Top Personal Injury Verdicts and Settlements of 2010
The 20 largest personal injury recoveries from 2010, nationwide, ranked by amount, with 26 independently-sourced results to browse. Individual client results and group recoveries are both listed and labeled. Each links to the full story, the firm, and the record behind the number.
Every result on this list holds a ProvenVerdicts designation, the largest verified personal injury result of 2010 or one of the Top 20, which the firm can display with a badge from its results page. The ranking is live and moves as results are verified.
- $505 millionVerdict
$505 Million Verdict Against Teva and Baxter for Propofol Vials That Spread Hepatitis C Across Las Vegas
A Clark County jury awarded Henry and Lorraine Chanin $505 million against Teva Parenteral Medicines and Baxter Healthcare after finding that both companies supplied oversized propofol vials to Las Vegas endoscopy clinics, enabling the reuse that infected Henry Chanin with hepatitis C.
After trial: Teva and Baxter appealed the $505 million verdict to the Nevada Supreme Court, which in early 2012 ordered the Chanin case resolved along with about 40 other pending hepatitis C lawsuits through a global settlement conference. The case settled for an undisclosed amount rather than the jury's award being paid.
- $208.8 millionVerdict
Los Angeles Jury Awards $208.8 Million in the Evans Asbestos Case, a Record Mesothelioma Verdict the Trial Judge Cut Down Months Later by Striking the $200 Million Punitive Award
A Los Angeles jury awarded $208,821,015 to Rhoda Evans, who developed mesothelioma after decades of washing the asbestos-laden work clothes of her husband, a Los Angeles DWP pipe cutter, with $200 million in punitive damages assessed against pipe maker CertainTeed. William Levin and Laurel Simes tried the case for the plaintiffs. The full number did not stand: months later the trial judge struck the punitive award as unconstitutional and ordered a new trial, and the case went up on appeal.
After trial: The $200M punitive award was struck as unconstitutional months after trial and a new punitive-damages retrial ordered; the appeal was decided in 2012 and the final resolution was never publicly reported.
Levin Simes LLP2010 · Los Angeles County Superior Court, Stanley Mosk CourthouseRead the full story → - $82.5 millionVerdict
Family Awarded $82.5 Million After Fatal Hood County Gas Plant Explosion
A Harris County jury found Hanover Compression L.P. (later Exterran Energy Solutions L.P.) grossly negligent in the 2007 explosion of a hot oil heater at a Quicksilver Resources natural gas plant in Hood County, Texas, that killed 27-year-old plant worker Joshua Wade Petrie. The jury assigned Hanover 90 percent of the responsibility and Quicksilver 10 percent, and in June 2010 awarded Petrie's widow, his three young children and his father a combined $82.5 million, a total that included $25 million in punitive damages against Hanover. Rob Ammons and Bennett Midlo of The Ammons Law Firm represented the family. Quicksilver, as Petrie's employer, carried workers' compensation coverage and was not itself on the hook for the damages award.
The Ammons Law Firm LLP2010 · 152nd District Court, Harris County, Texas (Houston)Read the full story → - $65 millionSettlementGroup recovery
$65 Million Settlement for Children Lead-Poisoned in New Orleans Public Housing
Joseph Bruno served as class counsel in a long-running class action on behalf of children who suffered lead poisoning from hazardous paint in Housing Authority of New Orleans units, securing a settlement fund of roughly $65.5 million.
- $52.4 millionSettlementGroup recovery
I-35W Bridge Collapse: $52.4 Million Settlement Against URS Corp for Negligent Inspection
James Schwebel represented 34 victims in a three-year lawsuit against engineering firm URS Corp, whose negligent inspection of the Minneapolis I-35W bridge preceded its August 2007 collapse, killing 13 people and injuring 145 others.
