Jury clears doctors of negligence in Ritter’s death

A Glendale jury today cleared two doctors of any wrongdoing in the multimillion-dollar wrongful-death lawsuit brought by the family of actor John Ritter.

The civil verdict ends a monthlong trial that included testimony by actor Henry Winkler but ultimately came down to technical medical issues related to the death of the 54-year old actor from a rare heart condition. Jurors found that the doctors did they everything they could to save Ritter’s life, rejecting arguments by attorneys for his family that his death was avoidable

The case highlighted the high stakes in malpractice cases where the alleged victim is wealthy: Attorney’s for Ritter’s family contended that with a new hit show, the veteran actor best known for his role as Jack Tripper on “Three’s Company” could have gone on to earn an additional $67 million had he lived.

Ritter’s wife, actress Amy Yasbeck, who attended each day of the monthlong trial, said today that she was disappointed by the outcome. Outside the courtroom, Yasbeck said she believed publicity in the case will aid her efforts to improve the ability for emergency room doctors to distinguish between heart attacks and Ritter’s rare condition, which requires different medical intervention

The family already has received more than $14 million in settlements, according to court records, including $9.4 million from Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, where Ritter died. Yasbeck told The Times earlier this year that the family was seeking damages in part because they wanted a public accounting of what had happened. She also said that none of the previous settlements had included an admission or guilt or apology, something she said they wanted to hear.

But in clearing the doctors of negligence – one who treated him on the day of his death in 2003 and another who interpreted the results of a body scan performed in 2001 – jurors found that Ritter’s death could not have been prevented.

At dispute was whether doctors at the hospital should have identified his condition – an aortic dissection, which is a tear in the largest blood vessel in the body – when he sought treatment for chest pain that had begun earlier that day while he was on the set of his hit show “8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter.”

Doctors treated him for a heart attack, not discovering his pre-existing condition until shortly before he died.

Lawyers for the defendants, radiologist Matthew Lotysch and cardiologist Joseph Lee, argued successfully that Ritter was doomed by his own biology.

At the time of his death, Ritter was enjoying new success on the show “8 Simple Rules.” Winkler told jurors last month that his close friend of three decades “was, every day, grateful that lightning had struck again.”

Winkler, best known for playing Fonzie on “Happy Days,” was on the set of the television show, making a guest appearance, on the day Ritter died. He told jurors that his friend “was sweating. He said, ‘You know, I really need to get some water.’ That was the last time I saw him.”

Times reporter Charles Ornstein contributed to this report.

john.spano@latimes.com