$45.3 Million Verdict for Army Veteran Left Brain Damaged by a Breathing Tube Placed in His Esophagus

Steven Butts was 30 years old, an Army veteran, when he fell from a friend's balcony in Chicago in July 2019. His mother drove him to the emergency room at Advocate Trinity Hospital. He had fractured his jaw on both sides, but he walked in under his own power, talking and breathing without difficulty.

The emergency physician, Dr. Michael Soo-Young Joo, decided to secure his airway. At 5:31 a.m. he administered a paralytic drug, which shut down Butts's ability to breathe for himself and made the doctor responsible for every breath that followed. Dr. Joo attempted to place an endotracheal tube and failed. He tried again and failed again. Roughly 18 minutes after the paralytic went in, a nurse anesthetist arrived and found the tube sitting in Butts's esophagus rather than his windpipe. By then Butts had gone into cardiac arrest. He spent about 11 minutes without oxygen.

He survived, but the oxygen deprivation caused permanent brain damage. A man who had walked into the hospital with a broken jaw left it needing care 24 hours a day. His mother, Gail Galich, was appointed his plenary guardian and brought suit on his behalf in the Circuit Court of Cook County, case number 19-L-11525, against Dr. Joo and the Advocate entities.

John B. Kralovec and Joseph M. Conboy, then of Kralovec Jambois & Schwartz, tried the case before Judge Senechalle, with Bruce R. Pfaff of Pfaff, Gill & Ports and Michael T. Reagan of Ottawa serving as co-counsel. Expert testimony centered on the choices made in those first minutes: proceeding to a rapid sequence intubation without consulting anesthesia, misplacing the tube, and failing to catch the misplacement while there was still time. On July 25, 2022, the jury returned a verdict of $45,305,966. That September the court entered judgment and added roughly $2.8 million in prejudgment interest under the Illinois statute that had taken effect the year before.

The defendants appealed, challenging the trial court's answer to a jury question about unanimity and the constitutionality of the prejudgment interest statute itself. On March 8, 2024, the Illinois Appellate Court, First District, affirmed in full in Galich v. Advocate Health and Hospital Corp., 2024 IL App (1st) 230134. The court held that jurors must agree the defendant was negligent, not agree on which particular negligent act caused the harm, and it upheld the prejudgment interest award.

A note on the firm: Kralovec and Conboy won this verdict while at Kralovec Jambois & Schwartz. They later left to found the firm that is now Conboy Law, where both continue to practice. The affirmed judgment, verdict plus interest, came to more than $48 million, held for the lifetime care of a veteran who cannot manage his own affairs.