiff’s practice dedicated exclusively to individuals injured or killed by medical malpractice, nursing home abuse, trucking accidents, and product liability.

Mediation: He began a very successful mediation practice with Henning Mediation 16 years ago and has turned to 100% mediation in the last two years.

Accolades: Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, Advocate with the American Board of Trial Advocates, and winner of the Tradition of Excellence Award.

Lester: When you read that, Robin, I want to be Nick Moraitakis when I grow up! [Laughter]

## Political Origins & Early Influences
Robin: Nick, you’ve been practicing almost 50 years now. Tell us a little bit about what motivated you to become a lawyer in the first place.

Nick: Well, that’s very kind. I’ll tell you one thing—the ‘D’ I got in biology my freshman year at Emory eliminated the possibility of becoming a doctor! But I grew up interested in politics and government. John F. Kennedy’s vigor and youth inspired me.

When I graduated high school in 1970, it was a wild political year in Georgia. Jimmy Carter was running for governor against a slew of folks, including Carl Sanders (whom Jimmy labeled “Cufflinks Carl”), an avowed racist named J.B. Stoner, and a very sharp African-American lawyer/minister candidate from Albany by the name of C.B. King.

I got retained as a personal aide to Charlie Jones, who was running for Lieutenant Governor against Lester Maddox. Back then, politicking was town halls and forums all over the state. I got to see remarkable debates.

Later, I interned during the ’73 and ’74 legislative sessions for the Department of Natural Resources under Jimmy Carter. We had giants in the legislature then: Elliot Levitus, Sydney Marcus, Julian Bond, Max Cleland. We put together meaningful bills like the Chattahoochee River Bill and the Sand Dunes Bill. That got me into studying legislation. Law was just a natural fit for me.

Lester: It’s been said before that if war is diplomacy by other means, trials and court are politics by other means. True or false?

Nick: Yeah, except more civil! Because you have real rules. Politics today, as we all know, is completely freewheeling.

## Running for Office and the Georgia Legislature
Robin: When did you get the bug to run for office?

Nick: In 1984, Elliot Levitus got beat by Pat Swindle. Pat went to my high school, and when he beat Elliot and was so cocky about it, I thought about running. Later, I ran in the Democratic primary against Ben Jones.

Lester: Ben Jones from the Dukes of Hazzard?

Nick: Yes, he was “Cooter.” I didn’t appreciate how much name recognition meant. He beat me. That’s my claim to fame: getting beaten in an election by Cooter from the Dukes of Hazzard. I wear that label proudly.

Lester: “You haven’t lived the highs and lows of life until you’ve lost an election and won a jury trial.”

Robin: But later in your career, you did run for the Georgia House and got elected. It seems so hard to maintain a law practice and serve in the legislature.

Nick: It was a very hard time. Roy Barnes had redrawn the maps, creating a multi-member district that ran from Sandy Springs down to the Georgia Dome. We only had about 30 lawyers in the legislature at the time. If you’re a lawyer who does good work, you get pulled in every direction. Next thing you know, you’re helping people write their bills and explaining them. It was very busy and very contentious because we were fighting tort reform, the flag debate, and teacher salaries.

## The Art of Mediation
Robin: Let’s talk about your mediation practice. You are a highly sought-after mediator. Both defense and plaintiff attorneys readily agree to use you. What did your experience on both sides bring to your mediation practice?

Nick: I got involved after a health scare when I was 58, thinking I wanted to slow the litigation practice down. The slowing down didn’t work out as I’d hoped, but I love doing it now because it keeps my mind busy.

I appreciate what defense lawyers do; they are busy as they can be, and I was there once. Furthermore, our firm did a lot of medical malpractice stuff, so I tend to get a high percentage of medical malpractice mediations now, which are tough and complicated. It also helps that I understand the stress of the plaintiff in the room—the “rookie” in the room. The defense side often doesn’t appreciate that pressure.

Lester: I went up to Harvard Law School recently and did their mediator training. I still worry about how hard it is to take off that advocacy hat and put on the neutral hat. What’s the most difficult part?

Nick: Patience. That is the hard part. Some of my best friends are defense lawyers and they say, “I don’t know how you have the patience for that.” That is the main characteristic you must have.

Also, the mediation landscape has changed. In the old days, you didn’t go to mediation until you tried to settle amongst yourselves and couldn’t. Now, a plaintiff sends a demand, the defendant says they’ll mediate, and that’s the first time they talk. Lawyers very seldom have serious settlement conversations before getting into the room. Because of that, I’m seeing more cases that don’t settle on the day of mediation, though I stay on them and get them done months later.

