Top Personal Injury Verdicts and Settlements of 2014

$23.6 Billion Punitive Verdict Against R.J. Reynolds, the Biggest Number of the Engle Tobacco Era, Thrown Out on Appeal and Erased by a Defense Verdict on Retrial

A Pensacola jury awarded Cynthia Robinson $23.6 billion in punitive damages against R.J. Reynolds over the 1996 lung cancer death of her 36-year-old husband, the largest single-plaintiff award of Florida's Engle tobacco litigation, but the trial judge called the number constitutionally excessive, an appeals court ordered a full retrial over improper closing arguments, and a second jury returned a complete defense verdict in 2019, so the estate ultimately collected nothing.

After trial: Thrown out as excessive; a 2017 retrial was ordered and the 2019 retrial jury returned a complete defense verdict, affirmed 2021. The estate ultimately recovered nothing.

Boehringer Ingelheim Pays $650 Million to Resolve Pradaxa Bleeding Lawsuits in MDL Where TorHoerman Law Served as Co-Lead Counsel

Boehringer Ingelheim agreed to pay $650 million in May 2014 to resolve approximately 4,000 federal lawsuits claiming the blood thinner Pradaxa caused life-threatening bleeding injuries without adequate warnings, in an MDL presided over by Judge David Herndon in the Southern District of Illinois where the court appointed TorHoerman Law's Tor Hoerman as one of five plaintiffs' co-lead counsel.

$190 Million Settlement for 8,000 Patients Secretly Recorded by Johns Hopkins Gynecologist

Jonathan Schochor served as lead attorney for more than 8,000 women who reached a $190 million class-action settlement against Johns Hopkins Hospital after gynecologist Dr. Nikita Levy secretly filmed patients during examinations over a 25-year career.

$172 Million Bronx Verdict After EMTs Arrived Without Oxygen or Defibrillator and Told Family to Wait

Thomas Moore won a $172 million jury verdict in Bronx Supreme Court for a woman left with catastrophic brain damage after FDNY EMTs responded to her 1998 cardiac arrest without essential equipment and advised her family to wait for a second ambulance instead of transporting her immediately.

After trial: No appellate decision is on the public record; the headline number was never tested on appeal.

Robert Dassow Serves as Liaison Counsel in $56 Million Biomet Hip Implant MDL Settlement

Robert T. Dassow of Hovde Dassow + Deets served as local liaison counsel for the plaintiffs steering committee in the Biomet M2A Magnum metal-on-metal hip implant MDL, helping coordinate a settlement valued at least $56 million, with individual awards paid from a program that ultimately resolved roughly 2,800 claims nationwide.

Quadriplegic Driver's $55.3 Million Verdict Against Honda Over a Defective Seat Belt, Affirmed on Appeal

A Philadelphia jury found that a defectively designed seat belt in a 1999 Acura Integra left driver Carlos Martinez a quadriplegic after a rollover on Interstate 70 near Baltimore, and awarded him and his wife $55,325,714. Stewart J. Eisenberg and Daniel J. Sherry Jr., then of Eisenberg, Rothweiler, Winkler, Eisenberg & Jeck (now Eisenberg Winkler Jeck Schwartz Schoenhaus & Sherry), tried the case against Honda. The trial court denied Honda's post-trial motions and entered judgment on the full verdict plus $2,066,002 in delay damages, a molded judgment of $57,391,716. Honda appealed, arguing that a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision handed down while its post-trial motion was pending had rewritten the state's products liability standard. On April 19, 2017, the Pennsylvania Superior Court rejected every argument Honda raised and affirmed.

After trial: Honda's post-trial motion was pending when the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decided Tincher v. Omega Flex, Inc., 104 A.3d 328 (Pa. See more

$39 Million Verdict for Family of Construction-Zone Inspector Killed on I-271

A Cuyahoga County jury awarded $39 million to the widow of a highway paving inspector struck and killed on Interstate 271 after the paving contractor failed to follow its court-approved safety plan.

$9 Billion Punitive Verdict Against Takeda and Eli Lilly in First Federal Actos Bladder Cancer Trial

Paul Pennock, now head of mass torts at Morgan & Morgan, then co-lead counsel of the federal Actos MDL at Weitz & Luxenberg, helped try the bellwether case that produced a $9 billion punitive verdict against Takeda and Eli Lilly for hiding the diabetes drug's bladder cancer risk. The award was later cut to about $36.9 million, but the verdict drove Takeda to a $2.4 billion global settlement in 2015.

After trial: In October 2014 Judge Rebecca Doherty cut the $9 billion punitive award by more than 99 percent, to $27.6 million against Takeda and $9.2 million against Eli Lilly, on top of the $1.5 million the jury awarded in compensatory damages. Takeda resolved the Actos litigation in a global settlement of about $2.4 billion in April 2015.

$26.3 Million Verdict for Pedestrian Who Lost a Leg and Suffered Brain Injury in Laguna Niguel Crosswalk Crash

A jury awarded $26,255,367 to Maryam Hedayati after a driver ran a red light and struck her in a marked crosswalk, leaving her with a severed leg, a shattered leg, and catastrophic brain trauma.

