Bossier jury sends strong message to child sex abusers with award of $1.1 billion against abusive late stepfather’s estate

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Bossier jury sends strong message to child sex abusers with award of $1.1 billion against abusive late stepfather’s estate

June 13, 2026 by tomaswell

She won’t receive anything approaching the award but the verdict handed down by a Bossier Parish jury in the case of a woman who claimed her late stepfather sexually abused her beginning when she was just four years old, should be a shot across the bow of abusers everywhere.

The jury awarded Pamela Elaine Lockridge $500 million for pain and suffering, $600 million in punitive damages and $585,000 for past and future medical and psychological treatment costs—more than $1.1 billion—an astounding award for any individual who is not a corporate CEO, according to a story in THE GUARDIAN, a British publication that has done a stellar job of tracking child sex abuse cases.

Her lead attorney, former state legislator Ryan Gatti, who admitted that Lockridge’s case was the first he had actually tried in more than a quarter-century of practicing law, said neither he nor Lockridge expected to collect the full award from her stepfather’s estate. Instead, Gatti said he expected to reach an undisclosed settlement.

Should that indeed be the case, there would be no appeal. If no such settlement is reached, it is within the presiding judge’s discretion to reduce the award or the defendants may appeal.

Regardless, the verdict is seen as a warning to future defendants in childhood sex abuse cases that juries are fed up with predators who seek out children for sexual abuse and that smaller verdicts like the $2.4 million in damages awarded last year to a man who sued the Holy Cross Catholic religious order in New Orleans for childhood sexual abuse. Those awards may now be a thing of the past with juries leaning toward larger awards like Lockridge’s.

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