FTCWatch, Published on Friday, June 17, 2022 @ 12:00 PM - Issue: 1029
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Former FTC judge has second career writing thrillers
Stephen McGuire spent much of his time writing fact-based opinions as an administrative law judge at the Federal Trade Commission and other federal agencies. These days he takes more liberties with his prose.
That’s because McGuire writes political novels that draw partly from his extensive career in Washington, DC. Though in an interview with FTCWatch, he joked there are no characters based on Tim Muris, Deborah Platt Majoras and William Kovacic, who were chairs during his time at the FTC.
Last month, McGuire published “Fractured Power,” a psychological thriller. It involves murder, power grabs and manipulated evidence. His first book, “Prior Restraint,” was released last year, and deals with political corruption, terrorism and life-risking investigative journalism. It all started because of a speech impediment.
“When I was 12 years old, I had a stutter, so I began putting my thoughts down on paper, and when I did, I thought I could say anything,” he said. “I’ve always enjoyed writing and liked the chance to combine it with my experience in Washington, DC.”
Once McGuire outlines the story, it takes about six months to write the first draft. And he goes through “several drafts” before he feels satisfied.
Though McGuire is an avid reader, he more often picks biographies and narrative non-fiction stories than novels.
He recently read Mark Bowden’s acclaimed book on the Tet Offensive, “Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam.” He’s also partial to the work of James Ellroy and Daniel Silva.
Fiction writing is fun, but McGuire looks back fondly on his previous career.
He was the FTC’s chief administrative law judge from 2003 to 2008. He had held similar positions at the Environmental Protection Agency and the Social Security Administration, but had to learn a new area of the law quickly.
One of McGuire’s first cases was the lawsuit the FTC filed against technology company Rambus. The agency alleged Rambus deceived the standards organization JEDEC, which develops computer memory standards. Rambus helped develop a new SDRAM memory standard without disclosing that it held patents to the technology it proposed.
The case was the agency’s largest antitrust litigation at that point, and after five months of hearings involving 74 lawyers, McGuire ruled against the FTC. The commissioners voted to overrule him, but the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit reversed the commissioners’ decision.
McGuire said the learning curve was not as steep as some might think.
“I’d been holding administrative hearings for a long time. When you’re dealing with any case, it’s about determining the findings of fact. Once you do that, you apply the law. It’s not an insurmountable task,” he explained.
Both his father and older brother were lawyers, but McGuire is the only administrative law judge in the family. He hadn’t planned on that career path when he joined the Department of Interior as a lawyer, but that soon changed.
“I understood the administrative appellate process and developed it as an expertise,” he said.
At the FTC, another significant case he presided over was the agency’s challenge of Evanston Northwestern Healthcare’s consummated merger with Highland Park Hospital.
McGuire ordered Evanston to sell the other hospital, but the full commission while agreeing that the merger was anticompetitive, said divestiture would be too costly. Instead, the commission required Evanston to set up separate and independent contract negotiation teams to bargain with managed care organizations as a means of reviving competition.
That case was part of a broader initiative by Muris to revitalize the agency’s enforcement of competition among hospitals, following a series of losses. (See FTCWatch, No. 906, Nov. 14, 2016.)
McGuire grew up in Louisville, Kentucky, and earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Kentucky and his law degree from the South Texas College of Law.
After leaving the FTC, he spent almost five years as vice president of corporate compliance & ethics at the University of Louisville Hospital and also conducted private mediation work.
References:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephen-j-mcguire-05973777
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2008/08/chief-administrative-law-judge-ftc-retire
https://www.stephenmcguireauthor.com/
https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/011-0017-rambus-inc-matter
https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/0110234-evanston-northwestern-healthcare-corporation-enh-medical-group-inc
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Former FTC judge has second career writing thrillers
Stephen McGuire spent much of his time writing fact-based opinions as an administrative law judge at the Federal Trade Commission and other federal agencies. These days he takes more liberties with his prose.
That’s because McGuire writes political novels that draw partly from his extensive career in Washington, DC. Though in an interview with FTCWatch, he joked there are no characters based on Tim Muris, Deborah Platt Majoras and William Kovacic, who were chairs during his time at the FTC.
Last month, McGuire published “Fractured Power,” a psychological thriller. It involves murder, power grabs and manipulated evidence. His first book, “Prior Restraint,” was released last year, and deals with political corruption, terrorism and life-risking investigative journalism. It all started because of a speech impediment.
“When I was 12 years old, I had a stutter, so I began putting my thoughts down on paper, and when I did, I thought I could say anything,” he said. “I’ve always enjoyed writing and liked the chance to combine it with my experience in Washington, DC.”
Once McGuire outlines the story, it takes about six months to write the first draft. And he goes through “several drafts” before he feels satisfied.
Though McGuire is an avid reader, he more often picks biographies and narrative non-fiction stories than novels.
He recently read Mark Bowden’s acclaimed book on the Tet Offensive, “Hue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam.” He’s also partial to the work of James Ellroy and Daniel Silva.
Fiction writing is fun, but McGuire looks back fondly on his previous career.
He was the FTC’s chief administrative law judge from 2003 to 2008. He had held similar positions at the Environmental Protection Agency and the Social Security Administration, but had to learn a new area of the law quickly.
One of McGuire’s first cases was the lawsuit the FTC filed against technology company Rambus. The agency alleged Rambus deceived the standards organization JEDEC, which develops computer memory standards. Rambus helped develop a new SDRAM memory standard without disclosing that it held patents to the technology it proposed.
The case was the agency’s largest antitrust litigation at that point, and after five months of hearings involving 74 lawyers, McGuire ruled against the FTC. The commissioners voted to overrule him, but the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit reversed the commissioners’ decision.
McGuire said the learning curve was not as steep as some might think.
“I’d been holding administrative hearings for a long time. When you’re dealing with any case, it’s about determining the findings of fact. Once you do that, you apply the law. It’s not an insurmountable task,” he explained.
Both his father and older brother were lawyers, but McGuire is the only administrative law judge in the family. He hadn’t planned on that career path when he joined the Department of Interior as a lawyer, but that soon changed.
“I understood the administrative appellate process and developed it as an expertise,” he said.
At the FTC, another significant case he presided over was the agency’s challenge of Evanston Northwestern Healthcare’s consummated merger with Highland Park Hospital.
McGuire ordered Evanston to sell the other hospital, but the full commission while agreeing that the merger was anticompetitive, said divestiture would be too costly. Instead, the commission required Evanston to set up separate and independent contract negotiation teams to bargain with managed care organizations as a means of reviving competition.
That case was part of a broader initiative by Muris to revitalize the agency’s enforcement of competition among hospitals, following a series of losses. (See FTCWatch, No. 906, Nov. 14, 2016.)
McGuire grew up in Louisville, Kentucky, and earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Kentucky and his law degree from the South Texas College of Law.
After leaving the FTC, he spent almost five years as vice president of corporate compliance & ethics at the University of Louisville Hospital and also conducted private mediation work.
References:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephen-j-mcguire-05973777
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2008/08/chief-administrative-law-judge-ftc-retire
https://www.stephenmcguireauthor.com/
https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/011-0017-rambus-inc-matter
https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/cases-proceedings/0110234-evanston-northwestern-healthcare-corporation-enh-medical-group-inc