CHICAGO – Seventh Circuit appellate judges who reversed District Judge Staci Yandle for not letting former district judge Patrick Murphy testify had to find an outside judge for the trial they ordered.
On July 15, Chief Circuit Judge Diane Sykes picked Central District Judge James Shadid to hear Murphy’s opinions on a claim of fraudulent settlement.
Seventh Circuit judges ruled in April that Yandle invaded the province of jurors who awarded $8,169,512.84 to Liliya Turubchuk.
They found she improperly excluded Murphy’s testimony for the defendant, Southern Illinois Asphalt of Marion.
They issued their mandate to district court on June 29.
Yandle can’t hold trial, because Seventh Circuit judges require reassignment when they remand a case for new trial.
The district court clerk posted an assignment of Senior District Judge Phil Gilbert on July 8, but Gilbert recused himself on July 15.
That left only Chief District Judge Nancy Rosenstengel, who currently operates with two judicial vacancies.
Murphy has litigated 30 cases in district court in seven years since retiring from it, and Rosenstengel hasn’t presided in any of them.
When random assignment places his cases in her court, she recuses herself.
Earlier this year she appointed him as special master in a medical malpractice suit.
Turubchuk’s fraud suit followed a wrongful death suit over a crash that killed her husband Aleksey Turubchuk on Interstate 24 in 2005.
The original suit claimed Southern Illinois Asphalt and E.T. Simonds Construction caused the accident through negligence on a paving project.
Defendants advised Turubchuk’s lawyer that they operated a joint venture on the project with a $1 million limit on insurance.
Turubchuk accepted $1 million and released all claims against them.
In 2012, she filed suit claiming they concealed available coverage under their individual policies.
Defendants retained Murphy as an expert on settlements, but Yandle found he would invade the province of the jury.
Turubchuk and E.T. Simonds settled on the first day of trial.
The firm of Rossiter and Boock in Clayton, Mo., represents Turubchuk.
Charles Schmidt and Megan Orso of Carbondale represent Southern Illinois Asphalt.