Jury recommends $15.4 million in damages

A Culpeper County Circuit Court jury on Wednesday awarded $5.4 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive judges to a sexual abuse victim who was 13 to 14 years old at the time of the ongoing incidents.

With former judge John G. Berry’s resignation, stand in judge Fletcher Ward Harkrader set aside the jury’s recommendation and ordered James W. Davis, 47, who used fake credentials to pose as a clinical psychologist, to pay the victim $570,000, which was the original amount sued for in the civil complaint.

“We sued for $570,000 and we got $570,000. We were thrilled that the jury’s verdict told molesters that the price of a stolen childhood is very, very high in Culpeper, but we understand that, under Virginia law, the judge had to reduce it to the amount sued for,” said the victim’s attorney, Mike Sharman.

Court documents show that the victim previously established requisite facts to find Davis liable to the victim for fraud, sexual assault and taking indecent liberties with a minor while in a supervisory or custodial relationship. As a result of these actions, the documents indicate that the court agreed that the victim suffered shame, humiliation, embarrassment, indignity to his feelings and financial loss.

Sharman said that the incidents occurred from summer 2005 to early spring 2006 and that they filed this civil suit March 5, 2009. He added that Davis was served but not present at the hearing Wednesday and nobody is sure of his whereabouts. Sharman said Thursday that he believes Davis is still in the area and that when he locates him he plans to pursue Davis’ assets or one-third of his lifetime wages. He clarified that as this is a civil matter, Davis is not currently a fugitive from the law.

According to the documents, if the jury believed that Davis acted with malice toward the victim or acted under circumstances amounting to a willful and wanton disregard of his rights, then the jury could also award punitive damages in addition to the compensatory damages, which they did in the amount of $10 million.

Through a press release, Sharman said the point of a civil lawsuit like this is to allow the jury to express the community’s outrage toward the molester and also to reverse the sense of powerlessness for the victim and the victim’s family. He added that the victim and his family’s “healing victory” is in that with such a large amount it puts the victim in control and the molester feels powerless.

Note: The Star-Exponent does not identify victims of sexual assault.