The Region : Family Gets $550,000 in Man’s Death

The family of a man who died in June, 1980, while being held as a shoplifting suspect by four supermarket employees was awarded $550,000 by a Pomona Superior Court jury despite the contention that his death was caused by PCP. According to testimony, 44-year-old Marvin Thompson was chased by Boys Market branch assistant manager Paul David Mall, who saw him in the store’s parking lot carrying several unwrapped bottles of liquor and assumed that they were stolen. After a struggle, Thompson allegedly was dragged into the back of the store by Mall and three clerks and held for police. Larry Booth, attorney for Thompson’s family, argued that the store personnel caused the man’s death through “stress and asphyxiation” by holding him so that he could not breathe. Kenneth Lautman, attorney for Boys Markets and the employees, produced expert testimony in an effort to show that Thompson would not have died if he had not been under the influence of PCP. Although a coroner’s report indicated that the victim’s body contained a large amount of PCP, other testimony supported the argument that the tests simply showed a residue of the drug from past usage.