Family Wins $22M After Woman Dies During Birth

CHICAGO (STNG) ― A grieving husband has won a $22 million verdict in a lawsuit stemming from the death of his wife during childbirth.

The suit claimed the doctor failed to follow proper procedures.

"She almost always had a smile on her face. She was the nicest person I ever met," Mark Bentivenga said about his wife Rachelle.

When he came home from work on March 14, 2003, he knew something was wrong with her.

The 34-year-old was expecting the couple's first child. She was suffering from a severe headache and was sweating.

The Bentivengas went straight to St. Francis Hospital in Evanston. Rachelle Bentivenga's blood pressure had skyrocketed. She was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia, a common condition in pregnant women, but a very treatable one.

"I was very uneasy, my wife was very uneasy and scared," Mark Bentivenga said.

The couple's lawyers said the doctor treating Rachelle Bentivenga did not follow St. Francis guidelines which advise giving a patient increasingly higher doses of a high blood pressure medication, until she responds. Instead, they say Bentivenga received the same low dose each time, and her blood pressure remained high.

"They never brought her blood pressures out of the severely hypertensive range," attorney David Barry of Corboy and Demetrio said.

Rachelle Bentivenga had an emergency cesarean section, her baby lived, but she suffered a brain bleed and died.

Mark Bentivenga sued St. Francis hospital and the doctor who treated his wife. On Tuesday, a Cook County jury awarded him $22 million, the largest Illinois verdict for the wrongful death of a mother during delivery.

The physician named in the lawsuit no longer works at St. Francis. He is now practicing medicine in Oklahoma.

Mark Bentivenga says his son Ricky, now 5, often asks about his mother. He tries to fill in the gaps, but says no father should have to do that.

"Rachelle was a great lady and she will be missed by a lot of people," he said.

An attorney for St. Francis and the doctor said, "We are very disappointed in the jury's verdict and we are going to vigorously pursue all of our appellate avenues."