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News
THE AMERICAN LAWYER, December 1982
"The 1982 Ammy Awards: The Year's Best and Worst Performances"
Personal Injury
Best Performance
Sheldon Schlesinger
In March, Sheldon Schlesinger, 52, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida,
won what many personal injury lawyers were then calling the largest
medical malpractice award for a single client ever - $12.47 million.
But Schlesinger did more than just win a big award. Circuit court
judge Robert Andrews added on a sizable amount to that award to
help pay the plaintiff's legal fees.
Schlesinger calls the case "a mystery wrapped in an enigma."
His 28-year-old client had become brain-damaged and comatose while
recovering from a car accident in the surgical intensive care unit
of the Florida Medical Center Hospital in Lauderdale Lakes. Though
the hospital claimed there had been medical complications from the
accident, Schlesinger persuaded the jury that her respirator had
become disconnected, that, in his words, this was "the most
reasonable probable" cause of her condition.
To win the $12.47 million, which he argued was necessary to provide
care for his client, Schlesinger succeeded in persuading Judge Andrews
to strike down a state law limiting payments in malpractice suits
against hospitals to $100,000 a year. Andrews also ordered the hospital
to pay an additional $4.4 million to Schlesinger's client, which
Andrews justified under a Florida law requiring the losing side
in such cases to be assessed an amount equivalent to "reasonable"
legal fees. (Schlesinger says he will receive a contingency fee
of 40 percent of the $12.47 million and an undisclosed amount of
the $4.4 million if the verdict is upheld on appeal.)
The Florida medical community is in an uproar. They had lobbied
for the "reasonable" -legal-fee law in an attempt to cut
down the number of malpractice suits brought. But Andrews, who has
been on the bench for four years, says Schlesinger's was the "very
best" legal work he has ever seen.
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Sheldon J. Schlesinger, P.A. represents clients throughout
the state of Florida including the cities of Boca Raton, Boynton
Beach, Carol City, Cooper City, Coral Gables, Coral Springs, Davie,
Deerfield Beach, Delray Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Hialeah, Hollywood,
Jupiter, Lake Worth, Miramar, Miami, Oakland Park, Palm Beach, Palm
Beach Gardens, Palm Springs, Pompano Beach, and Rivera Beach
Broward County • Miami-Dade County • Palm Beach
County
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