Willing to Please

Woodstock, Vt., is the very model of the picturesque New England country town. It has a tranquil village green, stately brick and stone houses, and a postcard vista of the ski slopes in the adjoining hills. So it is only natural that outside investors (notably Laurance Rockefeller) have bought property there, and that the population of 1,150 includes a sizable proportion of writers, artists and wealthy exurbanites.

It was just as natural that James Wright, a dapper young lawyer from Detroit, should settle on Woodstock ten years ago as a good place to practice. In due time, he became a director of the Woodstock National Bank, president of the Rotary Club, and even (from 1964 to 1968) the prosecuting attorney for surrounding Windsor County. Yet apparently his grasp exceeded his legal reach. Wright, 44, stands accused of writing himself and his family into the wills of lonely widows.

According to charges filed by Vermont Attorney General James M. Jeffords with the State Supreme Court, Wright also committed numerous other improprieties, including representing both sides in legal disputes. The attorney general is seeking Wright's disbarment.

Unpleasant Surprise. Wright's troubles apparently started in October 1963, when he witnessed a will for Mrs. Shirley Pierce. The will named him as executor. After Mrs. Pierce died in November 1964, Wright sold her house to his father-in-law for the modest sum of $5,000. Only two months after the sale, the father-in-law resold the property for $12,000.

Another widow, Mrs. Florence B. Bigelow, 70, whose fortune was estimated at $100,000, engaged Wright to draw up her will in 1965, when she was suffering from diabetes and failing eyesight. According to the attorney general, Mrs. Bigelow had a friend read her the will. She was unpleasantly surprised to find that Wright would get a share of the estate as executor. In addition, his wife Robyn was to inherit 25 shares of IBM stock, valued then at $10,250. Mrs. Bigelow promptly acquired a new attorney and a new will, and the Wrights got nothing when she died.

On June 6, 1969, after numerous cobalt treatments for throat cancer, Mrs. Dunlap S. Garceau, widow of an inventor of medical instruments, died. Her will, drawn up by Wright and executed eight days before her death, bequeathed 200 shares of Standard Oil (N.J.), then worth $15,500, to Wright's wife; the Garceau house, land and personal possessions to Wright's mother; $25,000 each to Wright's two adolescent daughters; and $35,000 cash to Wright's wife "to be used by her in her sole discretion for library purposes and for the arts."

Following Instructions. The reading of the Garceau will set in motion an examination of Wright's activities. Other lawyers reported numerous requests for revamping of wills that Wright had drafted. Wright declined to seek re-election as director of the Woodstock National Bank, a decision reportedly prompted by other board members.

Wright continues to be highly visible around Woodstock. He has filed an exhaustive 63-page brief with the Vermont Supreme Court, denying all of the attorney general's charges and declaring that he was only following the instructions of his clients. And a good many of the citizens of Woodstock choose to believe him. In such a friendly country village, said one Wright critic, "they just refuse to believe he's guilty of all those things."

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