Between them, Heimberg Barr's partners, Steven Heimberg and Marsha Barr-Fernandez, have received an astounding number of prestigious honors and awards and results reflecting their legal excellence and the quality of representation of their clients. The high esteem is also reflected by how others, both in the legal community and greater society, view the firm as a whole.
Steven A. Heimberg, Marsha E. Barr-Fernandez, Ricardo Echeverria, and Jeffrey S. Mitchell Arteaga Alvarez, et al. v. Community Regional Medical Center, et al.
In 2012, Dr. Pervaiz Chaudhry performed open-heart surgery on 70-year-old Silvino Perez at Fresno’s Community Regional Medical Center. Because of his control over patient referrals, this junior physician had become the most powerful cardiothoracic surgeon in the Central Valley and had been made director of cardiothoracic surgery for CRMC and its sister hospital. The key issue in the case was whether Dr. Chaudhry had a pattern of inappropriately leaving the operating room and hospital during surgeries with a physician assistant in charge. To prove this occurred with Perez, and that this was his pattern, the attorneys had to overcome adamant denials, not only by Dr. Chaudhry, but also by the anesthesiologist and all nurses in the OR. After Dr. Chaudhry left, Perez began bleeding profusely; by the time anyone able to perform the necessary surgical intervention arrived, Perez already had suffered severe brain damage. Six years later, he remains in a near-vegetative state. The attorneys contended that Perez’s brain damage would not have occurred but for Dr. Chaudhry’s inappropriate conduct. In addition to providing compensation for Perez’s future medical care, a Fresno jury awarded Perez and his wife compensation for pain and suffering, in an amount 100 times California’s unjust cap on noneconomic damages for medical malpractice under MICRA. The jury also found Dr. Chaudhry acted with malice, oppression or fraud, and awarded punitive damages. Exposing Dr. Chaudhry’s misconduct produced substantial institutional changes reestablishing patient safety as a priority over profits, including the revocation of Dr. Chaudhry’s privileges.
Top 100 CALIFORNIA TRIAL LAWYER for 8 consecutive years.