Ritter jury hears closing arguments

GLENDALE — A Glendale jury on Wednesday heard closing arguments in the case against two Providence St. Joseph Medical Center doctors accused of not doing enough to prevent actor John Ritter’s death five years ago.

“We’ve been waiting some time to come before you and give the evidence,” said Moses Lebovits, attorney for Ritter’s widow, Amy Yasbeck, as he closed his case against doctors Joseph Lee and Matthew Lotysch. “I am here to say [to the doctors], you were wrong and what you did had catastrophic consequences.”

Yasbeck is seeking $67 million in damages, claiming that cardiologist Joseph Lee and radiologist Matthew Lotysch failed to advise the actor of his heart condition and did not properly treat him when he died on Sept. 11, 2003, after complaining of nausea on the set of ABC’s “8 Simple Rules.”

Following his nausea and complaints of tightness in his chest, Ritter was admitted to the Burbank hospital, where he was seen by Lee and died hours later of an aortic dissection, a tear in his aorta.

“The evidence we have submitted to you was clear and convicting,” Lebovits told the jury. “When we go to the doctor, when we put our lives in their hands, we say to them, ‘Do one thing for us: do what you were taught to do.’ It only takes common sense to know you should have taken a chest X-ray. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.”

Lebovits rehashed arguments made over the course of the trial, including testimony from Dr. John Elefteriades, a cardiothoracic surgeon at Yale New Haven Hospital, who said that had Ritter been properly diagnosed by Lee in the hospital he would still be alive.

“The defense will say this is speculation, but the speculation lies on that side of the table,” he told the jury, who could award Yasbeck and her four children damages if they find the doctors guilty of malpractice.

Lebovits and co-counsel Michael Plonsker claim Yasbeck is owed $67 million both for what he could have made as the star of “8 Simple Rules” and as a devoted father and husband with a tremendous earning potential, they said.

“‘8 Simple Rules’ was a fantastically successful show for Touchstone,” said Plonsker, trying to prove that the sitcom’s success in 2003 would have translated into future earnings for Ritter and his family.