Amy Yasbeck, the wife of John Ritter, is suing his two doctors for wrongful death following the death of Ritter in 2003. Ritter, 54, died on his daughter's fifth birthday.
Yasbeck and their four children fault the care Ritter received from two doctors, radiologist Matthew Lotysch and cardiologist Joseph Lee.
Lotysch interpreted the results of a body scan he had in 2001, while Lee treated him the night he died. State regulators said that if Lee would have administered a chest X-ray, it probably would have shown that Ritter had an enlarged aorta. With that information, he could have been taken to surgery and saved.
Defense attorneys say their clients did nothing wrong and that Ritter would have died no matter what doctors did.
Because of his subsequent success on the series "8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter," his family is asking for more than $67 million in damages.
At the time of his death, Ritter had a seven-year contract with Touchstone Studios worth $75,000 per episode of "8 Simple Rules" in the first season with a 5% compounded raise every year. Assuming the series remained on air, he would have received up to $14.7 million, plus residuals.
Representatives for Ritter and Touchstone had started, but not completed, discussions on renegotiating the contract, which would restructure him to receive $250,000-$300,000 per episode. That would equal at least $67 million if the show had lasted seven seasons.
The family already has received more than $14 million in settlements, according to court records, including $9.4 million from Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, where he died.