- $52.3 millionVerdict
$52.3 Million Cigarette Design Verdict Survives Eight Years of Appeals and a Post-Trial Recalculation
A federal jury found that R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company had defectively designed Salem cigarettes and awarded Barbara Izzarelli nearly $8 million; punitive damages and years of accruing interest, upheld on appeal and left standing when the Supreme Court declined to hear the case, eventually brought the total to $52.3 million.
After trial: The Second Circuit affirmed the verdict in 2017 after certifying a question of state law to the Connecticut Supreme Court; the U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari in February 2018.
Silver Golub & Teitell LLP2010 · U.S. District Court, District of Connecticut (Bridgeport)Read the full story → - $40.8 millionVerdict
$40.8 Million Verdict for Brooklyn Man Left in Wheelchair After Verizon Van Struck Him at Intersection
A Kings County jury awarded $40,876,000 to Matthew Falcone Jr., who suffered a traumatic brain injury, facial fractures, and permanent left-side paralysis after a Verizon New York truck struck him at a Brooklyn intersection in 2006.
- $35.25 millionVerdict
Fatigued Trucker's Falsified Logs Cost CenTra $35.25 Million in Wrongful Death of Kansas City Principal
A Boone County jury awarded $35.25 million to the family of Anita Gibbs, a Kansas City elementary school principal killed when a CenTra Trucking driver failed to slow for stopped traffic on Interstate 70 in 2006, after Ken McClain of Humphrey, Farrington and McClain used offensive collateral estoppel to limit the trial entirely to damages.
- $34.33 millionVerdictGroup recovery
$34.33 Million Verdict for Ruth's Chris Workers Poisoned by Carbon Monoxide at Pier Five Hotel
After a 13-week trial, a Baltimore City jury awarded $34.33 million to 20 Ruth's Chris Steakhouse workers and three of their spouses after the workers suffered permanent brain damage when carbon monoxide from Pier Five Hotel's boiler system flooded their workplace over several months in early 2008.
Murphy Falcon & Murphy2010 · Baltimore City Circuit Court (Case No. 24-C-08-001376)Read the full story → - $30 millionVerdict
$30 Million Verdict Against Foster Agency That Cleared a Serial Abuser
A Santa Clara County jury awarded $30 million to a man who endured years of sexual abuse as a foster child, finding the Giarretto Institute 75 percent responsible for licensing and failing to monitor the Mountain View home where the abuse occurred.
- $24 millionVerdict
$24 Million Verdict for Girl Run Over by Father's Big Rig Was Largest Personal-Injury Award in Sacramento County History
A Sacramento jury awarded $24.3 million, then reduced to $22.5 million under a High-Low Agreement, to a 14-year-old girl who was crushed beneath the rear wheels of her father's big rig and faced at least 19 more surgeries.
- $23.4 millionVerdict
Tire Tread Separation Rollover Leaves Driver a Quadriplegic, Jury Awards $23.4 Million
Cynthia Castillo lost control of her 1997 Ford Explorer near Rancho Cucamonga, California, on March 23, 2007, after the tread separated from the left rear tire and the SUV rolled down an embankment, leaving her a quadriplegic. She sued Ford Motor Co. in San Bernardino County Superior Court, arguing the Explorer's design turned a routine tire failure into a rollover. In February 2010, a jury returned a unanimous verdict for Castillo of $23.4 million, split between medical care and future needs and her pain and suffering. The Associated Press named her attorney, Brian Brandt, as the lawyer who argued the case for the plaintiff.
The Law Offices of Brian Brandt2010 · Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino (Rancho Cucamonga)Read the full story → - $22.2 millionVerdict
$22.2 Million Verdict for Woman Paralyzed After Spinal Hematoma at Southern Tennessee Medical Center
A federal jury in Chattanooga awarded $22.2 million to a Franklin County couple after an epidural catheter placed for post-surgical pain control triggered a spinal bleed that left 62-year-old Bette Donathan permanently paralyzed from the waist down.
