Local News in Brief : Santa Ana : $700,000 Awarded Wife of Plane Crash Victim

An Orange County Superior Court jury awarded $700,000 Wednesday to the widow of a passenger on a small plane that crashed during a night training flight last year off Newport Beach.

The verdict was in favor of Alvina Villa of Orange and two sons, survivors of Benigno Villa, who died in the March 3, 1986, Piper Archer crash.

Aero Flight School, based at John Wayne Airport, had acknowledged responsibility, and the trial concerned only the amount the family should receive in damages. Lawyers for the firm at one time offered to pay $750,000.

Blood tests showed the student pilot, Barry King, was legally intoxicated, and traces of cocaine were found. Both King and instructor Phillip Peffley also died in the crash.

“The plane was seen by witnesses buzzing Newport Beach,” said Daniel C. Cathcart, the attorney for the Villa family. “It made a strafing run at the pier, pulled up, turned, dipped a wing in the water and crashed.”

Cathcart said tests showed Villa had not been drinking. He was taking flight lessons from Peffley and voluntarily went along on the night training flight for King.

The trial was conducted before Orange County Superior Court Judge John L. Flynn Jr. in Santa Ana.