F. Lee Bailey, a onetime “Dream Team” lawyer tied to some of the most high-profile cases in recent history, has died, his former law partner told the Herald.
Kenneth Fishman, a retired Massachusetts Superior Court judge, said his longtime friend died Thursday morning. Bailey was 87.
“He became the architect of the modern criminal defense attorney,” Fishman said Thursday. “He was able to display the qualities that make for a hard-charging defense attorney.”
Bailey was a Boston University Law School graduate and native of Waltham.
But Bailey, who had to declare bankruptcy late in his career and was disbarred, will forever be remembered as a flamboyant attorney who defended stars and notorious criminals from O.J. Simpson to “Boston Strangler” Albert DeSalvo.
He also represented Patty Hearst, the newspaper heiress convicted of bank robbery in 1976, and My Lai massacre Army Capt. Ernest Medina.
But it all started with his defense of Ohio physician Sam Sheppard, convicted in 1954 of murdering his wife. The movie “The Fugitive” starring Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones was said to be based on that case.
Bailey told the Herald in 2018 he was attempting to recast his reputation with a book intended for a generation too young to have lived through Simpson’s “trial of the century.”
“There has been a polarization as bad as I’ve ever seen,” said Bailey. “A lot of white people have berated me for prostituting my talents; blacks were happy with the outcome (of the trial). I finally decided millennials are large in number. I can reach them.”
Bailey suggested Simpson — found not guilty — did not murder his wife and her companion. His book placed blame on hitmen sent by Cuban or Columbian drug dealers to collect a $30,000 debt and the victims were killed due to mistaken identity. That theory never panned out.
Fishman said Bailey should be remembered for his uncanny ability to “mesmerize” a jury or an audience. “He was brilliant, eloquent, and had more chutzpah than anyone I’ve ever seen,” Fishman added.
Bailey was all-in for his clients. And that’s what set him apart, the former judge added.
“I get paid for seeing that my clients have every break the law allows. I have knowingly defended a number of guilty men. But the guilty never escape unscathed. My fees are sufficient punishment for anyone,” Bailey was once quoted as saying.
He also once said, “the memory of the American public is about six weeks.”
Hard to argue with that considering the pace of major crimes and those willing to open their wallets to hire Bailey.
He was also a court expert always in demand. This reporter sat next to him in a “Court TV” mobile studio during the trial of Neil Entwistle, found guilty in 2008 of murdering his wife and baby girl in their rented home in Hopkinton.
It felt as if Bailey had seen every play by the defense attorneys before they even made them. Each day during breaks, Bailey poked holes in Entwistle’s defense predicting the Brit would never again walk free. He did it while dressed in a suit coat and tie — while wearing Bermuda shorts out of the frame. It was June and hot in Middlesex Superior Court in Woburn.
Entwistle is serving two life sentences in a Massachusetts prison. His appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court for a new trial was rejected with just two words — “petition denied.” Bailey also saw that coming.
“A person in the business of defending criminal cases is going to live in controversy all of his or her life,” Bailey is also quoted as saying. Another truism by one of the best to ever sit at the defense table.