Kinnard Clayton & Beveridge2010 · U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Tennessee, ChattanoogaRead the full story → - $18.5 millionVerdictReduced after trial
Essex County Jury Awards $18.5 Million for a Delayed C-Section at Newark Beth Israel That Left a Boy With Cerebral Palsy
A boy born at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in 1998 developed cerebral palsy after doctors waited too long to perform a cesarean section despite clear signs of fetal distress. In April 2010, an Essex County jury awarded $18.5 million, and the family recovered $16.75 million under a high-low agreement reached during deliberations.
After trial: A high-low agreement placed during deliberations capped the recovery at $16.75 million, which the family received; the agreement foreclosed any appeal.
Mazie Slater Katz & Freeman, LLC2010 · Superior Court of New Jersey, Essex CountyRead the full story → - $11 millionSettlement
Tripler Army Medical Center Delivery Errors Yield $11 Million Federal Settlement for Brain-Damaged Infant
Davis Levin Livingston secured an $11 million federal settlement, requiring U.S. Attorney General approval, after Tripler Army Medical Center's cascading delivery-room errors, including a misplaced oxygen tube left in place for more than forty minutes, caused a newborn to develop spastic quadriplegia and cerebral palsy.
- $10.8 millionVerdict
San Diego Jury Holds Pizza Hut Liable for $10.8 Million After Delivery Driver's Head-On Crash
A San Diego jury returned a $10.8 million verdict against Pizza Hut after one of its delivery drivers drifted across a center divide and hit a mother and daughter head-on, leaving the daughter with a permanent brain injury.
- $4.75 millionVerdict
Multimillion-Dollar Verdict Against I-Flow After Pain Pump Destroyed Portland Man's Shoulder Cartilage
John Coletti won a multimillion-dollar jury verdict against I-Flow Corporation after the company's intra-articular pain pump destroyed Matthew Beale's shoulder cartilage following routine arthroscopic surgery, in what trial watchers tracked as the first verdict of its kind against a pain-pump manufacturer.
After trial: Reported as $4.75 million to $5.5 million.
Paulson Coletti Trial Attorneys2010 · Multnomah County Circuit Court, Portland, ORRead the full story → - $4 millionReduced from $20 million
An Anesthesia Team Skipped Rapid Sequence Induction, and a Young Mother Aspirated and Died
In January 2006, Paulett Pettaway Hall, a 32-year-old wife and mother of two, went to Springhill Memorial Hospital in Mobile for exploratory surgery. Her records showed risk factors for pulmonary aspiration, but the anesthesia team used a routine induction instead of a rapid sequence induction, and she aspirated bile into her lungs and died of aspiration pneumonitis on January 16, 2006. A Mobile County jury returned a $20 million wrongful death verdict in December 2009, which the trial court remitted to $4 million and her estate accepted. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the $4 million judgment on September 28, 2012.
After trial: The $4 million is a remitted amount: the trial court cut the jury's original $20 million verdict under Alabama's constitutional excessiveness review, and awarded_amount_value above records that original jury figure. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the reduced judgment on September 28, 2012, and no further appeal was found.
Cunningham Bounds, LLC2010 · Mobile Circuit Court, Alabama; affirmed by the Supreme Court of Alabama, 108 So. 3d 486 (2012)Read the full story → - $3.8 millionVerdict
Federal Jury Finds Boat Propeller Defectively Designed After Lake Austin Amputation; Fifth Circuit Affirms
After two hung juries, a federal jury in Austin found Sea Ray and Mercury Marine liable for a design defect in an unguarded boat propeller that severed an 18-year-old's right leg on Lake Austin, awarding $3.8 million; the Fifth Circuit unanimously affirmed.
Byrd Davis Alden & Henrichson, LLP2010 · W.D. Texas (Austin); affirmed 5th Cir. May 27, 2011Read the full story → - $3.5 millionVerdict
Jackson County Jury Awards $3.5 Million to Brain-Injured Driver in Fairley v. Schiber Truck Case
A Jackson County jury awarded James and Kim Fairley $3.5 million after a Schiber Truck Co. tractor-trailer rear-ended their minivan and pushed it into oncoming traffic, leaving James Fairley with a traumatic brain injury and two fractured vertebrae.
