Nathan Deal Judicial Center in Atlanta
ATLANTA – An $80 million verdict will stand in a wrongful death lawsuit over objections the defendant wasn’t allowed to show the deceased’s life couldn’t have been worth $30 million because of past drug abuse.
The Georgia Court of Appeals this month ruled against driver Marite Mendoza, who while driving struck a moped driven by Gail Pritchard. The case made it all the way to a jury trial in Cobb County, where jurors awarded $30 million for the value of Pritchard’s life.
Pritchard became a quadriplegic after the 2016 accident and died in 2019 at age 57 while her case was pending. Her estate took up her cause and was awarded $35 million for pain and suffering, $30 million for value of life and millions more in interest.
Mendoza’s insurer appealed, arguing the trial judge erred in preventing it from telling jurors about Pritchard’s drug use. Two years before the crash, she was diagnosed with a dependence on multiple substances and a blood test was positive for cocaine, Methadone, benzodiazepines and THC.
Though the trial judge originally ordered that evidence could be presented to a jury, they changed their mind after a motion for reconsideration. Pritchard’s estate obtained an affidavit from her treating doctor that said he had no opinions whether her drug use affected her life expectancy and that he was not an expert who could say one way or the other.
The trial court found a lack of expert testimony from both sides on the subject and excluded the evidence, calling it “irrelevant and inadmissible without expert testimony establishing a connection between its usage and its effects.”
Judge Anne Barnes and colleagues on the Court of Appeals agreed in a 24-page ruling that rejected other appellate arguments made by both sides. Mendoza’s evidence presented to the trial court had been the doctor’s deposition and Pritchard’s medical records.
Given there was no evidence Pritchard was on drugs at the time her moped was struck, introducing her prior drug use would have confused the jury, the court affirmed.
“(T)o the extent Mendoza contends the evidence of drug use is admissible with regard to Pritchard’s life expectancy, there is no ‘expert testimony linking the drug use suggested by the medical records… to her life expectancy,” Barnes wrote.
The court also said Pritchard’s estate couldn’t sue for punitive damages, because Mendoza’s driving wasn’t willful misconduct. Mendoza testified she didn’t know she had struck anyone while making a left-hand turn until she heard a bump in the back of her vehicle.
She speculated that Pritchard may not have had the moped’s lights on because she never saw her. Mendoza’s lawyers filed a notice of intent to appeal to the Georgia Supreme Court on Nov. 10.
