Twinkling Star : Quadriplegic Girl, 4, Meets the Press and Steals Some Hearts

Despite being a quadriplegic since birth, 4-year-old Ashley Hughes can still do many things.

For example, she uses her mouth to hold a brush for painting pictures, and her imagination to vividly describe her daily bike rides.

She can also reduce the most hard-boiled of cynics to tears.

Ashley did that easily Tuesday when she sang a familiar nursery rhyme to a throng of reporters and electronics technicians who gathered in a Beverly Hills law office to meet the little girl who was awarded $21 million in a malpractice suit against three doctors.

The room was still as Ashley, dressed in a bright blue dress with white trim, began to sing: “Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are. . . .”

And when she finished, the reporters, some of them misty-eyed, enthusiastically applauded the wheelchair-bound youngster.

Earlier, the child’s attorney, Bruce Fagel, talked about Monday’s Los Angeles Superior Court jury award to Ashley.

The obstetrician, Dr. Neil Jouvenat, used forceps to “pull, tug and twist” for more than 20 minutes while delivering the little girl on March 31, 1987, at Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center, Fagel said.

The doctor’s actions damaged the girl’s spinal cord and the suit contended that the other two physicians, Dr. Andrew Hsu and Dr. Yu-Shen Wu, were guilty of negligence and covering up Jouvenat’s actions. Fagel said the two could have treated the girl for the spinal cord injury, but they chose not to.

“This was a delivery that should not have taken place the way it did,” Fagel, who is also a physician, said. “The baby was just too big to be brought out vaginally. Her head was too high in the birth canal . . . 99% of the time, the doctors decide to do a Cesarean section.”

After 1 1/2 days of deliberations, the jury decided that the defendants would have to pay $21 million which, through investment, could amount to $460 million if Ashley should live to age 75--making the decision the biggest of its kind in California.

Because Jouvenat had admitted his liability before trial, Judge Bonnie Lee Martin ruled that the jury could not hear about the physician’s past problems with alcohol and drugs. Although Jouvenat apparently has no liability coverage and few assets to pay the judgment, the insurance of the other two doctors will cover the amount, Fagel said.

The physicians and their lawyers did not respond to telephone calls seeking comment.

While Fagel did most of the talking Tuesday, the real star was Ashley. Wheeled into the room by her grandfather, Gerald Hughes, Ashley--who breathes and talks with the aid of a ventilator--greeted the reporters with a hearty “Hi!”

Asked what she liked to do, she replied, “I like to play with magnetic balls.”

Ashley, who lives with her grandparents in Pomona, readily admits there is something wrong with her.

“I’m a handicapped person, grandma,” she said.

But that reality doesn’t stifle her enthusiasm for riding a bike, even if it is only in her mind.

“I just go places,” she explained.

Ashley said she enjoys school (she goes to a special school now, but plans to enter regular school when it’s time) and especially likes watching “Sesame Street” on television because “I like to count!”

It was then that reporters asked Ashley if she would sing for them.

Without prompting, she lit into “Little Star.”

Afterward, the not-so-jaded reporters thanked the little girl for the interview.

“You’re welcome,” she replied brightly.