All 2010 verdicts and settlements
26 results, largest first
The Law Offices of James Scott Farrin served as lead driver for a coalition of more than 25 firms in the In re Black Farmers Discrimination Litigation, helping win a $1.25 billion settlement for African American farmers denied a fair shot at USDA loan programs.
A Clark County jury awarded Henry and Lorraine Chanin $505 million against Teva Parenteral Medicines and Baxter Healthcare after finding that both companies supplied oversized propofol vials to Las Vegas endoscopy clinics, enabling the reuse that infected Henry Chanin with hepatitis C.
A Los Angeles jury awarded $208,821,015 to Rhoda Evans, who developed mesothelioma after decades of washing the asbestos-laden work clothes of her husband, a Los Angeles DWP pipe cutter, with $200 million in punitive damages assessed against pipe maker CertainTeed. William Levin and Laurel Simes tried the case for the plaintiffs. The full number did not stand: months later the trial judge struck the punitive award as unconstitutional and ordered a new trial, and the case went up on appeal.
A Harris County jury found Hanover Compression L.P. (later Exterran Energy Solutions L.P.) grossly negligent in the 2007 explosion of a hot oil heater at a Quicksilver Resources natural gas plant in Hood County, Texas, that killed 27-year-old plant worker Joshua Wade Petrie. The jury assigned Hanover 90 percent of the responsibility and Quicksilver 10 percent, and in June 2010 awarded Petrie's widow, his three young children and his father a combined $82.5 million, a total that included $25 million in punitive damages against Hanover. Rob Ammons and Bennett Midlo of The Ammons Law Firm represented the family. Quicksilver, as Petrie's employer, carried workers' compensation coverage and was not itself on the hook for the damages award.
Joseph Bruno served as class counsel in a long-running class action on behalf of children who suffered lead poisoning from hazardous paint in Housing Authority of New Orleans units, securing a settlement fund of roughly $65.5 million.
Irwin Levin of CohenMalad served as court-appointed co-lead class counsel in a multidistrict antitrust case against seven central Indiana ready-mixed concrete companies, securing approximately $59 million in combined settlements for construction-industry buyers who paid inflated prices during a four-year price-fixing conspiracy.
A Thurston County jury awarded $57 million to roughly 22,000 live-in home-care providers after finding that Washington's Department of Social and Health Services unlawfully cut their pay through an automatic 15 percent reduction in authorized care hours.
James Schwebel represented 34 victims in a three-year lawsuit against engineering firm URS Corp, whose negligent inspection of the Minneapolis I-35W bridge preceded its August 2007 collapse, killing 13 people and injuring 145 others.
A federal jury found that R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company had defectively designed Salem cigarettes and awarded Barbara Izzarelli nearly $8 million; punitive damages and years of accruing interest, upheld on appeal and left standing when the Supreme Court declined to hear the case, eventually brought the total to $52.3 million.
A Kings County jury awarded $40,876,000 to Matthew Falcone Jr., who suffered a traumatic brain injury, facial fractures, and permanent left-side paralysis after a Verizon New York truck struck him at a Brooklyn intersection in 2006.
A Boone County jury awarded $35.25 million to the family of Anita Gibbs, a Kansas City elementary school principal killed when a CenTra Trucking driver failed to slow for stopped traffic on Interstate 70 in 2006, after Ken McClain of Humphrey, Farrington and McClain used offensive collateral estoppel to limit the trial entirely to damages.
After a 13-week trial, a Baltimore City jury awarded $34.33 million to 20 Ruth's Chris Steakhouse workers and three of their spouses after the workers suffered permanent brain damage when carbon monoxide from Pier Five Hotel's boiler system flooded their workplace over several months in early 2008.