## Landmark Case 1: The Shooting of Kathryn Johnston (2006)
Robin: I want to talk about a couple of your famous cases. The first is the fatal 2006 shooting of Kathryn Johnston, a 92-year-old woman, by Atlanta Police Department narcotics investigators (the “Red Dog” unit). They burst into her home unannounced on a no-knock warrant, she tried to protect herself with a gun, and they shot and killed her. Then they planted drugs to cover it up. You represented her family.

Nick: Yes, Kathryn Johnston had no husband or children. Her sister was represented by the Cochran Firm (Hezekiah Sizemore and Jon Williams), and I was hired by the family of her deceased brother. We decided to handle it together, which was smart.

To keep the city in play—where the money was—we had to overcome municipal immunity by proving what these officers did was part of an unwritten policy of the police department under the Monell doctrine. That is incredibly hard to prove.

Here is what happened in a nutshell:

The Quota System: There was an unwritten quota for these drug units to have a certain number of arrests per month. It was the week of Thanksgiving, the end of the month was nearing, and this team needed one more drug arrest.

The Informant: They pressured a confidential informant (CI) on parole to give them an address of a heavy-duty drug house. He gave them an address, but it was a street away from Miss Johnston’s home.

The Falsified Warrant: To get a no-knock warrant, they lied in the affidavit, claiming they had already sent someone in to buy drugs at her house. They hadn’t.

The Raid & Cover-Up: They busted into the wrong house. She fired a warning shot into the air, and they unloaded on her. When they realized their mistake, they literally went into her basement, planted drugs, and lied about everything.

Robin: Who found the cover-up?

Nick: The FBI got involved and went to see the confidential informant. The CI said, “No, I’m not playing this game,” and he came clean.

From there, two of the officers reached out to us through their lawyers because they were facing serious federal prison time. We spent entire days with them, and they gave us the roadmap to prove the quota system existed. They identified emails and told us who would confess under oath. We deposed everyone—every colonel, sergeant, lieutenant, the Chief of Police, and city council members.

We aggressively filed a motion for summary judgment. The city moved to remove the case, but federal Judge Marvin Shoob had the case. He called us for a pre-trial hearing and said over the phone: “I want you guys to mediate this case before I rule on this motion, because somebody is not going to like the outcome.” [Laughter] Neither side knew which one of us he was talking about! We mediated and settled for $4.9 million.

## Landmark Case 2: The 1993 Midtown Marriott Sinkhole Disaster
Robin: The second famous case is the 1993 sinkhole disaster at the Marriott Courtyard Hotel in Midtown Atlanta. A massive sinkhole opened in the parking lot, two people died, and it presented an unbelievably complicated array of geological, engineering, and geotechnical issues.

Nick: Yes, technically a sewer collapse. A Guatemalan man, Oscar Cano, and a Russian woman died. The Russian lady’s car fell through and she got stuck; my client, Oscar Cano, got sucked through the sewer and washed out into Tanyard Creek. It was a horrible death.

We took so many depositions we had to set aside one week every month. When we first got involved, the defendants had already locked up all the local geotechnical engineers from Georgia Tech. We had to find an expert from Purdue University, Dr. Milton Harr, to teach us the science.

What the documents ultimately showed was unbelievable corporate greed intersecting with municipal incompetence:

The History: The sewer, known as the Orme Street trunk, was built in the early 1900s as a massive concrete cylinder you could drive a car through. Over the years, with the construction of I-85, the city just dumped dirt on top of it. The trunk was never designed to handle that weight or the massive water runoff from heavy rains.

Marriott’s Knowledge: Marriott wanted into Midtown. Ted Turner had previously looked at the property to expand CNN but backed out after his engineers went into the trunk, took photos of cracked floors, and warned that nothing heavy should ever be built near it. Marriott found these reports, discussed the sewer in their board meetings, and decided to build a high-rise on the solid granite portion of the site while placing the parking lot directly over the dangerous sewer.

The Falsified “Safety Net”: To protect the parking lot, Marriott commissioned a company called Tensar to build a subterranean structural grid or “safety net.” It was supposed to hold the soil for four days if a crack occurred, allowing time to warn people. They never told the hotel staff about this system.

The Failure: On the Thursday before the collapse, the head of Atlanta Public Works went into the sewer, saw massive cracks, and tried to call a repair company out of Tennessee. The company couldn’t get there until Monday. Public Works said, “We may not have until Monday,” in front of witnesses—yet they did nothing but put up a few meaningless yellow signs. On Monday morning at 6:00 a.m., it collapsed.

Robin: I remember reading that the engineering calculations for that safety net were completely botched.

