South Florida Personal Injury Lawyers

The four years of preparation for two civil lawsuits against Ford Motor Company now resides in a three-foot-high stack of court documents at the Greenville County Courthouse.

The product-liability cases were first filed in December 2002, three years after a single-vehicle crash in Laurens County that killed one passenger and left the 17-year-old driver in a wheelchair.

Jury selection and pre-trial motions began Monday. Testimony is expected to begin later in the week.

Allegations against Ford and three other defendants are centered on the seat belts and speed control of a 1995 Ford Explorer XLT.

According to records from the South Carolina Highway Patrol, Sonya Watson of Clinton, was driving the Explorer in the northbound lane of Interstate 385. Four other people were traveling with her, including her grandmother and other relatives.

Laurens County Coroner Nick Nichols said the SUV rolled over several times after Watson lost control.

“It looks like she was going several miles an hour over the speed limit,” Nichols told WYFF News 4, while reading over the incident report from 1999.

Nichols said the SUV hit a grass median area. “She overcorrected and, of course, then this started the rolling sensation. This particular vehicle flipped about three to four times.” The coroner’s report said one passenger, 46-year-old Patricia Carter of Clinton, died from multiple trauma after she was ejected from the vehicle.

Carter’s husband, Willie Carter, filed a wrongful death suit against Ford, which made the vehicle, TRW, Inc. and TRW Vehicle Safety Systems, which made its seat belts, and D&D Motors, where the vehicle was purchased.

The lawsuit claims that “The Explorer at issue was defective in several particulars, including the front and rear seat occupant restraint systems, the front seat system, the chassis, steering and component subassemblies, the electric cruise control and its acceleration systems. … The alleged defects caused the vehicle to accelerate suddenly and roll over.”

A second suit against Ford and other defendants was filed by Watson and other family members, including her younger sister, Stacy Watson, who was also in the vehicle at the time of the accident.

That lawsuit says “This is a products liability action claiming damages for bodily injury, pain and suffering, medical expenses, permanent impairment, permanent disfigurement, lost wages, parental loss of consortium, as well as punitive damages. This action also includes claims for breach of warranty, unfair trade practice, fraud, fraud on the market and general negligence.”

The suit claims “the design, selection, inspection, testing, manufacture, assembly, equipping markets, distribution and sale of an un-crashworthy, defective, and unreasonably dangerous automobile as well as general negligence.”

Opening statements and testimony will likely begin on Tuesday. According to the court docket, the trial is expected to last three weeks.

(AP) - PORT CANAVERAL, Florida-Federal investigators examined a new cruise ship to try to determine why the 951-foot (290-meter) vessel suddenly rolled to one side, seriously injuring 20 people in a scene that looked like something out of the movie on that night’s bill, “Titanic.”

The Coast Guard on Wednesday also questioned why authorities first learned of the trouble not from the captain, but from the mother of a passenger had who called her from the ship.

The Crown Princess rolled 15 degrees to its right Tuesday afternoon about 11 1/2 miles (18 1/2 kilometers) off Port Canaveral, throwing passengers, TV sets and other objects against the deck and walls. The ship slowly came back up after 30 to 40 seconds, by passengers’ estimate, then headed for port.

The crew reported a steering problem aboard the 113,000-ton vessel, which was christened only last month. The ship was sailing through calm seas, and there was no indication that a rogue wave or foul play contributed to the roll, officials said.

Coast Guard Commander James McLaughlin said the investigation could take days.

“We’ll look at weather, we’ll look at stability issues and we’ll look at mechanical issues,” he said.

As passengers boarded buses for the airport Wednesday, many recounted the terrifying scene. Some sobbed and clutched loved ones.

“Another 20 degrees and I would have been in the water,” said Alfred Caproni, of North Adams, Massachusetts, who was on his balcony on the ninth deck. “All the water from the pools was coming right over the edge. It was like Niagara Falls. There were dozens of people with bleeding noses.”

Gerald Brock, a surgeon from Ontario, Canada, said he helped ship doctors treat dozens of passengers with such injuries as broken bones, dislocated joints, short of breath and chest pains.

Tuesday night’s movie aboard the ship was supposed to be “Titanic,” according to several passengers.

The cruise line reported that all 3,100 passengers and 1,200 crew members were accounted for, but the Coast Guard was still verifying that information Wednesday.

