During his civil procedure class at the Washington College of Law at American, Professor Grossman referred in detail to a series of moves by Mr. Schlichtmann and his adversaries. A student raised his hand and suggested that he understood Mr. Schlichtmann. They had deep pockets. Some legal educators say they worry that the new teaching methods might turn out lawyers who do not thoroughly understand legal principles. But at law schools from coast to coast, the fascination with the Woburn case goes far beyond simply reading.the book.
Students study original legal filings from the case.
There are Internet sites filled with the scientific evidence from the trial. Mr. Grossman and a colleague from the law school here, Robert G. Vaughn, went to a Federal document center near Boston to retrieve scores of original documents from the suit. The two professors are now working on a legal text book dealing entirely with the Woburn case to be published by one of the major law text publishers, Foundation Press. For the last two years, both professors have been assigning the original legal documents as well as Mr. Harr's book as required reading in courses on the rules of civil law practice that they structure entirely around the Woburn case. Beatrice had won a jury verdict that it was not liable to the plaintiffs.