John Collier

A Tuscaloosa County jury awarded the family of Johnny Terrell Sledge $30 million after finding that the on-call trauma surgeon at DCH Regional Medical Center started a second elective operation instead of treating a gunshot wound, leaving Sledge to bleed to death in the emergency room over roughly two and a half hours.

A Jefferson County jury awarded Caroline and J.T. Malatesta $16 million, finding that Brookwood Medical Center committed medical negligence and reckless fraud when the natural-birth experience its advertising promised gave way to a delivery in which Caroline was physically restrained, leaving her with permanent nerve damage.

A Limestone County jury awarded Gloria Owen $15 million after finding that a HEMSI ambulance crew, including a paramedic with an undisclosed history of drug use who fell asleep instead of monitoring her husband, failed to respond as Robert Owen suffered a heart attack during a routine hospital-to-hospital transfer.

Margaret Green was killed on July 15, 2015, when a tractor-trailer struck her SUV as she pulled out of her driveway onto Alabama Highway 64. Her husband, Herschel Green, sued the road contractor, Joe Keenum Excavation & Construction Inc., over a movable construction sign it had placed beside the driveway. In February 2022 a Lauderdale County jury found the company responsible and awarded $9 million.

Thomas Doster, 77, was found on the floor of his room at Noland Hospital Dothan in 2007 and died less than 12 hours later. He had been assessed as a high fall risk and was supposed to be in restraints. In March 2016 a Houston County jury found the hospital breached the standard of care and awarded his daughter and executrix, Karren Hughes, $4 million. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed in October 2017.