ABLEnews Extra

                   "Punch in the Face"

          The body count from the Vietnam War
          continues to climb on the home front.

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    --BOTCHED BIOPSY KILLED AILING VIETNAM VETERAN
   
   Los Angeles--A federal judge's $125,000 award in a veteran's botched
   biopsy death in a military hospital amounts to ``a punch in the
   face,'' the man's family said.
   
   Richard Lee Hadd, 45, of Laguna Beach went to Long Beach Veterans
   Administration Medical Center in 1991 with alcohol-related problems
   and agreed to let doctors take a microscopic sample from his liver.
   
   But doctors mistakenly biopsied the pancreas and cut an artery,
   causing him to bleed to death less than a day later, according to the
   lawsuit filed by Hadd's mother, Audrey. The government did not contest
   liability.
   
   But U.S. District Judge John G. Davies had to determine damages.
   
   In a seven-page ruling made public Friday, the judge ruled that
   Richard Hadd's ``life expectancy was limited because of a long history
   of alcohol abuse'' and $125,000 was fair.
   
   Medical experts, the judge noted, testified that Hadd may have lived
   two to three years, although his family contended he had stopped
   drinking and could have lived longer.
   
   Peter A. Seidenberg, an attorney representing Audrey Hadd, said he was
   disappointed that the judge did not award the maximum $250,000 allowed
   by state law for noneconomic damages stemming from ``loss of society,
   comfort and protection.'' Hadd's mother had been seeking only
   noneconomic damages.
   
   ``With all due respect to the court, $125,000 doesn't even begin to
   reflect Richard's value to his mother,'' Seidenberg said. ``It's a sad
   end to what I consider a brave and honorable life.
   
   ``The guy was my hero, I'll tell you that.''
   
   Hadd joined the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War and, because of his
   small size, he was known as a ``tunnel rat.'' His first assignments
   took him deep below the jungle floor into tunnels built by the Viet
   Cong.
   
   He retired from the Army in 1985 with Silver and Bronze stars, and
   about a dozen other commendations. He settled with his twin brother,
   Robert, in Southern California and never married.
   
   Family members said Hadd's war experience contributed to his drinking
   problem, but they said he never let his drinking get in the way of
   work or responsibilities.
   
   ``He did a hell of a lot for his country,'' Robert Hadd said of his
   brother Friday, calling the ruling ``a punch in the face.''
   
   ``There are a lot of people living today who wouldn't be if it weren't
   for my brother,'' he said.
   
   The judge also found the geographic distance between Hadd and his
   widowed mother in Arkansas to be a factor in deciding the award.
   
   Audrey Hadd said her son had planned to move in with her to help his
   ailing father, who died of a heart attack last summer. But the judge
   said there was no evidence Hadd planned to move in with his mother.
   
   Both sides had agreed in April to let the judge take the case under
   submission, rather than hold a nonjury trial.
   
   Hadd, who suffered from cirrhosis, was admitted to the hospital about
   2 1/2 weeks before his death. Robert Hadd said his brother had given
   up drinking ``cold turkey'' and had suffered a seizure.
   
   Fearing that he might have cancer, doctors ordered a liver biopsy, an
   otherwise routine procedure that involves removing a small amount of
   tissue to be tested under a microscope for presence of a disease, his
   family said.
   
   But during the procedure on July 15, 1991, doctors inserted the biopsy
   needle into his pancreas, cutting an artery, according to the family's
   lawsuit. Hadd died of internal bleeding less than 24 hours later.

[Family Given $125,000 for Son's Death, San Francisco Chronicle,
May 15, 1995]

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