Chance of Life Lost; Justice Found, with Rudy Massa and Devyn Lisi
Episode Summary
Cheryl Pschirer was a lifetime smoker, at the end of her working life, adult children, no surviving spouse. “So some of the facts were stacked against us,” recalls Rudy Massa. “We had to, in essence, try to make this case about something more than that, and that’s where the early detection and the lost chance of life comes in.”
Rudy and Devyn Lisi took St. Clair Hospital providers to trial for their failure to inform Cheryl that an x-ray had detected a mass on her lung. She wouldn’t learn of the radiology report for seven months. Eight months later, she died of lung cancer at age 66.
With host Brendan Lupetin, Rudy and Devyn discuss how they overcame defense attempts to blame Cheryl for her smoking history and arguments that, regardless of the delay, nothing would have changed the outcome for her. They read from their powerful pre-trial statement and closing. The jury responded by awarding a $750,000 verdict.
Episode Preview
- Rudy believes the pre-trial statement should provide the judge with the essence of the story in the most economical language possible.
- Background of Pschirer v. St. Clair Hospital, in which 66-year-old Cheryl Pschirer died after a delayed lung cancer detection.
- How the “battle of the experts” turned into victim blaming because Cheryl had smoked for years.
- Rudy and Devyn argued that the emergency doctor and the hospital had a duty to inform Cheryl directly of the x-ray showing a mass in her lung. While the results were faxed to her primary doctor, “that duty doesn’t just go away.”
- The big role that personal choice played in voir dire.
- Sometimes, the blind squirrel can find a nut: that happened when an expert witness called the defendants’ behavior indefensible.
- Rudy’s closing began like this: “As for the amount of damages, I’d like to talk to you a bit about that. So, what is the chance to live worth?”
- Two juror questions sent different signals to the team – one negative, the other positive.
- How Devyn pushed back on the primary care physician’s testimony that “I can’t say one way or another” if early diagnosis is good for treating cancer.
Devyn Lisi
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