ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, December 22, 1995 TAG: 9512220045
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
NOTE: Below
BUT THE PUNITIVE judgment, $35,000, stands.
A Roanoke judge has thrown out a $100,000 award to an elderly woman who was traumatized when her landlady stomped a nestful of baby birds to death on the floor of her apartment patio.
Last month, a jury ordered Judy Woody and South Roanoke Apartment Village to pay $135,000 to Ruby Campagna, who testified that Woody knocked a nest of wrens from the wind chimes outside her apartment and stomped the tiny birds to death.
The jury awarded $100,000 in compensatory damages for Campagna's psychiatric bills and pain and suffering, plus $35,000 in punitive damages, intended to punish the defendant.
At a hearing Thursday in Roanoke Circuit Court, Judge Richard Pattisall threw out the $100,000 compensatory award and ordered a new trial on the issue of how much money Campagna should receive for actual damages.
The $35,000 in punitive damages - along with the jury's finding that Woody intentionally inflicted emotional distress - were left intact.
In a written motion asking Pattisall to set the entire verdict aside, Woody's lawyers argued the award was excessive, "shocking to the conscience, and clearly was the product of passion, prejudice, sympathy and bias."
Campagna's attorney, state Sen.-elect John Edwards, D-Roanoke, had asked Pattisall not to tamper with the jury's verdict.
"The jury has spoken, and there is substantial evidence to support the verdict," Edwards said after the hearing.
At a November trial, testimony showed Campagna had spent about $2,500 for psychiatric treatment for depression she suffered from witnessing the bird-stomping incident. In awarding compensatory damages, juries can also consider issues such as mental anguish that are more difficult to put a price tag on.
"There are no clear guidelines in cases like this, and that is why we have juries to evaluate the evidence and render a verdict that they think will fairly compensate the plaintiff," Edwards said.
Pattisall's ruling that the verdict was excessive sets up a new trial on the issue of compensatory damages. Edwards said he needs to research the law to determine if it is possible to appeal the judge's decision.
Testimony showed that Campagna, a bird-lover, was delighted to find two wrens had nested on some chimes hanging from her apartment patio in the spring of 1993.
Unknown to Campagna and the wrens, Woody had a policy of destroying bird nests throughout the apartment complex because of damage birds caused. When a maintenance man discovered the nest while installing new carpet on the patio, Campagna asked that it be left undisturbed.
A short time later, Campagna testified, Woody showed up irate and began to chastise her. The lawsuit said Woody knocked the nest to the floor, stepped on the thumb-sized birds and twisted her shoes "in order to mutilate and mangle their tiny bodies in front of [Campagna]."
All the while, the suit said, Woody stared at the woman "with a malevolent scowl on her face."
A family member who is also a nurse testified that Campagna was suffering from shock shortly after the incident, and a psychiatrist said she later exhibited symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.
Woody's lawyers said earlier that she did not know there were birds in the nest when she knocked it down. Once she discovered the birds, she killed them because "it was the least cruel thing to do," attorney John Sarber told the jury.
Sarber declined to comment after Thursday's hearing.
In an interview shortly after the verdict, one of the jurors said the jury was just as concerned about Woody's actions before and after the birds were killed as they were with the stomping itself.
Campagna testified that Woody was extremely rude and abusive, and that she later returned to the apartment and threw a wadded-up invoice for the new carpet at her, saying she would have to pay for the carpet.
"Everybody agreed that was no way for an apartment manager to treat an elderly lady," the juror said.
LENGTH: Medium: 78 linesby CNB