“There is a possibility when you take a roll like that that somebody could have gone overboard,” McLaughlin said.

About 240 passengers were treated on board for minor injuries, according to Princess Cruises. Ninety-eight people were taken to the hospital, including a child and an adult who were critically injured.

Coast Guard officials said it was unusual that first word of a problem came from a passenger’s mother. The Coast Guard immediately tried to contact the vessel, but were unable to reach it for 10 minutes, Petty Officer James Judge said.

Capt. Andrew Proctor was not on the bridge at the time of the incident, Princess Cruises spokeswoman Julie Benson said. She said that she did not know who called the Coast Guard first, but that it is standard procedure for the captain to contact authorities.

Coast Guard officials said it is not uncommon for a captain to first assess the situation and ensure the ship’s stability before contacting them.

The captain submitted to drug and alcohol tests after the incident. Alcohol tests came back negative Wednesday, while drug test results were still pending. Investigators said there was no indication he was under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

“He’s one of our most senior captains. He’s been with the company for about 35 years. He has an exemplary record,” Benson said.

She said all passengers on the nine-day Western Caribbean cruise ending in New York would receive a full refund.

A similar incident occurred in February on a ship also operated by Princess. The 2,600-passenger Grand Princess left the Port of Galveston, Florida, but soon turned around after a passenger suffered a heart attack. The ship tipped sharply on its side, injuring 27 passengers and 10 crew members. The incident was blamed on human error, Benson said.

James Hall, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said Wednesday he hopes the latest incident will prompt federal officials to toughen cruise industry regulations.

“This was a serious roll, there were injuries and obviously the people that were on the ship were terrified,” Hall said.

The International Council of Cruise Lines said the ship’s listing was an “uncommon occurrence” for cruise ships.

“This incident will be closely reviewed and any changes that may be needed will be quickly implemented,” the council said in a statement.

Professor Ronald McKay and a team of researchers at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, Maryland have successfully “triggered” the self-repair of brain injury in rats caused by stroke. The scientists used a specific protein called Notch, and added it to the surface of brain stem cells. Those rats that were treated showed marked improvement in mobility, and tests confirmed that new brain cells had actually “sprouted” in the brain, according to a June 2006 Nature article.

Brain damage occurs in violent head trauma situations such as car accidents, sports injuries, and work related injuries, but the most common cause is stroke. During a stroke, blood flow carrying oxygen to the brain is stopped or slowed so that brain cells essentially suffocate and die. Unlike some parts of the body like skin cells, brain cells do not normally grow back or fix themselves.

Some research has already been conducted into the possibility of using stem cells from other donors to stimulate the regrowth of brain cells. Basically, this approach “tricks” the brain into thinking it is developing like it did in the embryonic stage, causing it to generate new cells. But this is the first time scientists have tried to trigger the brain’s own stem cells into action. “This is where stem-cell biology needs to be,” McKay told Nature.

This research is a long way away from any practical uses for treating humans with brain injury, but it does show hope for the future. Professor McKay is uncertain why placing the Notch protein on brain stem cells triggers regrowth, but he suspects that it has something to do with the same biological systems that cause cancer cells to divide uncontrollably.

This offers both advantages and drawbacks. The main advantage is that there are years of research already invested into how cancer develops that can be used to study this particular phenomenon. The drawback is that science still hasn’t found a way to switch cancer cells “off” and in order for this procedure to be used to treat brain injury patients effectively, the off switch for the Notch protein and brain cell reproduction will have to be identified and accurately controlled.

Still, it is a promising new direction for the millions of Americans who are victims of traumatic head injury, stroke victims, and other brain damage patients.

If you or a loved one has experienced brain damage due to the negligence of another (i.e. in a car accident, in a work-related accident, or some other situation) you may be facing mounting medical bills, lost work, and needless suffering. Contact Florida personal injury lawyer David I. Fuchs at 800-570-2858 for a free consultation and case evaluation.

The Food and Drug Administration is urging antidepressant manufacturers to heighten the warning on their labels, informing pregnant women of the increased risk to their babies of a potentially life-threatening birth defect.

Persistent pulmonary hypertension (PPH) is a rare lung disorder that prevents babies from getting enough oxygen into their bloodstreams because of high blood pressure. The disorder affects approximately one to two babies per 1,000.

