Fact1: Beckett has been assigned leaving instructions for assistants to file paperwork following day, Fact2: following day marks end of statute of limitations for case, Fact3: paperwork is filed with court at last possible moment, Fact4: Miller After visits doctor declining to take case, Fact5: partner had worked with woman
Output: Andrew Beckett is a senior associate at the largest corporate law firm in Philadelphia. He hides his homosexuality and his status as an AIDS patient from the other members of the firm. A partner in the firm notices a lesion on Becketts forehead. Although Beckett attributes the lesion to a racquetball injury, it indicates Kaposis sarcoma, an AIDS defining condition. Shortly thereafter, Beckett stays home from work for several days to try to find a way to hide his lesions. While at home, he finishes the paperwork for a case he has been assigned and then brings it to his office, leaving instructions for his assistants to file the paperwork the following day, which marks the end of the statute of limitations for the case. Later that morning, he receives a call asking for the paperwork, as the paper copy cannot be found and there are no copies on the computers hard drive. The paperwork is finally discovered in an alternate location and is filed with the court at the last possible moment. The following day, Beckett is dismissed by the firms partners. Beckett believes that someone deliberately hid his paperwork to give the firm an excuse to fire him, and that the dismissal is actually as a result of his diagnosis with AIDS. He asks several attorneys to take his case, including personal injury lawyer Joe Miller. The homophobic Miller appears to be worried that he could contract Becketts illness. After declining to take the case, Miller immediately visits his doctor to find out if he could have contracted the disease. The doctor explains that the routes of HIV infection dont include casual contact. Unable to find a lawyer willing to represent him, Beckett is compelled to act as his own attorney. While researching a case at a law library, Miller sees Beckett at a nearby table. After a library employee stares down Miller, presumably because Miller is black, a librarian approaches Beckett and announces that he has found a book on AIDS discrimination for him. As others in the library begin to first stare uneasily, the librarian suggests Beckett to go to a private room. Feeling discouraged by the other peoples behavior and seeing the parallels in how he himself has been unfairly treated, Miller approaches Beckett, reviews the material he has gathered, and takes the case. As the case goes before the court, the partners of the firm take the stand, each claiming that Beckett was incompetent and that he had deliberately tried to hide his condition. The defense repeatedly suggests that Beckett brought AIDS upon himself by having gay sex, and is therefore not a victim. In the course of testimony, it is revealed that the partner who had noticed Becketts lesion, Walter Kenton, had previously worked with a woman who had contracted AIDS after a blood transfusion and so should have recognized the lesion as relating to AIDS. According to that partner, the woman was an innocent victim, unlike Beckett, and further testified that he did not recognize Becketts lesions. To prove that the lesions would have been visible, Miller asks Beckett to unbutton his shirt while on the witness stand, revealing that his lesions are indeed visible and recognizable as such. Beckett eventually collapses during the trial. After Beckett is hospitalized, another partner, Bob Seidman, who noticed Becketts lesions confesses that he suspected Beckett had AIDS but never told anyone and never gave him the opportunity to explain himself, which he regretted very much. During his hospitalization, the jury votes in Becketts favor, awarding him back pay, damages for pain and suffering and punitive damages, totaling over 5 million. Miller visits the visibly failing Beckett in the hospital after the verdict and overcomes his fear enough to touch Becketts face. After Becketts family leaves the room, he tells his partner Miguel that he is ready to die. At the Miller home, Joe and his wife are awakened by a phone call from Miguel, who tells them that Beckett has died. A memorial is held at Becketts home following the funeral, where many mourners, including Miller, view home movies of Beckett as a happy child.