By Marc Davis
Staff Writer

VIRGINIA BEACH - A man who slipped and hit his head at a local restaurant has won $2.5 million from a Circuit Court jury - and the jurors would have given him more if he had asked when he filed suit.

After three days of testimony this week, the jury deliberated 2 1/2 hours. Just before rendering its decision late Wednesday, the jury sent a heart-stopping note to the judge:

"May we award more than $2.5 million??"

Everyone in the courtroom was stunned. "It stopped me in my tracks," said attorney Jack E. Ferrebee, representing the injured man, William Quertermous of Virginia Beach. "I was just flabbergasted."

The judge told the jury it could not give the plaintiff more money than he had requested. Moments later, the jury awarded the full $2.5 million.

The verdict came one year after another jury said Quertermous did not have a case. Though the verdict is not the largest ever in Virginia Beach, it is among the biggest in cases of its kind - slip-and-falls, in which Quertermous, a diswasher at a nearby restaurant, had just eaten breakfast and was about to return his tray when he fell on a slippery spot. He hit the back of his head and suffered a serious brain injury.

He sued Boddie-Noell Enterprises, which owns 280 Hardee's franchises in Virginia and North Carolina, for $2.5 million.

The first trial was in June 1993. After four days of testimony, the jury ruled that Hardee's was not liable. Later, however, Judge Edward Hanson set aside the verdict and ruled that he had given the jury an improper instruction. He ordered a new trial.

"I honestly think that without that instruction, that jury last summer would have come back in our favor, Ferrebee said.

Randolph C. DuVall of Virginia Beach, the attorney for Hardee's, said he will ask the judge to set aside the jury's verdict and award. He said he will appeal to the state Supreme Court, if necessary.

Copyright - THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT & THE LEDGER-STAR, FRIDAY, JUNE 24, 1994