$9.5 Million Wrongful-Death Verdict for Family of Holyoke Teacher Killed in Crosswalk

On the morning after Thanksgiving 2017, Zoe Rosenthal was walking her dog through a crosswalk in Holyoke when Charles J. Davignon turned his pickup truck into her path. The impact caused Rosenthal to fall and strike her head on the pavement. She suffered a skull fracture and brain hemorrhage and died two days later, on November 29, 2017. She was 52 years old and worked as a teacher at The Literacy Project in Northampton.

Davignon had a severe visual impairment. His driver's license was suspended indefinitely after the crash, though no criminal charges were filed. His insurer's highest settlement offer in the three and a half years before trial was $1.2 million.

Charlotte Glinka and Karen Zahka of Keches Law Group, together with co-counsel Nicholas Rowley and Benjamin Novotny of Trial Lawyers for Justice, brought the case to a Hampden County jury in April 2021. Defense counsel conceded liability at trial, leaving damages as the only question for the jury. Plaintiff's counsel asked for $68.2 million.

After a three-day trial and roughly three hours of deliberation, the eight-person jury returned a verdict of $7 million in compensatory damages: $3 million to each of Rosenthal's two adult daughters, Tiffany and Chelsea Castillo, and $1 million for their mother's pain and suffering. Pre-judgment interest under Massachusetts law added another $2.5 million, bringing the total to $9.5 million. Attorneys for the family described it as a record non-economic wrongful-death verdict with adult heirs in Western Massachusetts.

The case was captioned Tiffany and Chelsea Castillo v. Charles Davignon, No. 1879CA00247-B, Hampden Superior Court. CVN ranked it among the ten most impressive plaintiff verdicts of 2021.