A Santa Clara County jury awarded $30 million to a man who endured years of sexual abuse as a foster child, finding the Giarretto Institute 75 percent responsible for licensing and failing to monitor the Mountain View home where the abuse occurred.
A Sacramento jury awarded $24.3 million, then reduced to $22.5 million under a High-Low Agreement, to a 14-year-old girl who was crushed beneath the rear wheels of her father's big rig and faced at least 19 more surgeries.
Cynthia Castillo lost control of her 1997 Ford Explorer near Rancho Cucamonga, California, on March 23, 2007, after the tread separated from the left rear tire and the SUV rolled down an embankment, leaving her a quadriplegic. She sued Ford Motor Co. in San Bernardino County Superior Court, arguing the Explorer's design turned a routine tire failure into a rollover. In February 2010, a jury returned a unanimous verdict for Castillo of $23.4 million, split between medical care and future needs and her pain and suffering. The Associated Press named her attorney, Brian Brandt, as the lawyer who argued the case for the plaintiff.
A federal jury in Chattanooga awarded $22.2 million to a Franklin County couple after an epidural catheter placed for post-surgical pain control triggered a spinal bleed that left 62-year-old Bette Donathan permanently paralyzed from the waist down.
A boy born at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in 1998 developed cerebral palsy after doctors waited too long to perform a cesarean section despite clear signs of fetal distress. In April 2010, an Essex County jury awarded $18.5 million, and the family recovered $16.75 million under a high-low agreement reached during deliberations.
Davis Levin Livingston secured an $11 million federal settlement, requiring U.S. Attorney General approval, after Tripler Army Medical Center's cascading delivery-room errors, including a misplaced oxygen tube left in place for more than forty minutes, caused a newborn to develop spastic quadriplegia and cerebral palsy.
A San Diego jury returned a $10.8 million verdict against Pizza Hut after one of its delivery drivers drifted across a center divide and hit a mother and daughter head-on, leaving the daughter with a permanent brain injury.
John Coletti won a multimillion-dollar jury verdict against I-Flow Corporation after the company's intra-articular pain pump destroyed Matthew Beale's shoulder cartilage following routine arthroscopic surgery, in what trial watchers tracked as the first verdict of its kind against a pain-pump manufacturer.
In January 2006, Paulett Pettaway Hall, a 32-year-old wife and mother of two, went to Springhill Memorial Hospital in Mobile for exploratory surgery. Her records showed risk factors for pulmonary aspiration, but the anesthesia team used a routine induction instead of a rapid sequence induction, and she aspirated bile into her lungs and died of aspiration pneumonitis on January 16, 2006. A Mobile County jury returned a $20 million wrongful death verdict in December 2009, which the trial court remitted to $4 million and her estate accepted. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the $4 million judgment on September 28, 2012.
After two hung juries, a federal jury in Austin found Sea Ray and Mercury Marine liable for a design defect in an unguarded boat propeller that severed an 18-year-old's right leg on Lake Austin, awarding $3.8 million; the Fifth Circuit unanimously affirmed.
A Jackson County jury awarded James and Kim Fairley $3.5 million after a Schiber Truck Co. tractor-trailer rear-ended their minivan and pushed it into oncoming traffic, leaving James Fairley with a traumatic brain injury and two fractured vertebrae.
A Clermont County, Ohio jury found that an emergency room doctor was negligent for failing to instruct the parents of a nine-year-old boy on how to watch for a serious head injury after a fall, a lapse that let an epidural hematoma go undetected overnight and required emergency brain surgery. The jury awarded $2,412,899 in 2010, which the trial court reduced by a $500,000 credit for the family's earlier settlement with the hospital, leaving the doctor and his practice group liable for $1,912,899 plus prejudgment interest. The Twelfth District Court of Appeals affirmed the verdict in 2012, and the Ohio Supreme Court resolved a separate dispute over how the interest should be calculated in 2013, sending that narrow issue back to the trial court. The underlying negligence finding and damages figure were never disturbed.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.