Boyd v. Bulala
| Citation | 905 F.2d 764 |
| Decision Date | 12 June 1990 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 88-2055,88-2056,s. 88-2055 |
| Parties | Helen C. BOYD; Roger E. Boyd; Veronica Lynn Boyd, by her parents and next friends, Helen Boyd & Roger E. Boyd, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. R.A. BULALA, M.D., Defendant-Appellant, Association of Trial Lawyers of America; Virginia Trial Lawyers Association; Distressed Parents Together; Consumer Federation of America; Medical Society of Virginia, Amici Curiae. Helen C. BOYD; Roger E. Boyd; Veronica Lynn Boyd, by her parents and next friends, Helen Boyd & Roger E. Boyd, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA; R.A. Bulala, M.D., Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (4th Circuit) |
Phillip C. Stone, Ronald D. Hodges, Wharton, Aldhizer & Weaver, Harrisonburg, Va., A.E. Dick Howard, Charlottesville, Va., Mary Sue Terry, Atty. Gen., Gregory E. Lucyk, Asst. Atty. Gen., Richmond, Va., for defendants-appellants.
William O.P. Snead, III, Fairfax, Va., J. Randolph Parker, Tucker, Parker & Beskin, Charlottesville, Va., Rosemarie Annunziata, Dickstein, Shapiro & Morin, Vienna, Va., for plaintiffs-appellees.
Bill Wagner, Tampa, Fla., Jeffrey R. White, Washington, D.C., Fred D. Smith, Jr., Minor & Smith, Richmond, Va., for amici curiae The Ass'n of Trial Lawyers of America, Virginia Trial Lawyers Ass'n, Consumer Federation of America, and Distressed Parents Together.
Allen C. Goolsby, III, Patricia M. Schwarzschild, Robert Acosta-Lewis, Timothy A. Hartin, Hunton & Williams, Richmond, Va., for amicus curiae The Medical Soc. of Virginia.
J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Atty. Gen., Judson P. Garrett, Jr., Deputy Atty. Gen., Robert A. Zarnoch, Kathryn M. Rowe, Asst. Attys. Gen., Annapolis, Md., for amicus curiae State of Md.
John R. Bolton, Asst. Atty. Gen., Robert S. Greenspan, Scott R. McIntosh, Civ. Div., U.S. Dept. of Justice, Washington, D.C., for amicus curiae U.S.
Before HALL and PHILLIPS, Circuit Judges, and WINTER, * Senior Circuit Judge.
This medical malpractice action returns to us after certification of several questions to the Supreme Court of Virginia. See Boyd v. Bulala, 877 F.2d 1191 (4th Cir.1989). That court recently issued an opinion answering those questions, and we are now able to decide the remaining issues in the appeal.
The facts of the case and the course of proceedings leading to this appeal are fully set out in our earlier opinion and in the opinion of the Supreme Court of Virginia, see Bulala v. Boyd, 389 S.E.2d 670 (Va.1990), and need not be repeated here. A brief summary will suffice for present purposes.
This medical malpractice action was based on allegations of negligence by Dr. Bulala which resulted in the birth of Veronica Boyd with serious birth defects and injury to her mother, Helen Boyd, during the process of Veronica's birth. The action included claims by Veronica Boyd for her personal injuries; by Helen Boyd, for her personal injury and emotional distress; by the father, Roger Boyd, for emotional distress; and by the parents jointly for Veronica's anticipated medical expenses. Veronica and Helen Boyd's claims were for both compensatory and punitive damages.
A jury found Dr. Bulala liable on all the claims and, in separate verdicts, made the following damage awards:
(1) For Veronica Boyd
compensatory damages $1,850,000
punitive damages $1,000,000
(2) For Helen Boyd
compensatory damages $1,575,000
punitive damages $1,000,000
(3) For Roger Boyd
(emotional distress) $1,175,000
(4) For Helen and Roger Boyd jointly
(medical expenses) $1,700,000
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Total Awards $8,300,000
The district court first entered judgment on the verdicts as returned, but then reduced the judgment of each plaintiff proportionately to reflect an aggregate settlement of $650,000, which they had received in a state court action against the hospital involved. See Boyd v. Bulala, 877 F.2d 1191, 1193 n. 1 (4th Cir.1989). This appeal by Dr. Bulala followed.
