Decorah-based lawyer wins two big lawsuit verdicts

A Decorah-based attorney has won two large lawsuits in California.

In the first case, a jury awarded a San Luis Obispo couple more than $74 million, ruling that the doctor was negligent in the delivery of a baby who developed cerebral palsy.

The plaintiffs' attorney, Nick Rowley, presented evidence during the trial that the baby's heartrate was fluctuating wildly and the doctor didn't hasten the birth or conduct aproper examination of cord blood.

The jury awarded damages that mostly cover medical costs that the familywill incur during the course of Sofia's lifetime

In the second case, Rowley was the plaintiff's attorney in a El Cajon, California case in which a man was awarded $7.5 million from a motorcycle crash with an auto dealer's courtesy shuttle that left him with a penis permanently shortened by more than an inch.
 
The Superior Court verdict against Group 1 Automotive and Rancho Auto Group of San Diego centered on a collision between a van and a motorcycle on August 30, 2007, in San Diego.  Rowley said that the van's driver, Pedro Flores Miramontes, was a non-U.S. citizen who had an expired driver's licence and had never been trained as a shuttle driver.
 
The van turned in front of the motorcycle.  The rider struck the van and was thrown forward on to the motorcycle's handlebars, suffering a fracture of his pubic bone.