Judge Cuts Award Davis Must Pay Klein by $8 Million

A San Diego County Superior Court judge reduced a $10-million jury verdict in Eugene Klein’s suit against Al Davis and the Raiders to $2.04 million Friday, leaving the former owner of the San Diego Chargers the choice of taking the money or allowing his old nemesis a new trial.

Judge Gilbert Harelson gave Klein 30 days to accept the reduced damages. Should Klein fail to take that offer, Harelson said he will grant the Raiders’ motion for a new trial.

Harelson announced his ruling in response to a new trial motion filed last month by Davis’ attorneys on the grounds of jury misconduct. A San Diego jury had awarded Klein $5 million in compensatory damages in December and an additional $5 million in punitive damages a month later, after a controversial three-month trial stemming from a lawsuit filed by Klein against Davis for malicious prosecution.

However, alternate juror Stacey Thomas alleged in a sworn declaration that several jurors were biased against Davis during the trial. According to Thomas’ four-page affidavit, some jurors openly expressed their contempt for the Raiders during the trial and deliberations.

She called Davis’ office in the middle of deliberations to tell him that he was being victimized by “prejudiced and biased statements” by jurors.

Davis’ attorneys used Thomas’ allegations as the basis for a motion for a new trial and asked Harelson to set aside the $10-million award.

Klein, a millionaire businessman who sold the Chargers in 1984, sued Davis after charging that the managing general partner of the Raiders had maliciously singled him out as a defendant in the Raiders’ 1981 antitrust lawsuit against the National Football League.

Klein sued Davis after he suffered a heart attack while testifying in Davis’ suit against the NFL and Klein.

In announcing his ruling, Harelson described Klein and Davis as “two giants in their field acting as adversaries in a game of hardball, and Klein and Davis are both great hardball players.”

When asked by reporters for a comment on Harelson’s ruling, a glum-faced Klein answered tartly: “I have none.”

Davis was not at Friday’s hearing, but a gleeful Joseph Alioto, who is Davis’ attorney and the former mayor of San Francisco, called Harelson’s ruling a victory for Davis and the Raiders.

“They couldn’t beat the Raiders on the field, so they felt they could beat them somewhere else,” Alioto said. “Well, it didn’t happen. . . . We knocked out 80% of this verdict that we originally said was unjust, and there’s a good chance that we will knock out the other 20% at a new trial.”

In a two-page ruling, Harelson said that he decided to reduce the compensatory damages awarded to Klein from $5 million to $1.04 million on several grounds, including the fact there was:

--No permanency of injury, and the physical effects of the heart attack were for a relatively short period of time, about six months.

--No limitation on Klein’s physical activities after November 1981.

--No damage to Klein’s reputation.

--No loss of business opportunity.

--No financial loss other than $48,606.82 in medical and hospital expenses.

Harelson also decided to reduce the punitive damages awarded to Klein from $5 million to $1 million.