Dr. Bulala's principal contention on appeal was that the district court erred in holding that Virginia's then statutory "cap" of $750,000 on medical malpractice awards, Va.Code Ann. Sec. 8.01-581.15 (1984), violated both state and federal constitutional provisions and so could not be applied to limit in any way the overall recovery against him. He also challenged the district court's rulings and instructions to the jury that under Virginia law he could be found liable to the plaintiffs for the negligence of hospital nurses on a respondeat superior basis; that the father, Roger Boyd, might recover for his emotional distress in the absence of any physical injury to himself; that Veronica might recover compensatory damages for her loss of the enjoyment of life and, on the evidence adduced, for lost earning capacity; and that the evidence warranted awards of punitive damages against him. Finally, he challenged two critical procedural rulings: that Veronica's death after verdict but before judgment did not require converting her claim into one for wrongful death, and that her death in that interval did not require relief from the judgment which reflected awards on the basis of a much more extended life expectancy.
In our first opinion we decided several of these issues. Specifically, we held that Virginia's $750,000 statutory cap on medical malpractice recoveries violated neither the state nor federal constitutional provisions relied on by Bulala. And we further held that under settled Virginia law and on the evidence adduced, Bulala properly could be found liable to the plaintiffs on a respondeat superior basis; that punitive damages on both Veronica's and Helen Boyd's claims properly could be awarded; and that Roger Boyd properly could recover for his emotional distress despite the lack of any personal injury to himself. But we thought that several further questions of Virginia law whose resolution was potentially required to decide the appeal were sufficiently unsettled to warrant their certification to the Supreme Court of Virginia to provide answers for our guidance. Accordingly, we requested that court to answer the following questions:
1. Where there are two or more plaintiffs entitled to recover damages arising from the same act or acts of medical malpractice, does Sec. 8.01-581.15 apply individually to each plaintiff or overall to two or more such plaintiffs? If the statute does apply to all or any combination of plaintiffs' claims, how is it to be apportioned among them?
2. Does Sec. 8.01-581.15 apply to damages for the infliction of emotional distress arising from some act or acts of medical malpractice?
3. Does Sec. 8.01-581.15 apply to an award of punitive damages for an act or acts of medical malpractice?
4. Does Virginia law allow recovery for the loss of enjoyment of life when death results from an act or acts of medical malpractice?
5. Does Virginia law allow Veronica Boyd to recover damages for her lost earning capacity based upon the evidence presented in this case?
6. What is the effect, under Va.Code Ann. Secs. 8.01-21, 8.01-25, and 8.01-56, of Veronica Boyd's death after verdict but before judgment in this case?
See Boyd v. Bulala, 877 F.2d 1191, 1200 (4th Cir.1989).
Accepting the certification, the Supreme Court of Virginia, in a comprehensive opinion, Bulala v. Boyd, 389 S.E.2d 670 (Va.1990), answered the questions as follows (in our paraphrase):
(1), (2), and (3). The statutory cap sets a separate limit on the total damages recoverable for "any injury" to a single "patient," regardless of the number of claims and claimants and theories of recovery related to that injury. Accordingly, the cap applicable to any single patient's injury covers both compensatory and punitive damage claims of the patient and any claims by others that, by substantive law, are "derivative" of the patient's claims.
As applied to the facts found in this case, Veronica Boyd and her mother, Helen Boyd, were each "patients" of Dr. Bulala who suffered separate injuries from his negligence. On this basis, the cap applies separately as a limit upon all the damages, both compensatory and punitive, recoverable by anyone for the respective injuries of these two patients, i.e., as a $750,000 limit upon the total damages properly recoverable for Veronica Boyd's injuries, and as a $750,000 limit upon the total damages properly recoverable for Helen Boyd's injuries. Because both the claim of Roger Boyd for his emotional distress arising from Veronica's injuries and the joint claim of Roger and Helen Boyd for medical expenses attributable to those injuries are "derivative" of...
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