Oh Those Nasty Medical/Corporate Lawsuits

I pointed out the other night that Tom DeLay filed a lawsuit (and won a settlement) against a manufacturer of a product in use/misuse by Tom DeLay's dad before the man suffered critical injury and Tom DeLay's family decided to remove Tom's dad from life support. But credit for this disclosure comes from folks posting at DailyKos.

Well, it turns out Tom's not the only "we gotta stop these lawsuits" type who is fine with torts so long as they're the ones filing them. Josh Marshall points us to this 1999 story from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

A Virginia jury last night awarded the wife of Sen. Rick Santorum $350,000 in damages after she charged in a lawsuit that a Virginia chiropracter's negligence caused her permanent back pain.

Deliberating more then six hours after a four-day trial in which Santorum, R-Pa., testified, the Fairfax County Circuit Court jury unanimously ruled for Karen Santorum. She had sought $500,000 against Dr. David Dolberg of Virginia, because of pain from his 1996 treatment of her.

"Mrs. Santorum has been vindicated," said her Pittsburgh attorney Heather Heidelbaugh. "She was injured permanently through the actions of a chiropractor who acted negligently."

Hmmm.. she sued for more than the $250K DeLay and Santorum think is "still too high" but want to set as a maximum award. Mrs. Santorum's back has been fine though while producing several more little Santorums.

One would almost think Mrs. Santorum would seek medical, and not chiropractic, help with what she perceived as a serious back injury. While a chiropractor may be a fine individual to treat symptoms after a full workup and diagnosis, the latter comes from a medical professional as I'd expect a Congress critter's wife to know.