Nick: Yes! I went down to Miami to spend three days with our expert, Dr. Harr, to review Tensar’s 12 pages of mathematical graph paper calculations. My trigonometry was non-existent, but Dr. Harr showed me that by page nine, the engineer had made blatant mathematical errors. It wasn’t just a negligent design; it was a negligent manufacture.

I took the defense engineer’s deposition for two days. On the second day, I walked him through his formulas line-by-line: cosine, sine, etc. We got to page nine, he stalled, and he said, “Hmm, this can’t be right. There is a series of mistakes in here.” He literally lost it. His lawyer had to call an hour-long break. He came back and admitted he completely screwed up the math. That was the end of that.

## Defining Justice and the Rule of Law
Robin: What are your thoughts about where we stand with the rule of law right now, and what can lawyers do?

Nick: I think we’re in a very dangerous, difficult, and dark place, frankly. I’m worried the law is in danger of being ignored, abused, and circumvented. I read a quote from Jon Meacham citing Alexander Hamilton, who said that with this constitutional experiment, we’re going to see how reason holds up against force. Reason requires a sense of fairness; force can be anything.

What can lawyers do? We have to speak up. With upcoming elections, we ought to volunteer to protect the polling systems. I worry about the upper courts, the delays, and the blatant ignoring of court orders without consequences. We have to keep pounding the pavement for the rule of law.

Robin: Our last question to every guest: How do you define justice?

Nick: Justice Carla Wong McMillian recently spoke to new bar admittees and talked about how no one is above the law and no one is too low to avail themselves of the law’s protections.

Nick: “I think justice relies first on an understanding that all people are equal. Equality and fairness together are what justice is all about.”

For those of us who spend our lives in the courtroom, we are fortunate. The premier place where equality and fairness come to life is when you take a person who is suffering, less fortunate, or in despair, and place them before a jury alongside a massive corporate citizen. In that room, they stand as exact equals. For trial lawyers, we don’t just talk about the concept of justice—we get to see it happen in front of our very eyes.

## Legal News Roundtable
Robin: Thank you, Nick! Now is the time in our program where Lester and I bring you a legal news item. Lester, you’re up first.

Lester’s Segment: The County Seat Lawyer
Lester: I want to share a piece from the ABA Journal from June of 1950 written by Robert H. Jackson (Supreme Court Justice and Nuremberg prosecutor) titled The County Seat Lawyer. It’s a tribute to country lawyers:

“He decided not to specialize nor did he pick and choose clients. He rarely declined service to worthy ones because of an inability to pay… He identified himself with the client’s cause fully, sometimes too fully. He would fight the adverse party, fight counsel, fight every hostile witness, fight the court, fight public sentiment, fight any obstacle. He never quit… If he lost, he joined the client at the tavern in damning the judge, which is the last right in closing any unsuccessful case… The law to him was like a religion and its practice was more than a means of support. It was a mission… A free, self-governing republic stands as a monument for the little-known and unremembered as well as the famous men of our profession.”

Robin: Beautiful. It reminds me of Attorney Bob Benham walking down the street to the courthouse in Cartersville, Georgia, and people walking behind him saying, “Attorney Benham’s going to court.” —

Robin’s Segment: Judges Running Amok in Texas
Robin: My story is about a judge in Bexar County, Texas—Judge Smedley Gonzalez. In a 2024 incident, Judge Gonzalez ordered a defense attorney, Elizabeth Russell, to be placed in handcuffs and seated in the jury box during a probation revocation hearing.

The attorney had simply asked for a moment to confer with her client, who functioned below average intellectually. The judge went off the handle, said “You’re not going to be allowed to be argumentative,” and ordered her into custody.

Fast forward to now: a Bexar County grand jury has officially indicted the judge on felony charges of unlawful restraint of a public servant and official oppression. She has been suspended from the bench.

Lester: It’s one thing to feel disrespected, but it’s hard for me to see how any rational person would feel disrespected by an attorney asking to speak to their client. When they meet in the tavern about that case, cursing the judge will be completely justified!

## Outro
Robin: Well, it’s been a great program. We want to thank our sponsor, the Georgia Civil Justice Foundation, and our producer, Philip Hoover. You can learn more about Lester Tate at akentate.com and more about me at gatrialawyers.net. See you next time!

Lester: All right, till next time. See you in court.

Voiceover: You’ve been listening to the See You in Court podcast, brought to you by the Georgia Civil Justice Foundation. For further insights and resources, visit our website at www.seeyouincourtpodcast.org. Special thanks to our producer, Philip Hoover. I’m Fred Smith, Executive Director of the Georgia Civil Justice Foundation. Until next time, we’ll see you in court.

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