Connecticut Supreme Court Upholds $34 Million Fertility Malpractice Verdict
On February 6, 2024, the Connecticut Supreme Court upheld a $34 million jury verdict against UConn Health in a case brought by Walsh Woodard on behalf of a Bristol couple.
Our clients, Jean-Marie Monroe-Lynch and Aaron Lynch, received sperm from a donor through an an intrauterine insemination procedure at the University of Connecticut Health Center’s Center for Advanced Reproductive Services in 2014, becoming pregnant with twins. However, the donor sperm was infected with cytomegalovirus, or CMV, a virus that causes severe birth defects.
Due to the viral infection, one of the twins, Shay, was stillborn; her brother, Joshua, was born with severe neurological and developmental disabilities that will require lifelong care.
Walsh Woodard brought suit against the State of Connecticut on behalf of the family. The case was tried in November and December 2020 by attorneys Michael Walsh, Karolina Dowd and Caitlyn Malcynsky. The Superior Court ruled in our clients’ favor in January 2021, and the state appealed. Attorneys Walsh and Dowd represented the family at the Supreme Court along with attorney James J. Healy of Cowdery, Murphy & Healy, LLC.
In 2024, a unanimous Supreme Court upheld the judgment. The decision noted that Joshua “is an innocent victim, without blame for his many afflictions and disabilities, who will suffer every day for the rest of his life from serious physical and ‘ruinous neurological maladies,’ and require constant medical care and treatment.”
“What for most couples is a time of pure joy, turned into tragedy and grief when nine months after the insemination procedure at UConn Health, the twins were born infected with the CMV virus,” Attorney Karolina Dowd said. “This was easily preventable, and it led to disastrous and tragic consequences.”
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