Ind. Dep’t of Ins. v. Everhart

Robin Everhart filed suit against the Indiana Patient's Compensation Fund (PCF) to recover excess damages after settling a wrongful death claim against an emergency room physician in whose care her husband died. The PCF asked the trial court to reduce its award of damages to account for the twenty percent change that Robin's husband would have died anyway, even in the absence of the physician's negligence. The trial court declined to do so, awarding Robin the statutory maximum of $1 million in excess damages. The Supreme Court affirmed but on slightly different grounds, holding that the PCF was required to pay the statutory maximum in excess damages and was not entitled to a set-off because of how the trial court's peculiar findings of fact interacted with the rules for calculating a set-off.