Legal News

Soap Star Hit With $885,000 Award for Suing Therapist

By Matthew Heller, Editor

A Las Vegas judge has dealt a crushing blow to soap opera star Hunter Tylo, ordering her to pay nearly $885,000 in damages to a psychotherapist whom she sued for negligent treatment of her children.

Hunter Tylo

Shanna Downing, a licensed clinical social worker, counseled Tylo's children while their parents were going through a divorce. The $884,983 award resulted from an unusual counterclaim for abuse of process in which Downing alleged that Tylo sued her as payback for her refusal to testify on Tylo's behalf in the divorce case.

?[Tylo] can produce no evidence that Downing was negligent in any respect in her care and treatment of any member of the Tylo family,? Clark County District Court Judge Timothy C. Williams said in a Sept. 21 order.

Williams also found that Tylo ?attempted to suborn perjury from Downing? in the divorce case, awarding Downing $700,000 in noneconomic damages, $158,104 in attorney fees, and $26,879 in special damages.

The case has now cost Tylo a total of nearly $1 million, including the award to Downing, about $50,000 in attorney fees to the other defendant ? Horizon Family Therapy And Wellness, where Downing practiced ? and $61,912 in fees to Tylo's original attorney.

With Tylo representing herself, Williams granted Downing's motion for summary judgment on her countersuit in June. Tylo, who stars in ?The Bold and the Beautiful,? did not show up for the Sept. 16 hearing on Downing's damages even though Williams had given her additional time to find a lawyer.

Awards for abuse of process, a tort that is similar to malicious prosecution, are rare. ?This case really called for it,? says Downing's attorney, Michael J. Shannon (Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith, Las Vegas). ?She [Tylo] used the legal system for an illegitimate purpose.?

Tylo sued Downing in April 2006, alleging violations of professional ethics, and once told Larry King in an interview that Downing's treatment of her family was ?a disaster.? Among those she treated was Tylo's son Michael, who drowned in the swimming pool of her Henderson, Nev., home in October 2007 after suffering a seizure.

Williams last year dismissed an earlier award to Downing of $749,185 on her counterclaim, finding Tylo had not been able to properly defend it because legal papers were not sent to her current address. Downing then renewed her motion for summary judgment.

When Tylo did not appear at the ?prove-up? hearing on damages last month, court records show, the judge found her in default. She showed up later in the day, saying her new lawyer was running late, but Williams refused to reopen the proceeding.

"[Tylo] sued Downing after Downing refused to sign an affidavit containing false statements as part of Deborah Hunter Tylo's divorce case," he ruled.

The higher award now facing Tylo includes the additional attorney fees incurred by Downing from another year of litigation. Tylo's only remaining recourse may be an appeal to the Nevada Supreme Court.

In 2008, Williams denied her motion to add a wrongful-death claim to her complaint because she had not produced an expert witness to testify that Downing's negligence caused her son Michael's death. Downing had diagnosed him with a stress disorder.

?Michael did not receive proper referrals and testing during a critical period of his life so that true diagnoses could be confirmed and good treatment could commence,? Tylo alleged. ?... [H]ad the proper referral been made ... Michael's death could have been avoided.?

Tylo has certainly experienced the extremes of the legal system. In 1997, a Los Angeles jury awarded her $4.8 million in her pregnancy discrimination case against the producers of "Melrose Place."

By Matthew Heller
On Point

Full post as published by On Point News on October 19, 2010 (boomark / email).