Milwaukee Jury Awards $25.3 Million to Quadruple Amputee Over Undiagnosed Strep A Infection

A Milwaukee County jury awarded $25.3 million after emergency room providers failed to tell Ascaris Mayo that her symptoms could mean a Strep A infection, an omission that cost her all four limbs, though the Wisconsin Supreme Court later reinstated the state's $750,000 cap on noneconomic damages.

$22.5 Million Vermont Verdict for Lineman Who Lost Both Legs in High-Voltage Substation Arc

A Vermont jury awarded $22.5 million, the second-largest verdict in state history at the time, to a Maine utility lineman who lost both legs below the knee after an ungrounded, defectively installed air-break switch at a Richford substation released a 5,000-degree electrical arc through his body.

The Concrete Truck Signalled Left, Then Turned Right Across His Path. The Steering Had Been Worked On That Month and the Driver Knew It Was Still Wrong.

Billy Moyle, 24, was driving behind a Mack concrete truck on US Highway 75 near Nebraska City on Halloween 2012. The truck moved into the left turn lane and then turned right across his path, running his pickup off the road. He suffered a broken vertebra and a partially severed spinal cord.

After trial: The verdict is $19,607,486, returned 29 January 2014 in the District of Nebraska before Senior Judge Lyle Strom, and it is the jury's own precise figure rather than a rounded report. What we cannot confirm is the final disposition. See more

Monterey County Jury Holds Caltrans 60 Percent Liable for Double Fatality on Highway 156, Awarding $18.7 Million to Two Families

A Monterey County jury returned an $18.7 million verdict against Caltrans and a trucking company after finding the state had ignored three decades of its own data showing that the left-turn configuration on Highway 156 made the road one of California's most dangerous corridors.

Nurses Ignored Pitocin Orders, Leaving Newborn with Spastic Quadriplegia: $18.27 Million Verdict

A Barren County jury awarded $18.27 million after finding that nurses at T.J. Samson Community Hospital disregarded the treating obstetrician's standing Pitocin orders during a 2007 delivery, depriving newborn Tristan Hamilton of oxygen and leaving him with spastic quadriplegia.

$16.7 Million Verdict After Radiologist Missed Lung Cancer on Chest X-Ray at Brigham and Women's

A Suffolk Superior Court jury awarded $16.7 million after a Brigham and Women's Hospital radiologist read a 2006 chest X-ray as normal, missing a visible lung nodule that would develop into terminal cancer within 13 months.

$12 Million Verdict Over a Perforated Colon During Hernia Surgery, Affirmed by the Connecticut Supreme Court

A Danbury jury awarded Vivian Gagliano and her husband roughly $12 million after her colon was perforated during hernia repair surgery at Danbury Hospital, and the Connecticut Supreme Court later affirmed the verdict, holding Danbury Hospital vicariously liable for the surgical resident who performed the procedure.

After trial: The verdict was affirmed by the Connecticut Supreme Court on August 10, 2018 (SC 19804) and is fully final. The trial itself took place in May 2014; some secondary sources round the year to 2015, but May 2014 is the date sourced here.

Niagara County Jury Awards $8.8 Million After Teen Loses Arm to Defective Post-Hole Digger

A Niagara County jury awarded $8.8 million to a 16-year-old girl whose right arm was severed by a tractor-driven post-hole digger with a defectively designed safety shield, a verdict the New York Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed in April 2014.

$7.25 Million Verdict for Family of DOT Supervisor Killed on Route 8 Shoulder

A Hartford jury returned a $7.25 million verdict for the estate of Daniel DiNardi, a Connecticut DOT supervisor fatally struck by a tractor-trailer while working on the shoulder of Route 8 northbound near Waterbury.

Waterbury Jury Awards $7.2 Million to the Estate of a 5-Year-Old Who Drowned in a Boys & Girls Club Pool Watched by a Single Lifeguard

On June 9, 2008, a 5-year-old nonswimmer in an after-school program at the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Waterbury went under in the club's indoor pool while the only lifeguard sat in a deck chair doing paperwork. Her 7-year-old brother tried to pull her out, the lifeguard told him to tug her to the side, and no one performed chest compressions for 11 minutes until paramedics arrived. She was declared brain dead the next day at Yale-New Haven Children's Hospital. On September 18, 2014, after a two-week trial, a Waterbury jury found the club liable and awarded her estate $7.2 million and her mother $90,600 in medical and funeral expenses, part of a $12.3 million total verdict that also compensated her brother.

After trial: The club said after the verdict that it planned to appeal. We found no reported Connecticut Appellate Court or Supreme Court decision in the case, and no public report of a reduction, so the verdict is treated as final. See more

Jury Awards $6.71 Million After KSBY Manager Killed Crossing Shell Beach Road Outside The Cliffs Resort

A San Luis Obispo County jury awarded $6,709,300 to the family of Tricia Rittger, a KSBY sales manager who was struck and killed by an SUV while crossing Shell Beach Road to reach The Cliffs Resort, after the firm proved the resort had violated its own parking policy and a city-issued operating permit.