Antidepressants and Pregnancy: The Research

A study published in the February issue of the New England Journal of Medicine found that women who used antidepressants during the second half of their pregnancy had six times the risk of delivery a baby with PPH.

But conflicting research has many pregnant women confused. A recent article that appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association advised women against discontinuing use of antidepressants during pregnancy because of the increased risk of a relapse.

However, the editor of JAMA issued a statement last week saying that the journal had been misled by researchers who failed to disclose their financial ties to antidepressant companies – a fact which taints the supposed objectivity of that study.

The FDA Recommendation

Susan Bro, a spokeswoman for the FDA, said that the agency recommends that women who are expecting and currently taking antidepressants consult with a doctor before discontinuing use.

Paxil, Zoloft, Paxil, and Lexapro are among the antidepressants known to increase the risk of birth defects when used during pregnancy. They belong to a class of antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs.

The FDA plans to issue updates on the drugs as they obtain further information.

The co-pilot of an airplane that crashed nearly two years ago in Montrose, West Virginia, has filed a negligence lawsuit against the manufacturer of the aircraft, its owner, and the charter company.

Eric Sloan Wicksell is one of three survivors of a fatal plane crash that happened during takeoff on November 28, 2004. In May, the National Transportation Safety Board concluded that icing on the wings of the twin-engine Canadair jet caused the crash.

The lawsuit claims that the aircraft was defective, citing inadequate operating and training manuals that failed to the plane’s vulnerability to dangerous icing. Among the defendants named in the suit are Bombardier Corp. and Hop-A-Jet, Inc.

The two other survivors of the crash include NBC sports executive Dick Ebersol and his son Charlie. Ebersol’s youngest son, Teddy, 14, died in the crash along with pilot Luis Polanco-Espaillat and flight attendant Warren Richardson III.

On July 6, the Florida Supreme Court issued its long-awaited decision in Engle v. Ligette Group. Its opinion could not have pleased either side.On one level, Big Tobacco was a big winner: The court overturned a $145 billion punitive damages jury verdict rendered in 2000.

But the rest of the decision was a bit murkier: For instance, it remains unclear if Big Tobacco must pay the plaintiffs a separate $710 million it promised them in 2001, when the appeals process first began.

Background: The Class Action Decision, and the Trial’s Phases I and II

To understand the decision, some background is necessary. In 1994, the Engle case was filed, as a nationwide class action by smokers against the tobacco industry.

Big Tobacco argued that each smoker’s case should be tried individually, on the ground the factual issues - Why did a given plaintiff begin to smoke? Why did that plaintiff get sick? — were too complex and various for a class action. But the trial court disagreed, certifying the class action to proceed, under Florida law, as to 700,000 Florida smokers (though also declining to certify a nationwide class action).

In Phase I of the multiphase trial, the jury determined classwide issues — such as whether cigarettes can cause the diseases at issue, whether cigarettes were defectively designed, and whether the defendants misrepresented the risks of smoking - in the plaintiffs’ favor.

In Phase II, the jury determined how much, if any, each of three sample class members should receive in compensatory damages. In addition, it determined how much the class as a whole would receive in punitive damages - settling on a figure of $145 billion.

(In Phase III, which never occurred, the jury would have figured out compensatory damages for the other class members, and assigned each a proportionate share of the total $145 billion punitive damages award.)

The Bargain the Parties Struck Over the Appeal Bond

After Phase II, the defendants were permitted to appeal - and given the whopping verdict, they urgently wanted to.

However, there was a wrinkle. Under Florida law, the plaintiffs could demand that the defendants post an “appeals bond” equal to the award amount in dispute before filing their appeal. The point of an appeals bond is simple: Since an appeal prevents the prevailing party in a lawsuit from collecting their judgment, the bond guarantees that the losing party will still be able to pay if they lose their appeal.

The tobacco companies, however, could not post a $145 billion bond. So they had to figure out how to appeal without one.

Friends of the tobacco industry introduced a bill in the Florida legislature that would have limited the size of appeals bonds to $100 million. But the lawyers for the class in Engle, Stanley and Susan Rosenblatt, threatened to challenge its constitutionality if it were enacted.

