Laliberte v. Mead

ROBERTS, Justice.

Defendant Roger Mead appeals from a judgment entered on a jury verdict in the Superior Court (Sagadahoc County, Bradford, J.) awarding Albert Laliberte, the guardian and conservator of Virginia Char-pentier, compensatory and punitive damages on his claim for the breach of a fiduciary duty. Mead contends that the court’s instructions to the jury on the plaintiff’s burden of proof constituted obvious error. Because we conclude that the court’s erroneous punitive damages instruction affected Mead’s substantial rights, we vacate that part of the judgment awarding punitive…