Spine Surgeon Found Negligent After Scoliosis Surgery Left Yakima Woman Worse Off
Emily Daley, 42, had spinal surgery in July 2011 to correct a worsening curve from scoliosis she had lived with since her teens. Instead of straightening her spine, the operation by Dr. Michael Thomas left her with a severe forward and left lean, and Daley alleged Thomas then failed to provide adequate follow-up care. For three years she lived with pain that was at times severe enough to make her lose consciousness, until a different surgeon corrected the lean in August 2014. In July 2017, a Yakima County Superior Court jury awarded her $1,219,052, covering her past medical expenses and non-economic damages.
What happened
In July 2011, Emily Daley, then 42 and living with scoliosis since her teenage years, underwent spinal surgery in Yakima, Washington to correct worsening back pain. Her surgeon, Dr. Michael Thomas of Cascade Neurosurgical Associates, was meant to straighten the curve in her spine. Instead, the operation left her with a severe forward and left lean, a worse deformity than the one she started with.
Daley filed suit in Yakima County Superior Court in June 2015, alleging that Thomas provided substandard care during the surgery itself and then failed to give her adequate follow-up care afterward. For roughly three years she lived with pain that was at times severe enough to cause her to lose consciousness. She consulted several spine surgeons before undergoing a second operation in August 2014 that corrected the lean caused by Thomas's surgery.
The case went to trial before Judge Gayle M. Harthcock. Felix Luna and Tomas Gahan of the Seattle firm Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna represented Daley. Thomas and Cascade Neurosurgical Associates were defended by David Thorner and Megan Murphy of the Yakima firm Thorner Kennedy and Gano. The trial ran from July 17 to July 27, 2017, and the jury returned its verdict on the last of those days, finding that Thomas's negligence was a proximate cause of Daley's injuries.
The jury awarded Daley $1,219,052: $219,052 for past medical expenses and $1,000,000 in non-economic damages for her pain and suffering. Washington does not cap non-economic damages in personal injury cases. The state Supreme Court struck down an earlier statutory cap as unconstitutional in 1989, so the jury's award stood at the full amount it found.
Thomas had a prior disciplinary history. The Washington Department of Health had placed him on probation after he tested positive for narcotics and benzodiazepines while performing a separate neck and spine operation in 2012, and his medical license credentials had expired by January 2016. No appeal of the Daley verdict appears in Washington's appellate court records. Whether the award was ultimately paid is not public.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.Yakima Herald-Republic, Aug. 1, 2017 (staff reporter Molly Rosbach): verdict amount and breakdown, plaintiff Emily Daley, defendant Dr. Michael Thomas of Cascade Neurosurgical Associates, surgery date and injuries, names Felix Luna as Daley's attorney, notes Thomas's prior probation and expired license.
- 2.LexisNexis Jury Verdicts and Settlements, Case of the Week, Aug. 24, 2017: precise verdict total ($1,219,052), trial judge (Gayle M. Harthcock), plaintiff counsel of record (Felix Luna and Tomas Gahan) and defense counsel (David Thorner and Megan Murphy), verdict date (July 27, 2017).
More proven verdicts from Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna
All Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna proven verdicts →A King County jury awarded $857 million in December 2023 to seven people, five former students and two parent volunteers, who said they were sickened by PCBs leaking from light fixtures at the Sky Valley Education Center in Monroe, Washington. The verdict included $73 million in compensatory damages and $784 million in punitive damages against Monsanto and its successor Pharmacia. In April 2024 a King County judge cut the punitive award to $365 million under Missouri's statutory cap on punitive damages, reducing the total to $438 million. Monsanto appealed, and Bayer said in February 2026 that Monsanto had settled the remaining Sky Valley jury verdicts on confidential terms, so what was ultimately paid is not public.
A King County jury returned an $82 million verdict against Monsanto in December 2022 for a family exposed to PCBs at the Sky Valley Education Center in Monroe, Washington, awarding $20.5 million in compensatory damages and $61.5 million in punitive damages to one member of the family. The firm described it as the largest verdict against Monsanto for an individual plaintiff in any PCB case.
Seattle Public Schools agreed to pay $16 million in October 2024 to settle a lawsuit from a former Garfield High School student who said two coaches sexually abused her over several years while the district failed to intervene. The suit named volunteer coach Walter Jones, who had been barred from district employment yet was allowed to coach anyway, and assistant coach Marvin Hall, who continued an abusive relationship with her into her college years. It is the largest tort settlement in the district's history, funded mostly through the district's insurance pool. Both coaches were separately prosecuted in King County Superior Court: Hall pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct with a minor in 2025, and Jones's child rape trial ended in a hung jury and a mistrial in December 2025. Paul Sewell and Tomas Gahan of Peterson Wampold Rosato Feldman Luna represented the former student.
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