$75.6 Million Verdict for Paralyzed Highway Flagman Struck by Drunk Ivyland Cafe Manager
Won by Saltz Mongeluzzi & Bendesky.
A Philadelphia jury awarded $75.6 million to Joseph Tuski, a highway construction flagman left quadriplegic when a drunk driver who had just served himself alcohol at the bar he managed struck him at 40 mph and fled the scene.
What happened
On the morning of January 17, 2001, Joseph Tuski was working as a flagman at a highway construction site in Warminster, Pennsylvania, guiding traffic through an active work zone. Michael Petaccio, the manager of the Ivyland Cafe, had been at the bar that morning and had consumed alcohol before driving away. His blood-alcohol level later tested at .17, more than twice the legal limit.
Petaccio's vehicle struck Tuski at more than 40 miles per hour, throwing him more than 100 feet. The impact fractured Tuski's spine and left him quadriplegic, confined to a wheelchair and requiring around-the-clock care for the rest of his life. Petaccio fled the scene. He was arrested several days later and later pleaded guilty to aggravated assault while driving under the influence, serving time in prison.
Robert Mongeluzzi of Saltz, Mongeluzzi, Barrett and Bendesky represented Tuski at trial in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. The case proceeded on two theories: negligence against Petaccio as the driver, and dram shop liability against the Ivyland Cafe for serving alcohol to Petaccio when he was visibly intoxicated. Pennsylvania's Dram Shop Act allows injured parties to recover from a licensed establishment that serves a person who is already unreasonably intoxicated. Because Petaccio was both the manager of the Cafe and had served himself drinks there that morning, the facts presented a direct tie between the bar's liability and the crash.
At trial, Tuski's medical expenses already totaled $1.7 million, and experts estimated his future care costs at $12 million. On January 13, 2004, the jury returned a verdict of $75.6 million: $50.6 million in compensatory damages and $25 million in punitive damages against both Petaccio and the Ivyland Cafe. Mongeluzzi described it at the time as the largest liquor liability verdict in Pennsylvania history and believed it was the second-largest non-death personal injury verdict Philadelphia had ever seen.
Following the verdict, Common Pleas Judge John Milton Younge granted a defense motion for remittitur and reduced every element of the award by half, leaving Tuski with approximately $37.5 million. The Pennsylvania Superior Court affirmed that reduced award in a unanimous ruling, finding that both defendants had been properly held liable. The case was later the subject of further proceedings in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court (586 Pa. 773). Separately, Ivyland Cafe's insurer, Princeton Insurance Co., agreed to pay $20 million to settle a bad-faith refusal-to-settle claim brought on Tuski's behalf after the insurer had declined to pay out on the bar's $1 million policy limit.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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