Accordingly, the lawyers for the tobacco industry offered the Rosenblatts a trade: Promise not to challenge the law, and we’ll put $710 million into an escrow account - and pay it to the class at the end of the appeals process regardless of whether it won or lost the appeals. The Rosenblatts accepted; the money was deposited into an escrow account in 2001; and it has been sitting there ever since.

And now, the decision on appeal has come down.

Why the Court Rejected the $145 Billion Jury Verdict

Here’s what the Florida Supreme Court decision held:

Most of the Phase I jury’s conclusions - regarding, for example, general causation and product defect — can stand (in legal terms, they continue to be “res judicata”), because some issues in this case were properly resolved on a classwide basis. .

What was done in Phase II, however, cannot stand - for two basic reasons.

First, punitive damages in a class action have to be reasonably related to compensatory damages. So there can be no award of class-wide punitive damages without an award of class-wide compensatory damages to judge it against. Phase II only had compensatory damages awards for a meager three sample plaintiffs, so its punitive damages award was invalid.

Second, getting a new, valid punitive damages judgment here cannot be as simple as just going back and telling a jury to calculate class-wide compensatory damages this time. Due to individualized facts — raising individual issues of causation, plaintiff fault and damages — each smoker’s case must be heard individually. Thus, the court decertified the class going forward — and gave the class members a year to refile their suits individually.

Who Really Won, and Who Really Lost, Here?

So who should be celebrating - and who should be upset? It’s unclear, for no one is quite sure who won or lost.

The holding regarding Phase I is arguably a loss for Big Tobacco. Individual plaintiffs have had to spend a lot of time and money proving Phase I’s issues individually in other states. Yet here, the Court allowed these issues to be determined on a class-wide basis.

On the other hand, Big Tobacco’s loss on this point is mitigated by the fact that it wasn’t going to win these issues anyway, if the recent past is any guide. Today, Big Tobacco wins its cases (when it does win) by arguing that individual smokers were comparatively at fault for smoking, or that their illnesses were caused by something other than smoking. So it may be that Big Tobacco has only been fast-forwarded to the phase of the proceedings where it might actually win. And it’s been advantageously allowed to litigate in this phase on a case-by-case basis, which also will be time-consuming and expensive for the plaintiffs.

Surely the plaintiffs are very unhappy that they lost their huge punitive damages verdict. But that loss may at least be mitigated if the get the $719 million in escrow - which, remember, was supposed to go to them after the appeal, regardless of outcome. But will they get the money?

What Happens to A Contract When One Party Disappears?

Remember, the parties to the contract were Big Tobacco and the plaintiff class. After the Florida Supreme Court decision, however, the class no longer exists–the Court decertified it, though only on a going-forward basis.

Since the class existed when the contract was made in 1999, the contract was valid. But with the class decertified, who can collect?

The Court almost certainly did not mean to decertify the class with respect to this contract. But its opinion did not expressly exempt the conflict from its forward-looking decertification, and the disbursement of the $719 million was to take place in the future.

Perhaps the Court could clarify its opinion to make clear its intention that the class continue on as a party to the contract (though not as a party to the lawsuit).

The Persisting Problem: Who, Exactly, Gets the $719 Million?

Even if the Court does issue this kind of clarification, a practical problem remains: How can the Court disburse the money in the escrow to the members of the class of smokers in Florida?

After all, the contract was for the benefit of the actual members of the class–not anyone who claimed to belong once they heard $710 million was being given out. Accordingly, the defendants would have every right to demand that some minitrial-like mechanism be developed to determine who really belongs in the class.

In the end, the money might revert back to the state of Florida. Or maybe the court should maintain the escrow until the last of the thousands of former class members completes his or her minitrial on the merits of the case, and then distribute the money to those individuals. But that could happen ten or fifteen years from now.

Finally, What About the Lawyers?

And what about the lawyers - the Rosenblatts? Might they too have to wait a decade to get compensated?

Not necessarily. A court could order that they receive some compensation for the work they have done up to now.

The Rosenblatts are now in an odd situation. Since they no longer have their one big “class” client, it is unclear who actually is obliged to pay the Rosenblatts for having fought Engle to the bitter end. The thousands of individual ex-class members who are expected to file suits within the year-long window created by the Court are not the Rosenblatts’ clients anymore.

So it would be fitting if the Court took a small portion of the amount in escrow and awarded the Rosenblatts reasonable attorneys fees for making sure, on behalf of the then-class, that the jury’s verdicts on so many of the issues in Phase I survived the appeal.

