In 2004, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. was looking to hire an expert to handle an appeal, not to build a long-term relationship with another big-city attorney.
The world's largest retailer had plenty of those, paying 250 law firms around the country about $200 million a year to represent its interests.
Then the legal team at Wal-Mart met mild-mannered Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., a Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher partner. Now, he represents the company on a variety of matters around the U.S.
"I talk to Ted Boutrous more than I talk to any outside lawyer in the world, and there's not even a close second," says Tom Mars, Wal-Mart's top in-house counsel. "We have access to all the best lawyers in the world.... Yet somebody has to be the best of the best, and that's the way I would describe Ted."
In the last 20 years, Boutrous has carved out a practice focusing on limiting punitive damages for corporations and defending 1st Amendment rights for media companies. He has represented Ford Motor Co., DaimlerChrysler, the Wall Street Journal and Time Inc. as well as big media coalitions of which the Los Angeles Times has been a member.
His current crop of assignments includes mounting a defense against the state of California, which sued six of the biggest automakers for allegedly causing health problems and contributing to global warming. For his media clients, Boutrous is trying to unseal a special prosecutor's secret proceedings as part of the investigation into who leaked CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity to reporters.
"My media practice helps me be a better lawyer in my other practice," Boutrous says. "It gives me better insight into both sides of the equation."
Mars, who works at Mal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., says he liked Boutrous because the North Dakota native didn't act much like a "tall-building lawyer" -- an Arkansas term for city slickers who drive fancy rental cars and wear suits to rural courts instead of hopping out of pickup trucks in sport coats.
"What I saw in Ted was something quite different," Mars says. "Ted displayed candor, balance, respect. He was humble."
Wal-Mart first retained Boutrous to handle the issues, and media glare, that came with the territory of Dukes vs. Wal-Mart, a San Francisco case in which 1.6 million current and former female employees banded together to sue for alleged discrimination.
