Traumatic Brain Injury Pain and Suffering Verdict for $2,500,000 Upheld on Appeal Despite Lack of Objective Medical Test Demonstrating Injury for First Six Years after Car Accident

Posted on August 19, 2010 by John Hochfelder

On February 5, 2002, Diane Garrison, a 44 year old housewife, was involved in a high speed motor vehicle accident in Ulster County, New York. The other driver admitted his liability for the crash in which Ms. Garrison's head struck the window of her car's door.

Only a huge impact can smash a car window:

Complaining of headaches and neck pain, Ms. Garrison was transported by ambulance to the hospital where she was treated and released in the absence of any findings of a fracture or other serious injury.

For the next six months, Ms. Garrison sat home in a chair with worsening headaches and neck pain. She was diagnosed with post-concussive syndrome; however, there were no objective medical tests that conclusively established the basis for her complaints.

Nonetheless, Ms. Garrison sued the other driver and, in a damages only trial, on December 22, 2008 the jury awarded her pain and suffering damages in the sum of $2,500,000 ($500,000 past - 6 years, $2,000,000 future - 31 years). That award has now been affirmed on appeal in Garrison v. Lapine (3rd Dept. 2010).

During the years after her accident, medical tests, including an MRI, a Magnetic Resonance Angiography ("MRA") and an Electroencephalogram ("EEG"), failed to reveal objective proof of any neurological damage. Finally, in June 2008, six years later (and only six months before trial), a four day ambulatory EEG showed spiking activity, cerebral dysfunction and electrical short circuiting in Ms. Garrison's brain's frontal and left temporal lobes.

Imagine walking around with these EEG wires attached for four days:

The new EEG result, her doctors testified, was conclusive proof that she had indeed suffered a traumatic brain injury ("TBI") of her left temporal lobe and diffuse axonal injuries that were responsible for her erratic behavior and disabilities which included:

  • crying and saying wildly inappropriate and odd things
  • trying to jump from moving cars on several occasions
  • wandering into the street at night in her underwear
  • stuttering and speaking in incomprehensible letters and words (Broca's aphasia and dysprodic speech)
  • inability to socialize, cook or clean house
  • constant fatigue
  • unremitting headaches

The defense contended that plaintiff's problems were unrelated to the accident and were instead due to outside emotional factors such as the stress of caring for a relative with Alzheimer's or pre-existing anxiety and tinnitus. Furthermore, the defense argued after the verdict that $2,500,000 was an overly excessive pain and suffering award.

Denying a post-verdict motion by the defendant to reduce the pain and suffering award, the trial judge issued a decision on June 29, 2009 that was detailed and well researched. In particular, the Hon. Richard M. Platkin relied upon Popolizio v. County of Schenectady (which we discussed, here), an appellate court decision issued on May 21, 2010, in which $2,100,000 was found to be an appropriate pain and suffering award for a 56 year old man with TBI from a similar car accident.

As with Ms. Garrison, Mr. Popolizio's injuries did not result in a skull fracture or surgery and the MRI was negative. In both cases, plaintiffs sustained diffuse axonal injuries, suffered from many of the same symptoms (difficulties in cognitive and executive functions, depression, headaches and lack of energy) and disabilities (as to work and social life).

The $2,500,000 sustained award for TBI pain and suffering in Garrison v. Lapine is significant because, as we discussed here, here and here, most pain and suffering verdicts in TBI cases that exceed $1,000,000 and that are sustained on appeal involve one or more of the following:

  • a skull fracture
  • brain surgery
  • significant bleeding in the brain or
  • anoxia (lack of oxygen) at birth leading to paraplegia or qudriplegia

Inside Information: The jury's $400,000 loss of consortium award to Ms. Garrison's husband was sustained on appeal despite the fact that after the accident he had left the marital home for several weeks (after Ms. Garrison threatened to kill him) and he had been separated from her for 18 months before the accident.

 

 

 

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Inside Story of Lawsuit over Catastrophic Injuries at Construction Site - Did Attorney's Rejection of Settlement Offer Cost His Client $7,000,000?