By Anthony J. Sebok, a Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School

(AP) - NEW YORK-A doctor suspected of blowing up his Manhattan town house to avoid selling it in a divorce settlement died from his severe burns, the medical examiner’s office said Monday in declaring his death a suicide.

Dr. Nicholas Bartha, 66, had warned his wife in e-mail shortly before the July 10 explosion: “I will leave the house only if I am dead.”

He was pulled from the rubble alive after the blast, but died late Saturday from burns over 35 percent of body, with diabetes and heart disease as contributing factors, said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the New York City medical examiner.

She added that “the manner of death is suicide.”

Bartha had been ordered to sell the Upper East Side town house, on a wealthy block of 62nd Street between Park and Madison Avenues. The home was valued at $6.4 million in a divorce judgment.

Police were unable to speak to Bartha following the explosion because he was in a medically induced coma, but authorities have said they were investigating whether he was the person who tampered with a gas line leading into the home’s basement, allowing vapors to flow freely for hours until it caused the building to blow up.

Bartha was not charged and “if he’s dead, there’s no criminality,” said Detective John Sweeney, a police spokesman.

The physician, who lived and worked in the four-story landmark, was its lone occupant during the blast, which leveled the building and left the upscale block covered in bricks, broken glass and splintered wood. Authorities said at least 14 others were injured, including 10 firefighters.

The last victim to leave the hospital, Jennifer Panicali, a 22-year-old Web site developer, was released on Saturday.

The town house was to be sold at auction in October to pay a $4 million judgment against Bartha, though his ex-wife had predicted he wouldn’t leave without a fight.

Cordula Hahn Bartha told police she received an e-mail from her ex-husband shortly before the explosion, saying he would not leave the home alive and warning that she would be “transformed from gold digger to ash and rubbish digger.”

“He has said many times that he intends to ‘die in my house,’” she said in a petition filed last year.

The doctor had, at least briefly, considered selling the town house, bringing the matter up with his broker about 2 1/2 weeks earlier, the broker Mark Baum said. Even then, Bartha seemed unconvinced.

“He kept saying ‘if’” in reference to the possibility of a sale, Baum told The New York Sun. “And that’s it, he never mentioned it after that.”

Bartha had been visibly depressed the last several times the two had seen each other, he added.

“He just wanted to destroy himself, and ‘himself’ was the house, too,” Baum said.

A lawyer for Cordula Bartha, Polly Passonneau, said her client would have no comment on his death.

“His death, though expected, is the sad end to a long series of tragic events for him,” Ira Garr, a lawyer who had represented Nicholas Bartha, told the Daily News. “Hopefully his family can get some peace out of this.”

Bartha was responsible for other implied threats against his ex-wife, according to court records.

A 2005 appellate court opinion said he had “intentionally traumatized” Cordula Bartha, a Jew born in Nazi-occupied Holland, by posting “swastika-adorned articles and notes” around their home. The opinion also said Bartha had “ignored her need for support and assistance while she was undergoing surgery and treatment for breast cancer.”

Bartha’s next-door neighbors, Niso and Sherry Benbasat and their son Vidal, sued him Friday, claiming the explosion damaged their cooperative apartment and forced them to leave it. Their lawyer said the lawsuit would proceed against Bartha’s estate.

(AP) - BOSTON-Gov. Mitt Romney on Monday dramatically raised the number of potential trouble spots identified by engineers and investigators in a Big Dig connector tunnel where the ceiling collapsed.

Romney, speaking at a Statehouse news conference and illustrating his points with charts and diagrams, said that tests show more than 1,100 bolt assemblies that used epoxy and more than 300 other areas in the tunnel are unreliable. All, he said, will have to be reinforced.

“In grabbing ahold of these bolts and pulling on them with excess force, they’re letting go … at lower pressures than they were designed to handle,” Romney said.

“That suggests that this epoxy system is not working … and for that reason we can’t count on it,” he said.

Last week, days after 12 tons of ceiling panels came loose and fell on a car, crushing a passenger, the governor announced that inspections had found at least 242 points where bolts were separating from the tunnel roof.

Two Big Dig tunnels have since been closed and Romney has not yet cleared the way for them to reopen.

