OUTCOME: Favorably settled on a confidential basis after interlocutory appeals.
This was my first brain damaged baby case. The delivery had been botched horribly, but the Defendant had committed suicide years earlier, and his estate had closed. We made new appellate case law by ...successfully re-opening the estate to administer previously undistributed assets of the estate, i.e., professional liability insurance. We won that issue on appeal at the SC Supreme Court level, and the US Supreme Court declined to accept a further appeal.
Birth injury
Rush v. Blanchard
N/A
OUTCOME: Verdict for my clients in the total amount of $625,000, reduced by the trial judge. The verdict was appealed despite the reduction of the verdict, and the reduced verdict was upheld on appeal.
This case involved a permanent facial nerve injury to a baby from traumatic attempts to perform an amniocentesis at term. The facial nerve performs a variety of important functions, including closing ...one's eyelid, and providing muscle tone to prevent facial sagging and lip droop.
The mother was diabetic, and the amniocentesis was for the purpose of assuring sufficient lung maturity before the planned delivery. Special challenges at trial involved documentation by nurses and doctors of needle marks at the back of the baby's neck, which were not in the right location to cause facial nerve damage, and no documentation to corroborate the father's testimony of an additional puncture where the facial nerve exits the skull near the earlobe. The jury was convinced that the extra puncture mark existed and had been covered up by the large bandage placed over the baby's eye by an obstetrician, to prevent dry eye from the eyelid being paralyzed open.
Insurance
Mitchell v. Fortis
N/A
OUTCOME: Verdict for $15.15 Million, reduced on appeal to $10.15 Million
This health insurance bad faith case reads like a John Grisham novel. The client was a young man who worked part time as a college freshman to pay for health insurance, which his mother could not affo...rd after losing her manufacturing job when the factory shut down. After donating blood to the Red Cross for extra credit, he learned he was HIV positive. The diagnosis was confirmed by lab testing by his family doctor. All of the Red Cross records, labs, medical records and bills had correct dates except for one handwritten note by a nurse that wrote down the wrong year. If that date had been correct, it would serve as evidence the client learned he had HIV the day before he applied for the policy. The insurance company chose to believe the one erroneous date to the exclusion of all other evidence, accused the client of lying on his application, and cancelled his policy retroactively. At the time he most needed the peace of mind that health insurance would help with urgently needed medical care, the insurance company left him to wither and die on the vine. Fortunately, a free HIV clinic stepped up to provide him with excellent medical care, and he survived. By the time the case was reached for trial, the insurance company had admitted it was wrong to accuse its insured of lying, and had reinstated the policy. The jury recognized the insurance company would never have admitted its wrong or reinstated the policy but for the proof of wrongdoing I had assembled. The jury awarded $150,000 in emotional harm damages and $15 Million in punitive damages, to punish the insurance company and make an example of its extreme wrongdoing to keep it and other insurance companies from repeating such inhumane, reprehensible misconduct. The insurance company appealed to the SC Supreme Court, which reduced the punitive damages to $10 Million, still a record in SC. The insurance company tried to get the US Supreme Court to hear further appeal, but it declined. Our client was finally compensated in 2010, eight years after the insurance company wrongfully accused him of lying and rescinded his health insurance at his time of greatest need.
I have successfully resolved many brain damage cases, usually on a confidential basis and without a reported appellate decision. These have involved adult brain damage as well as brain damage at birth....
OUTCOME: Favorable confidential recoveries, including many in seven figures
I have handled more permanent brachial birth injury cases than any other lawyer in SC, and my reputation for successfully representing these children extends far beyond SC. My client recoveries in the...se cases are all confidential, but range from seven figure recoveries for the most severe injuries to high six figures for more moderate permanent injuries and low to mid six figures for those children with the best recovery of function. Each case is different, and statutory damages caps preclude adequate recoveries in certain cases.
