A Florida jury has awarded a $200 million judgment to the estate of a 92-year-old woman who wandered off at a nursing home and suffered a fatal fall. “I think this is the largest nursing home verdict in the state,” Bennier Lazara Jr., lawyer for the plaintiff, told the
Tampa Bay Times.
Elvira Nunziata, who used a wheelchair, slipped away from a group of residents at the Pinellas Park Care and Rehabilitation Center in 2004, the Tampa Bay Times reported Friday. She was later found at the bottom of a flight of stairs, still strapped in her wheelchair.
Her estate, represented by her son, sued Trans Health Management Inc., which operated the nursing home, arguing that it had not done enough to safeguard Nunziata.
On Wednesday, a Pinellas County civil jury ruled the company should pay $60 million in compensatory damages and $140 million in punitive damages.
Trans Health Management no longer runs the nursing home. The paper said company officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
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