Posted on June 13, 2009 by John Hochfelder

A 35 year old healthy construction worker was helping to build a new Lowe's Home Depot in Orangeburg (Ulster County), New York on November 14, 2002 when he fell off the roof 22 feet striking his head on the ground below.

After 63 days in the hospital (57 of them in a coma), 11 surgeries and 65 more days in a rehabilitation hospital,  Robert Doviak was left totally and permanently blind, with a sense of touch that was seriously compromised, partial loss of hearing and no sense of smell or taste. Additionally, he had substantial orthopedic injuries including fractures of his left femur, several cervical vertebrae, both zygomatic arches and other bones in and about his face and eyes, his left hand and his right wrist.

Doviak's wife hired Finkelstein & Partners, a well known personal injury law firm in Newburgh, New York and they began a lawsuit against Lowe's and others based on New York's Labor Law which provides that owners of commercial buildings under construction are liable for injuries suffered by workers when they involve falls from heights. A judge granted plaintiff's motion for summary judgment on liability grounds and the case then proceeded to a jury trial to determine the amount of damages.

In Doviak v. Lowe's  Home Centers, Inc., an Ulster County jury found that plaintiff was entitled to $1,000,000 for his pain and suffering ($200,000 past; $800,000 future - 32 years) plus additional amounts for his lost earnings and medical expenses and his wife's loss of consortium. The jury's total award for all elements of damages was thus $3,700,000.

Since each element of a future damages verdict that is more than $250,000 must under New York law (CPLR 5014) be calculated to present value (usually resulting in a significantly lower figure) before a judgment is given to a plaintiff,  the $3,700,000 jury total really represented only about $3,000,000 for the plaintiff.

In a post-trial motion, the pain and suffering award was found by the trial judge to be unreasonably low and a new trial was directed to be held unless defendants agreed to increase the pain and suffering sum to $4,100,000 ($1,200,000 past and $2,900,000 future). Plaintiff appealed and the appeals court this week (properly relying, in part, on Villaseca v. City of New York, a loss of vision case we discussed here) added another $1,000,000 to plaintiff's future pain and suffering award which is now $5,100,000 ($1,200,000 past; $3,900,000 future). The new total (including the earnings, medical expenses and consortium claims) is $9,300,000 - a present value of about $7,000,000.

As always, and especially in catastrophic injury cases like this one, no amount of money ever makes  the injured plaintiff feel like the whole thing was worth it. Neither $7,000,000 nor $100,000,000 would be enough for any sane person to undergo what Robert Doviak has undergone and will suffer with for the rest of his life.

Now for the inside information. During the trial, the defendants offered on the record to settle for a present value of $9,250,000. Plaintiff's then attorney, without plaintiff present, rejected that offer on the spot. The next day, the defense increased the settlement offer to $10,000,000. Again it was rejected. Finally, still before the verdict, the defense made a final settlement offer -  $12,000,000. Doviak says the offer was rejected by the Finkelstein firm without bothering to consult him.

Did Doviak's lawyers fail to inform him of the $12,000,000 offer?

After the trial, the plaintiff fired Finkelstein and hired two new firms. Levy Phillips & Konigsberg (a New York City personal injury law firm best known for its extensive advertising about and its mass representation of plaintiffs in asbestos exposure lawsuits) was hired to handle the appeal decided this week. Another firm was hired to sue the Finkelstein firm for malpractice. In the malpractice suit, Finkelstein & Partners admits that the $12,000,000 offer was made but denies it acted improperly.

Doviak and his new attorneys are claiming that errors were made by Doviak's trial counsel which cost Doviak  $7,000,000 ( the difference between the settlement offer and the final appellate court figures). Here are some of the matters relevant to the ongoing malpractice dispute:

  •  significant settlement offers must be conveyed to clients and if rejected then the rejection should either be on the record or in writing (with a full explanation of the consequences also on the record or in writing)
  •  attorneys (and their injured clients) should not let greed serve as the foundation of a personal injury lawsuit - during summation, Doviak's attorney asked the jury to award Doviak $60,000,000 for pain and suffering, an amount Doviak's new attorneys say is preposterous and evidence of awful advocacy and which defense counsel says revealed the greed that served as the foundation of plaintiff's case

As the attorney malpractice case progresses (and surely it will move quickly now that the appeals court has ruled on the propriety of the verdict figures), we will report on claims, defenses and developments.

