On Monday, the judge went over 80 pages of jury instructions with the jury. They will have to consider seven claims including:
- False imprisonment
- Battery
- Medical negligence
- Fraudulent billing
- Survivor claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress (Estate of Beata Kowalski)
- Wrongful death claim for intention infliction of emotional distress causing death
- Maya Kowalski’s claim for infliction of emotional distress
After jury instructions were read, one juror was dismissed for medical issues after a defense request to have a particular juror, who asked a lot of questions, reassigned as an alternate was denied.
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Last week, the case nearly came to a standstill
as the Kowalski's attorneys questioned a witness on the hospital’s Joint Commission review. They pointed out the hospital had an immediate jeopardy citation, which they believe was during the time Maya was hospitalized. Days prior, the hospital presented expert witness Mark Anderson who told the jury they met accreditation standards in 2016.
The Kowalski family’s attorneys said that could have misrepresented the St. Petersburg hospital’s image to the jury. While the defense team for the hospital said it was only for the hospital’s heart institute, the Kowalski’s attorneys wanted a closer look and so did Judge Hunter Carroll.
"This thing kind of exploding on the last day of testimony, the last thing I want to do is make a wrong call on this issue because this issue has the perspective of causing this whole thing to be done over again," said Judge Carroll.
Before the jury was in the courtroom on Monday, the Kowalskis’ attorneys told Judge Carroll they had not received corrective action plans, town hall meetings or internal emails until they did a deposition from a former hospital staff member. He said at that time they received a stack of documents that was 8–10 inches thick that correlated with fixing the cultural issues of Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital not just with its Heart Institute.
The lawyers for the Kowalski family said that the information they were provided revealed a culture of retaliation and retribution for people who raised issues at Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital. It has been noted that several nurse practitioners brought up issues at the hospital as early as 2015.
The attorneys added that the documents revealed that eight key executives were forced out during this time and the hospital conducted a massive re-education campaign encouraging all team members to speak up and speak out.
On Monday. the jury heard from Dr. Joseph Corcoran, a policy and procedure expert, before the plaintiffs rested their rebuttal case. He told the jury, despite claims from the St. Petersburg hospital that all was well, it was not. He stated that the hospital may have passed their accreditation, but they had several red flags raised, including how the hospital reported problems, complains and claims of mismanagement.
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All-inclusive article at link...
After two months, a jury in Sarasota County began deliberations Tuesday afternoon in a $220 million case against Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital that was at the heart of the Netflix documentary ‘Take Care of Maya’.
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