Summer may typically be a time when little gets done; however, that doesn’t apply to the Orange County, Fla. judicial system, where the Ereck Plancher litigation is on a fast track.
Earlier this month, Circuit Judge Robert M. Evans denied the UCF Athletics Association’s request to alter a jury’s verdict on June 30, which favored Enock and Giselle Plancher in the wrongful-death trial.
The court had found that UCFAA was negligent in the death of Plancher, a UCF football player, and awarded his parents $10 million in damages.
Plancher died on March 18, 2008 shortly after participating in an offseason conditioning drill. An autopsy revealed that he carried the sickle-cell trait, a condition that may have contributed to his tragic death. During intense activity, the trait can hamper the body’s ability to distribute oxygen, resulting in malformation, or “sickling,” of cells in the heart, lungs, liver, spleen, pancreas, kidneys, adrenal glands and thymus.
On March 12, 2009, the Planchers sued UCFAA and the UCF board of trustees, alleging that the coaches and athletic trainers were negligent in the treatment of their son.
The jury found UCFAA was negligent. Some of his teammates testified that throughout the workout Plancher was struggling and gasping for breath at times. They also claimed that no water or trainers were present, which was allegedly a “punishment” for players coming back from spring vacation out of shape.
On appeal, UCFAA argued that the verdict “is against the manifest weight of the evidence. It is also excessive.” In short, the attorneys suggested that the testimony of the plaintiffs’ witnesses was contradicted by the testimony given by the defendants’ witnesses. They also questioned whether sickle cell was definitively the cause of death.
In addition, they called for a reduction in the award.
“The verdict amount should be remitted to an amount not to exceed $500,000.00 to $1,000,000.00 per surviving parent, which should then subsequently be remitted to a reasonable total amount not to exceed $200,000.00, consistent with the provisions of Fla. Stat. Sec. 768.26, which provides sovereign immunity protection, including a recovery limit in tort actions, to UCFAA as an agency or subdivision of the state,” they wrote.
Evans would have none of it. Aside from denying UCFAA’s request for a new trial, he also denied the athletic association’s request to reverse the jury’s verdict and reduce its $10 million award.
In rendering the opinion, Evans wrote: “I don’t second-guess juries unless there simply is no evidence on which they could have based their verdict.” He also found that attorneys for Plancher are eligible to receive court costs and legal fees from UCFAA because they had offered a $4.75-million settlement offer that UCFAA attorneys rejected before the trial. Florida law states that if an eventual judgment exceeds any settlement offer by 125 percent, the defendant is responsible for all court costs and attorney fees.
Attorney Steve Yerrid, who represented the Planchers, told the media that the combination of likely court costs, legal fees and interest would push UCFAA’s bill to nearly $14 million.
Yet to be determined is whether UCFAA will appeal to the Fifth District Court of Appeals.
Regardless of what the association does, “the impact of the ruling will be felt across the country,” said one high-profile plaintiff’s attorney.
“I was very pleased to see that justice was done in the Plancher case,” said Eugene Egdorf of The Lanier Law Firm in Houston, which has represented numerous plaintiffs in such cases. “As I said after we settled the Lloyd case, the mandatory SCT testing was only half the battle. If coaches and trainers continue to fail to act responsibly we will still have deaths. We now have a jury finding what I have said for years – these coaches are responsible and must change their methods and attitudes in handling the student-athletes entrusted to them. These deaths – every one of them – are completely preventable if sensible precautions are taken. Now that that jury has spoken, it is also time for the NCAA to act. Its original purpose was athlete safety, rather than spending so much time investigating text messages. It’s time to start punishing those that endanger the lives of these young men and women.”
