University of Virginia Library

Foreman To Speak Here On Feb. 19

By Kip Klein

Percy Foreman, the attorney who
defended Jack Ruby and James Earl
Ray, will speak here Friday evening at
8:30 p.m. in Old Cabell Hall.

The speech is being sponsored by the
Student Legal Forum at the University in
cooperation with the Criminal Section of
the Virginia State Bar Association.

Mr. Foreman's career as a defense
attorney has been a colorful one, his most
notable case being the famous Jacques Mossler
trial in Miami, eight years ago. In that trial, he
successfully defended Melvin Powers for the
alleged murder of Mr. Mossler, a
multimillionaire.

Mr. Foreman is a staunch opponent of
capital punishment and feels that the public
must come to realize for themselves the real
implications of the death sentence. In a recent
interview he said that "all electrocutions should
not only be on television, but they should be
sponsored by the Texas Power and Light
Company which supplies the Juice."

The Texas-bred attorney credits among his
achievements the largest contested divorce
settlement recorded when he represented Mrs.
Cecil Blaffer Hudson, the wife of a Texas
oilman. The total awarded alimony in that case
amounted to over nine and one-half million
dollars of which, it is believed, his share totalled
more than one million dollars.

The high fees that Mr. Foreman charges do
not seem to bother the attorney. "My fee is
their punishment," he says. "I don't represent
wealthy clients. If they aren't poor when they
come to me, they are when they leave."

Mr. Foreman is a graduate of the University
of Texas Law School. He began his law practice
in Houston when he was 27, and since that date
he has been fighting not for justice but for his
clients. "My clients want freedom," he says,
"not justice."