The $14.6 billion Big Dig - the most expensive highway project in U.S. history - buried a highway network that used to slice through the city, replacing it with a series of tunnels.

The project also has also been plagued by leaks, falling debris, cost overruns, delays and problems linked to faulty construction.

Attorney General Tom Reilly, who is considering filing involuntary manslaughter charges in the ceiling collapse, said Monday that investigators had discovered documents showing there was a “substantial dispute” from 1999 to 2000 over whether the design of the tunnel was adequate to hold the weight of the 3-ton ceiling panels.

Reilly, who refused to give specifics, said he did not know how the dispute was resolved. He said the tunnel designer, the contractor and the company overseeing the Big Dig project were involved but would not say who raised the questions.

The contractor on the tunnel, Modern Continental Construction Co., issued a statement saying it was cooperating with the investigation and is “confident that our work fully complied with the plans and specifications provided by the Central Artery Tunnel Project.”

Messages left with project manager Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff and tunnel designer Gannett Fleming were not immediately returned.

Commuters on Monday endured increased traffic hassles with the closing of a second tunnel ramp connecting two interstates. It was closed Sunday after testing showed dozens of problems with the bolts holding up the ceiling. That ramp had been used as part of a detour around the accident scene.

Romney said engineers successfully tested a system to reinforce the bolts. With crews working around the clock, at least one portion of the closed areas could reopen by late in the weekend, he said.

Romney met earlier in the day with congressional, state and city leaders to outline his plan for traffic and to ensure the safe reopening of the tunnels. After the meeting, Sens. John Kerry and Edward M. Kennedy endorsed the governor’s plans.

Kennedy said congressional committees are making plans to hold hearings into the tunnel collapse and the Big Dig project.

“We want to make sure the issue of safety is front and center,” Kennedy said.

(AP) - PHILADELPHIA-A toddler climbed out of a second-story window and scampered across the porch rooftops of at least eight row houses before a family dog’s barks alerted residents, police and neighbors said.

Neighbors who heard the barking spotted the 23-month-old boy, Phillip Redmond Jr., followed closely by the family’s German shepherd, Alfie.

“He was protecting the baby, making sure the baby was all right,” neighbor Tina Mitchell told WPVI-TV.

Another neighbor, Shavyonn Robinson, was able to grab the toddler from the porch roof a few doors down Sunday morning, police said.

“First I had my hand sticking out (of the window) trying to grab him,” Robinson said. “That’s when he tried to run past, because he thought I was playing with him, and he almost fell so I had to go out and get him.”

By the time police arrived, the child had been helped down from the roof and officers took him to the hospital, said Sgt. Francis Erickson. The child’s footprints and the dog’s prints could be seen in the blacktop coating on the porch roofs.

Child welfare officials placed the boy in the care of relatives while the incident is investigated, said the boy’s father, Phillip Redmond. He said he was embarrassed, but grateful that his son was fine.

“It was my fault,” he said. “I didn’t think he could get out there.”

(AP) - STAMFORD, Conn.-A lesbian couple filed a medical malpractice lawsuit Tuesday claiming cancer treatments damaged their sexual relationship. Their attorneys say it is the first lawsuit of its kind under Connecticut’s civil unions law.

Margaret Mueller and Charlotte Stacey are suing two doctors, accusing them of treating Mueller for ovarian cancer when she actually had cancer of the appendix. They contend Mueller underwent years of devastating chemotherapy treatments while the real cancer spread.

“I think it’s any patient’s worst fear that everything they’re doing to treat themselves is for naught,” said Joshua Koskoff, an attorney for the couple.

Connecticut’s civil union law, passed last year, allowed Stacey also to sue for the harm to her relationship, known as a loss of consortium claim, Koskoff said. Before the law gave gay couples the same legal rights as heterosexual married couples in Connecticut, only a married partner could seek that compensation.

Attorneys for the doctors, Iris Wertheim and Isidore Tepler, say the two provided appropriate care for a complex illness.

Eric Stockman, Wertheim’s attorney, said he does not plan to challenge Stacey’s right to be added to the lawsuit.

Mueller and Stacey were domestic partners for 21 years and were joined in a civil union on Nov. 12, 2005, according to the lawsuit.

The original lawsuit was filed earlier this year on Mueller’s behalf. The new lawsuit was amended in Stamford Superior Court to seek damages on Stacey’s behalf as well.