Medical Center Suit Bungled, Regents Admit

The University of California has acknowledged that it bungled a lawsuit resulting in an $18.6-million malpractice award against UCI Medical Center in Orange, Lt. Gov. Gray Davis said Thursday.

Davis, a member of the UC Board of Regents, said he and other board members discussed the judgment when they met in Sacramento on Thursday.

Orange County Superior Court Judge C. Robert Jameson ruled last month that the university should pay the money to compensate 38-year-old Denise DeSoto, who has remained in a coma since she underwent hand surgery at the university-run hospital.

Jameson took the extraordinary step of barring university officials from presenting a defense in the case after ruling that the university system and its attorneys had frustrated the court’s efforts to find out how the Garden Grove woman was left brain-damaged.

The university’s action, the judge said, was “intentional, despicable and unprofessional.”

UCI officials acknowledged that there were delays in handing over evidence, but said they were not meant to stymie the court.

But Davis rejected that explanation, calling instead for a regents’ hearing to discuss what he described as a “seemingly unending hemorrhage of millions of dollars to clean up and compensate for misconduct by university officials.”

Jameson’s award represented another financial blow to the regents, who are still dealing with suits filed by women and couples whose eggs or embryos were allegedly misappropriated by three former UC Irvine doctors.

Thus far, the regents have approved about $14 million to settle roughly half of the 102 lawsuits filed by patients of the now-defunct UC Irvine fertility clinic.

On Thursday, the regents met in closed session to discuss Jameson’s judgment.

“Something went terribly wrong, first at the hospital and then with our lawyers,” Davis said “In either event, the university is committed to get to the bottom of it.”

But Davis said university officials were “still not yet clear as to where the responsibility for bungling this lawsuit lies.”

They promised to investigate further and to present a report at the regents’ next meeting, scheduled for Nov. 20 at UCLA, Davis said.

DeSoto, a mother of two, is now living in a Santa Ana care center. She first went to UCI Medical Center after a traffic accident on Dec. 6, 1993, but returned a week later after complications developed.

After 30 minutes in the recovery room, DeSoto turned blue from a lack of oxygen and never regained consciousness.