The mother and sister of Yeardley Love, a University of Virginia student-athlete slain by her on-again, off-again boyfriend in 2010, won a $15 million verdict Monday from a Charlottesville jury in their wrongful-death lawsuit against the fellow student who broke into her bedroom, attacked her and left her to die of brain damage.
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The verdict came a decade after the criminal conviction of George Huguely V, a lacrosse player with a history of heavy drinking and two prior allegations of attacking people, including Love. In 2012, he was found guilty of second-degree murder and grand larceny and sentenced to nearly 24 years in prison.
During the civil trial, testimony portrayed Huguely as consuming 44.5 drinks in the 30 hours leading to the attack — drinking so heavy that Huguely’s own lawyer noted in court that his client’s brain was “working at the level of an amphibian.”
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By his own admission, Huguely barged into Love’s off-campus apartment on the night of May 2, 2010. Evidence showed that he kicked a hole in her door and proceeded to inflict multiple injuries on the 22-year-old Love, who was later found bruised, bloodied and unresponsive by a roommate.
Huguely’s lawyer acknowledged the circumstances but argued that Love’s brain damage and death were inadvertent, the results of the two tumbling off the bed and onto the floor. One nearby apartment resident testified to hearing a single loud crash, and competing evidence from doctors and forensic experts occupied much of the six-day trial.
The jury confined its award to compensatory damages of $7.5 million each to mother Sharon Love and sister Lexie Love Hodges. Both women testified last week but declined to take questions after the verdict.
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Paul Bekman, one of their two attorneys, said, “$15 million is a very fair verdict.”
Huguely’s attorney, Matthew Green, agreed.
“We hope the end provides some measure of closure to everybody involved and some measure of peace,” Green said.
The verdict came exactly 12 years after the night of the fatal attack.
A scion of a prominent Washington-area family, Huguely is earning 55 cents per hour working in the print shop at the State Farm Enterprise Unit in Powhatan, Va. Now 34, Huguely is slated for release, according to the state’s online record, in October 2030.