BIG BUCKS MARK VERDICTS RETURNED BY JURIES IN '00

BOSTON Last April 21, a lawyer in Sioux Falls, S.D., made an unusual
request of a jury deciding damages in a lawsuit against a small-time drug
dealer.

Both sides agreed to the facts: Wayne Clarence Johnson had sold
methamphetamine to a man later involved in a car wreck that killed Floyd Muhs.

"Give a verdict that gets on the Top 10 list," laewer Mark Meierhenry said.

The jury's $268.6 million award was No. 6 among the 10 highest jury
verdicts of 2000, according to the Boston-based magazine Lawyers Weekly
USA, which published its annual Top 10 list yesterday.

Leading the list in 2000 was the $474.7 million verdict in favor of former
Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith, who accused the family of her late
husband, oil tycoon Howard Marshall, of conspiring to cut her out of his will.

The rest of the list:

2. Former hostage Terry Anderson of Lorain, formerly an Associated Press
reporter, was awarded $341.7 million from the Iranian government by a
Washington jury. Legislation passed by Congress allowed him to collect
damages of $41.7 million from frozen Iranian assets.

3. The parents of Jeffrey Curley, 10, of Cambridge, Mass., who was raped
and murdered in 1997, were awarded $328 million from two men serving life
prison sentences for the crime.

4. In another suit against the Iranian government, the families of two
victims of a 1996 terrorist attack were awarded $327 million in Washington.
Under the same law that applied to the Anderson verdict, the families will
collect $27 million.

5. In Texas, the family of a teenager who died when she was given 40 times
the proper dose of post-operative medication was awarded $268.7 million.

6. In South Dakota, a woman who was widowed and seriously injured by a
driver under the influence of methamphetamine was awarded $268.6 million.

7. Two men who claimed Disney stole their idea for a giant sports complex
were awarded $240 million by a Florida jury.

8. A Tennessee lawyer who fled to Mexico after his wife was murdered was
sued by his wife's family after he tried to obtain some of her trust fund.
The wife's family was awarded $113.5 million.

9. In New York, a jury ordered Bear Stearns to pay $111.5 million to a
multimillionaire who lost $300 million in high-risk currency futures trading.

10. (tie) The father of a man who was sexually abused decades ago by a
teacher at a South Carolina school was awarded $105 million in an emotional
distress suit.

10. (tie) A Missouri jury ordered Bridgestone-Firestone to pay $105 million
to a man seriously injured when a rim assembly system broke during a tire
change.