 

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Loss of Consortium Claim Follows Arrest of College Basketball Coach

Posted on March 11, 2009 by John Hochfelder

On December 18, 2008, University of Mississippi's basketball coach, Andy Kennedy, was arrested in Ohio for assault following an altercation with Mohammed Jiddou, a Cincinnati cab driver. The criminal trial is set for April 20, 2009.

But that's not what's prompting this post. What's blogworthy here is the lawsuit the coach filed the day after his arrest: he sued the cabbie for defamation claiming that the cabbie's statements to the media (repeating the allegations he made to the police that formed their basis for the arrest) were false and malicious and caused a barrage of media coverage causing the coach "significant distress" entitling him to money damages.

Bear with us, here comes the point: three days later, the coach brought his wife Kimber into it and they filed an amended complaint adding a claim for loss of consortium. The amended complaint states that as a direct result of the false and malicious statements made about Coach Kennedy, Kimber Kennedy has suffered a loss of consortium with her husband.

And the media reaction has been: you've got to be kidding coach. And I must say I agree.

This loss of consortium claim is ridiculous, frivolous and worthless. Here's why:

  • filing a defamation suit one day after his arrest leads many to conclude that the filing was not genuine but instead a strategic ploy, a quick fire reaction
  • it's unlikely any significant money could ever be recovered from the cabbie, even if the coach were to win his defamation lawsuit
  • filing the loss of consortium claim three days later as an amendment also smacks of a strategic ploy, a measure designed to focus away from the assault and on to the poor coach and his wife and their alleged damages

I don't buy it and don't think anyone but the coach, his wife and their attorneys believe there's any merit to the consortium claim. Nor do some local observers, such as Legal Schnauzer, who refer to Mrs. Kennedy as "hot" and "scorching" suggesting that there's no way this overachieving in the wife department fellow could have a claim for loss of consortium!

One Ohio attorney reports here that the loss of consortium claim is a speculative one, related to the decreased or limited sexual activity between the injured party and the spouse and the decreased or limited care, companionship and affection between them. It's therefore to be expected that the loss of consortium claim may make the parties' sexual activity fair game for questioning and exposure.

Well fair game it is and local media have jumped all over this story, for example here, here and here. And it's caught the attention of scholars nationwide too, such as Walter Olson at Overlawyered.

Counsel for the coach, Richard L. Katz (who is the founder of KMG Sports Management, an agency for professional athletes and college coaches), howls that the focus on the sexual element of Mrs. Kennedy's claim is irresponsible and that his client would not file a claim for that, nor would his wife. But counselor: that appears to be just what  you did file on behalf of your clients.

In all due respect, counselor, if you didn't want any focus on your clients' sex life then you shouldn't have filed the loss of consortium claim to begin with. As I've said before, this claim is rarely significant without accompanying devastating physical injuries. And that you simply don't have in this case.

We will follow this case and report on its conclusion - which could all come as soon as next month.

 

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Spouse Awarded $1,000,000 for Loss Of Consortium Claim

Posted on March 7, 2009 by John Hochfelder

Loss of consortium is the term most often used by judges and lawyers to refer to the claims of physically uninjured spouses in personal injury cases brought by their physically injured mates. The claim arises when a physically injured person cannot as a result provide his or her spouse with the services, companionship, love, affection and sexual relations enjoyed before the accident.

The loss of consortium claim is usually not a significant one unless the physically injured spouse has suffered a devastating, long-lasting injury such as paralysis, incontinence, loss of sexual function or inability to walk.

