Memphis Jury Awards $38.8 Million in Regional One Birth Injury Case

A first-time mother arrived at Regional One in Memphis in early labor with a raised white blood cell count, an early sign that something was wrong. Her labor stretched on for hours. The fetal monitor strips kept flashing warnings, including an eight-minute drop in the baby's heart rate after her water broke, with meconium present, while she was still only four centimeters dilated. The medical team did not move to a cesarean section for another fourteen hours, and according to trial testimony, only after the mother said she would leave the hospital.

By the time her son was delivered, the harm was done. The newborn was septic and needed ECMO, a form of heart and lung life support, for roughly two and a half months. He suffered bleeding in the brain, had a carotid artery tied off, and had a stroke at ten months old. The boy lives with intellectual disability and physical limitations that will require care for the rest of his life.

The lawsuit named two physicians with UT Regional One Physicians, Inc., Dr. Roberto Levi D'Ancona and Dr. Claudette Shephard, rather than the hospital itself. Attorneys Jodi Black and Eric Espey of Greer Injury Lawyers spent years preparing the case, taking depositions, lining up expert witnesses, and assembling the records that laid out the labor's timeline hour by hour.

The trial ran about eleven days in the spring of 2026, with experts for both sides walking jurors through the fetal monitoring data and the standard of care during a high-risk delivery. Firm founder Thomas Greer framed the odds plainly: "Over 90% of the trials that go forward against doctors and hospitals are lost."

The defense did not contest that the child was injured. The doctors' attorney said they "do not dispute that the child sustained an injury, but they believe it could not have been predicted, given the clinical circumstances," and said the physicians "respectfully disagree with the verdict."

When the trial concluded, the jury sided with the family and returned a verdict of $38,816,500: $3.8 million for lost earning capacity, $8,016,500 for a lifetime care plan, and $27 million in non-economic damages. Tennessee law caps non-economic damages in health care liability cases, so the judgment the court ultimately enters is expected to be lower than the $38,816,500 the jury returned.