Jury Asked to Double Award in Hudson Case

The attorney for Rock Hudson’s lover, calling a jury’s award of $14.5 million to his client “magnificent,” urged the panel Thursday to double that amount as a further signal to society that AIDS victims have a duty to warn their sexual partners.

“I ask you to cause a headline, ‘Rock Hudson Jury Does It Again,’ ” said Harold Rhoden, the attorney for Marc Christian. “And if you do that, boy, will you send a message.”

In what appears to be the first decision of its kind, the Los Angeles Superior Court jury Wednesday awarded Christian $14.5 million for emotional distress after determining that Hudson and his longtime private secretary, Mark Miller, 63, had engaged in “outrageous conduct” by hiding Hudson’s illness.

Hudson, 58, died in October, 1985. Christian, 35, who said he repeatedly had high-risk sex with the Hollywood idol for eight months after a diagnosis showed Hudson had AIDS, has continued to test negative for the virus that leads to AIDS.

On Thursday afternoon, the jury began deliberations on the issue of possible punitive and exemplary damages. After meeting for 2 1/2 hours, the panel, which deliberated for three days before reaching its initial decision, recessed until this morning.

The second phase of the trial focuses on Miller only, since the law prohibits exemplary and punitive damages from being collected from the estate of a dead person.

However, it remains unclear how the estate would pay its share of the initial judgment. Court records filed in 1985 listed the value of Hudson’s estate at $8.6 million. And Earl Bender, a probate attorney for the estate, said in a phone interview Thursday that after taxes, the estate was worth less than $6 million.

“There are charitable beneficiaries that would be deprived of their shares (if the judgment stands),” added Bender, who cited the ultimate beneficiaries of Hudson’s fortune as the Motion Picture and TV Country Home and Hospital in Woodland Hills, the Braille Institute and USC.

Miller, who also stands to benefit from the estate, testified in court Thursday that his net assets are less than $100,000.

“There is no need to punish him with any more punitive damages,” Miller’s attorney, Andrews Banks pleaded to the jury. “You’ve taken everything he had.” He is almost certain to appeal the initial judgment if it stands.

High-Risk Sex

During the five-week trial, Christian, a former bartender who met Hudson at a political fund-raiser, testified that he had engaged in high-risk sex with Hudson. He said he had suffered extreme emotional distress after learning from a TV broadcast that the actor was dying of AIDS.

Although participants in the trial are barred by a gag order from discussing the proceedings outside the courtroom, Rhoden and Banks, in their arguments to the jury Thursday afternoon, made clear their views that the jury’s initial $14.5-million award will have widespread repercussions.

“The message is really this: There is a duty to warn,” declared Rhoden. “ . . . You’ve said so and you can be sure the world heard it.

“You’ve (also) established this: A homosexual can get a fair trial and whoever said he can’t is all wet.”

In pleading for the additional damages, Rhoden told the jurors that they are in a unique position to set a further precedent that could “save the lives of untold millions.” By making the award at least equal to the compensatory damages, the jury would “send the message” to others who might engage in “despicable conduct” like Hudson’s.

Banks, to the contrary, told the jurors that they have already made enough of an impact.

“I submit to you that your verdict yesterday for $14.5 million sends the world a very loud message,” the defense attorney said. “There is no doubt in my mind or anyone else’s mind that it has been heard. . . . Now please exercise caution.”