Judges in New York tell juries in personal injury cases that in determining the loss of consortium damage amounts they are to consider following factors and traits of the physically injured spouse:

  • disposition and temperament
  • social life
  • services rendered in supervising the household
  • acts of affection, love and sexual intercourse

It's obvious that these elements of the claim are vague and I can tell you from experience that juries often misunderstand them. As a result, loss of consortium awards range from shockingly low or even nothing at all to amazingly high. The appellate courts do not hesitate to exercise their powers, in New York under CPLR 5501, to increase or decrease loss of consortium verdicts when they find the amounts awarded deviate from what is reasonable compensation.

Here are some of the higher awards sustained in New York for loss of consortium claims:

  • Villaseca v. City of New York (Appellate Division, 1st Dept., 2008) - a Bronx County jury awarded Diane Villaseca $1,800,000 for her loss of consortium claim in connection with an $8,000,000 pain and suffering award for her husband who suffered loss of vision after nine surgeries (his pain and suffering claim was reduced to $5,000,000, as we noted previously here). On appeal, Ms. Villaseca's award was reduced to $750,000 ($250,000 past, $500,000 future), with the court noting that she had assumed full responsibility for household chores, cooking and helping her husband move about.
  • Bissell v. Town of Amherst (Appellate Division, 4th Dept., 2008) - an Erie County jury awarded Sherry Bissell $3,000,000 for her loss of services claim ($1,000,000 past, $2,000,000 future) in connection with her husband Peter's fractures of his lumbar vertebrae from a workplace fall that left him paralyzed, incontinent and sexually dysfunctional. Ms. Bissell took over all aspects of her husband's hygienic care. The appeals court reduced her award to $1,000,000 ($250,000 past, $750,000 future).

  • Hopper v. Regional Scaffolding & Hoisting Co., Inc. (Appellate Division, 1st Dept., 2005) - a Bronx County jury awarded Laurel Hopper $1,500,000 ($300,000 past, $1,200,000 future) in connection with her husband Bill's spinal injuries from an elevator hoist drop. He underwent a T10-12 laminectomy and suffered ruptured blood vessels that led to a spinal cord stroke. He was left in constant pain, incapable of sitting long and with frequent urinary urge. His wife became his caregiver. His prognosis was poor and the $1,800,000 pain and suffering award was upheld on appeal and the loss of consortium award was reduced to $800,000 ($200,000 past, $600,000 future).

In some cases, juries have awarded nothing at all, or too little. For example, in Barnaby v. Gold Construction Corp. (Appellate Division, 1st Dept., 2008), the judge in a non-jury damages only trial in Bronx County awarded nothing at all to the spouse and only $50,000 to a laborer who fell at work sustaining a fractured ankle and torn meniscus in his knee. A new trial was ordered because the judge failed to state why he didn't make an award for loss of consortium, especially in view of the fact that Ms. Barnaby was left with a spouse largely confined to their home and unable to do any household chores.

Don't get the impression that loss of consortium claims are often in the $750,000 to $1,0000,000 range. They aren't. Typical awards in significant but non-catastrophic injury cases are more along the line of the following cases:

Insider's Tips:

  1. When there's a divorce or the spouses separate after the accident, the loss of consortium claim will be negatively affected. There's no spousal claim for the time period after the separation and any award for the prior time when they were together will likely be much less than had the jury not known about the marital strife. Savvy lawyers will either avoid adding the loss of consortium claim at all or they will try to get the uninjured spouse to drop the claim. Jurors do not want to hear about the divorce or the separation. As Maryland attorney Ron Miller has noted, they want to see the spouses sticking together "for better or worse."
  2. Usually, a loss of consortium claim is included in (i.e,, derivative of) a personal injury claim and counts toward the limit of liability under any applicable liability insurance policy. In some cases, though, for example in Tennessee under the Government Torts Claim Act, the loss of consortium claim is separate. (h/t Day on Torts)

Tidbit:

Loss of consortium claims began in England in 1846 via statute as Lord Campbell's Act and were originally paired in a Latin expression: "per quod servitium et consortium amisit,"  translated as "in consequence of which he lost her society and services."

 

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