Charter Spectrum ordered to pay over $1 billion in lawsuit after employee murders woman
Cable company Charter Spectrum has been ordered by a judge to pay $1.147 billion to the family of an 83-year-old woman killed by one of its cable technicians, according to a news release from the family’s attorney.
The cable company in July was found by a Dallas County jury liable in part for the robbery and killing of 83-year-old Betty Thomas in her Irving home by Charter Spectrum employee Roy Holden Jr. Jurors at the time awarded the family with upwards of $7 billion in damages.
Dallas County Court at Law Judge Juan Renteria set the final amount the family is owed at $1.147 billion on Monday. That money will be divided among Thomas’ adult children, according to the final judgment.
Charter Spectrum had previously said it intends to appeal the decision.
Attorneys for Thomas’ family said in the news release that trial testimony showed Charter Spectrum ignored red flags regarding Holden from his first day on the job until the day he killed Thomas.
Holden last year pleaded guilty to Thomas’ murder and was sentenced to life in prison.
One day in December 2019, Holden made a service call at Thomas’ home. He returned the next day, in his Spectrum uniform and driving his Spectrum van, to rob Thomas.
“So I had stopped there because I was broke,” Holden told Irving detectives, according to court documents. “I was hungry.”
During the holdup, Holden stabbed Thomas multiple times on her neck and forearm, leaving her body on the living room floor in front of a television. Holden later told Irving detectives that he had used his Charter Spectrum knife and work gloves when he killed the woman.
During the civil trial, testimony noted that Holden made multiple outcries to supervisors about significant personal and financial issues having to do with a divorce that left him no money, even crying at a meeting.
He then began scamming elderly female Spectrum customers, stealing their credit cards and checks, according to testimony.
Thomas’ family later received a $58 charge for Holden’s service call, and the bills continued to come after the murder and eventually they were sent to a collection agency, according to testimony.
“We are grateful that, after careful consideration and review of the law and trial record, the Court entered judgment ordering Charter to pay more than $1 billion in total damages to the victim’s family,” the family’s attorney, Chris Hamilton of Dallas-based Hamilton Wingo, said in a news release. “The final judgment includes findings that Charter further committed felony forgery in causing harm to the plaintiffs, which properly eliminates the cap on punitive damages under Texas law.”
Jurors found that Charter Spectrum forged a service agreement after Thomas’ death, and claimed Thomas had agreed to it, in an attempt to force the suit into arbitration, the family’s attorneys said in the release. In the case had gone to arbitration, the results would have been secret and the damages would have been limited to less than $200, the release said.
“The victim’s family voluntarily ‘remitted’ the initial $7 billion punitive damages award to an amount equal to two times the compensatory damages in requesting entry of judgment,” Hamilton said. “This conservative damages multiplier will make the judgment exceedingly unlikely to be overturned on appeal given the criminal forgery findings against Charter and established Supreme Court precedent.”
This story was originally published September 21, 2022 at 4:38 PM.