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Singer Chris Brown has been found liable by a Los Angeles jury for USD 13 million in the gruesome case of a dog that attacked his housekeeper, mauling and disfiguring her at his residence in 2020, Variety reported.
On Tuesday, the verdict went strongly in favour of Brown's housekeeper Maria Avila, who was viciously attacked by the singer's 200-pound Caucasian shepherd Hades. She was emptying trash outside Brown's Tarzana, California, house when the attack took place. As shared by Avila's attorney, Michael C Murphy Jr., to Variety, Chris Brown and his company, Black Pyramid LLC, are on the hook to pay USD 12.9 million to the housekeeper for negligence. Also, Maria Avila's sister, Patricia Avila, who was also on the job when the mauling took place, was awarded USD 885,000 for emotional distress. Avila's husband, Oscar Olivo, was separately awarded USD 50,000. "After more than five years of litigating against Chris Brown, we are thrilled that we were able to get justice for our client, Patricia. We are so happy for her and her family after everything they went through on that horrible day. It was an honour to represent her," Murphy told Billboard. Pertaining to the case, Chris Brown had claimed that the dog was kept for security reasons and was not his personal pet. Following the attack, the singer left the scene and drove around for hours, leaving behind the situation for his employees to handle. During the trial, Brown testified in court that he had warned Avila and her sister about the dogs, even asking them to go outside only in the presence of security. However, the housekeepers denied having such a conversation with him. He also said that he was about to go to shower when he heard the dog growling. He rushed down to find the housekeeper lying in a pool of blood. "The blood kind of freaked me out. I was in shock," he said. Meanwhile, Maria Avila, during the trial, offered a detailed account of the traumatic incident, which left her with severe scarring on her face and left arm. She had limited mobility after surgeons grafted skin from her abdomen to repair her arm and has not been able to return to work ever since due to a lack of arm strength. (ANI)
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