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# Santa Monica loses $1.3 million lawsuit
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/santa-monica-loses-1-3-million-lawsuit/
- Published: 2002-09-28T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T00:45:39.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Crime, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*Man awarded $1M in damages for pain and suffering*

*By Daily Press staff*

A Santa Monica jury has decided that the city must pay a West Los Angeles couple more than $1 million because it was responsible for a tree that fell on their car, injuring them both.

Jim and Joan Holiday sued the city for $40,413 in medical expenses, $332,531 for lost wages, and asked for $1.1 million in pain and suffering damages.

The 12-person jury reached a decision Friday at about 2:15 p.m. after they heard closing arguments on Thursday. The jury was split 9-3 in awarding $1,008,708.50 to Jim Holiday. The jury was unanimous in awarding Joan Holiday $33,206.50.

One of the city’s mature red-flowering Eucalyptus trees hit the Holidays as they drove down Broadway Avenue in January of 2001\. Jim Holiday suffered a compression fracture to a vertebra in his back. Lawyers said the collision also exacerbated existing problems with his lower back and neck.

Lawyers said Holiday, who operated a maintenance company and worked part-time for a homeowners’association, now lives with constant pain and will not work again.

Jurors had to decide if the city was responsible for what the law calls a “dangerous condition of public property.”

The city and plaintiffs agreed the tree’s roots were decaying but disagreed over whether or not the city should have known about it before the accident.

Holiday’s attorney, Robert Wolfe, argued on Thursday that the city should have enlarged the mature Eucalyptus’ tree well. Because it didn’t, Wolfe argued, the tree was “constricted” by the concrete, limiting the flow of nutrients and causing roots to decay.

But Deputy City Attorney Norman Hirata told the jury that the city had no way of knowing the condition of the roots, especially since the month the tree toppled over experienced heavy rainfall. He argued that the city can’t be blamed for the rain, which saturated the soil and added more weight to a tree already weighing several tons.

Neither Wolfe nor Hirata were available for comment on Friday.

The lawsuit comes amid a statewide debate over the Eucalyptus, sometimes called “The Widow Maker,” because it often drops limbs unexpectedly. Several groups are pushing for more aggressive action by cities to remove the non-native species.

The trial, which began Sept. 17, was heard under Superior Court Judge Linda K. Lefkowitz. An earlier trial ended last July in a hung jury.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 28, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/092802.pdf?ref=smdp.com)