A jury found for the plaintiff in this personal injury case. The award was $1.5 million for contracting HPV from a dentist.
“Certainly, the truth can indeed be stranger than fiction and this is one instance where that is the case. I heard about this lawsuit thanks to another personal injury lawyer. It involves a woman who filed for damages against a dentist after she contracted the human papilloma virus, referred to as a sexually transmitted disease,” recounted Charlie Donahue who is a New Hampshire personal injury lawyer located in Keene. Donahue handles injury cases in New Hampshire and across the United States.
Despite an appeal in 2008, the dentist lost once again and the high court ordered him to pay his victim $1.5 million for infecting her. Evidently the dentist elected not to tell one of his patients to take precautions when they had intercourse to protect her from contracting anything. The man even went so far as to claim he didn’t have any diseases, and that since he had been tested for STDs, he’d not had relations with anyone.
“As things progressed, the two did have intercourse and one year later the woman had an abnormal pap smear. The guilty dentist admitted he’d had sex in the time between his STD test and when he and the woman had intercourse. He had also been active with others while seeing this woman,” said Donahue.
To compound the problem, the dentist also said the other woman he’d slept with showed the same symptoms. The woman who filed the lawsuit claimed that because he gave her HPV, it will, for the rest of her life, affect her health and any relationships she may have. The court awarded $700,000 in compensatory damages and $800,000 in punitive damages.
“The dentist had the unmitigated gall to file a countersuit for libel, slander and malicious prosecution. That’s a frivolous suit that will haunt him in front of the jury, which will already be none too pleased with his actions. That was a terrible strategy, not to mention being dishonest,” added Donahue.
Personal injuries may be more than just physical wounds such as broken bones, bruises, cuts, fractures, scarring, burns or traumatic brain injury. Personal injury lawsuits have everything to do with harm that is negligently inflicted on another. This case speaks for itself. If you have been in a situation similar to this, you might want to speak to a veteran New Hampshire personal injury lawyer, who will do right by you,” said Donahue.
To learn more, visit Donahuelawfirm.com.