Fred Baron
Fred Baron
Baron is one of America?s most prominent trial lawyers. He is a founder of Baron & Budd, P.C., a Dallas, Texas law firm and a former president of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America. 3
As a handful of lawyers for those companies pushed in civil courts to investigate the memo and its use, and a judge in Dallas initiated a criminal investigation, firm founder Fred Baron offered a variety of defenses and explanations. The memo was the work of a rogue paralegal and unknown to lawyers at the firm. It was not encouragement to lie because a lawyer has a duty to “refresh” a client’s memory. It was a breach of the attorney-client privilege to even question the memo. At one point, the firm offered a legal affidavit concluding that whatever its behavior, it is not against the law in Texas to suborn perjury. 6
Mr. Baron, who was chairman of the Democrat’s campaign finance committee in 2004 and 2008, said Mr. Edwards didn’t know about his aid to Ms. Hunter. Mr. Edwards confirmed that, saying repeatedly during a television interview that he knew nothing about the payments. 4
Says here that attorney Fred Baron, co-founder of local law firm Baron & Budd, has been included on a list of the nation’s 100 most influential attorneys as selected by The National Law Journal. The complete list is available here, but suffice it to say Baron’s the only local attorney to make the list, and jut one of four from Texas. 2
Baron has been an active figure in politics as a prominent fund-raiser for the Democratic Party and fellow trial lawyer, Sen. John Edwards. Baron was the finance chair of Edwards’ 2004 presidential campaign before co-chairing the Kerry Victory ‘04 committee, a joint effort of the Democratic National Committee and the Presidential campaign of John Kerry. Baron gave $1.7 million to the Texas Democratic Trust in the last two years and [was] also heavily involved in Edwards’s 2008 presidential campaign, moving to North Carolina to head up fundraising, and lending Edwards his Hawker 800 private jet. 8
In 2007, Baron, “[o]ne of the nation’s best-known trial lawyers, resumed his duties as Edwards’s top fund-raiser. For years, Baron has ranked in the top 20 of Democratic donors every campaign cycle, and his ability to tap others in the legal profession for cash is called unprecedented. It’s no wonder Hillary Clinton tried to woo Baron away. Last year, Baron attended one of the hush-hush briefings Clinton held for potential supporters?but he gave an advanced heads up to Edwards before he did so,” Holly Bailey wrote February 15, 2007, in Newsweek. 7
Susan Davis and Amy Chozick report on the presidential race. Former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards admitted to an extra-marital affair Friday. ABC News?s ?Nightline? will air the exclusive interview tonight. 9
John Edwards would like this story to end today but it looks like there’s a lot more waiting to be revealed: Dallas lawyer Fred Baron told The Dallas Morning News today that he paid relocation and housing expenses for the woman that former presidential candidate John Edwards has confessed to having an affair with. Mr. Baron, who was chairman of Mr. Edwards? 5
