GREENVILLE, NC- A record making judgment has been made in a Pitt County Court. The woman who broke up a North Carolina couple's marriage has to pay $5.8 million. This is the second largest judgment ever made under the alienation of affection law. Judges are laying down the law, and we're seeing more of these multi-million dollar judgments being made.
When they moved to Greenville, she was a radiologist and he retired from the army. They took vows to love, honor, and obey, but when she was several months pregnant and her husband's former high school classmate came to visit-- his vows went out the window.
“She came down and helped my client paint her nursery and in the process she helped herself to my client's husband,” Cynthia Mills of Mills & Bryant.
She represented Lynn Arcara in the alienation of affection case she took to trial against Susan Pecoraro, a woman she once called her friend.
Often the hardest part of an alienation of affection case can be proving the couple was happy before the affair started. In this case as these documents show-- that wasn't an issue.
The couple was happy and expecting their first child. He cooked for her; they regularly shared in activities.
“She was a great wife; she's a great mother, a great person and she was a very sympathetic witness,” said Mills.
Mills says Judge Russell Duke listened to each piece of evidence before ordering a judgment of $5.8 million be paid to Arcara, the second largest alienation of affection judgment to ever be made in the state.
“If you want to have an affair, you need to choose someone who doesn't reside in North Carolina to have it with because you are going, you're gonna' open yourself up to a liability if you do so,” said Mills.
It’s a liability North Carolina judges don't take lightly. North Carolina is one of a handful of states that has the alienation of affection law. Part of the reason the judgment in this case is so large is because of the amount of money the couple could have earned if they had stayed together. The mistress in this case lives in Maryland so chances are she may never pay a dime in this judgment.
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