Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, November 30, 1995                   TAG: 9511300069
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CITY JURY FINDS FOR THE BIRDS

When a family of wrens decided to nest on the wind chimes hanging outside of Ruby Campagna's apartment, the Roanoke grandmother was delighted.

"I love birds," Campagna said. "I got very attached to them. They became my babies."

So it was easy for a jury to understand Campagna's distress when her apartment manager knocked the nest to the floor of her apartment patio, then stomped the newly hatched birds to death as she watched.

Late Tuesday, the jury awarded Campagna $135,000.

In an unusual finding of intentional infliction of emotional distress, the Roanoke Circuit Court jury included in its verdict $35,000 in punitive damages against Judy Woody, manager of South Roanoke Apartment Village. The jury awarded $100,000 to cover Campagna's medical bills and to compensate her for pain and suffering.

Campagna's lawsuit, filed by attorney and state Sen.-elect John Edwards, claimed that Woody stepped on the thumb-sized birds and then twisted her shoes "in order to mutilate and mangle their tiny bodies in front of [Campagna]."

All the while, the suit claimed, Woody stared at the woman "with a malevolent scowl on her face."

That was more than two years ago, but a psychiatrist testified Tuesday that Campagna still suffers from depression and anxiety akin to post-traumatic stress disorder.

"My entire life has changed from joy and happiness to sadness and depression," said Campagna, who has since moved out of the Parliament Road apartment.

John Sarber, who represented Woody and the apartment complex, told the jury that bird nests were routinely removed because of the damage they caused.

"These birds were wild; they were not pets," Sarber said.

He declined to comment on the jury's verdict after the trial.

Woody did not know there were birds in the nest when she knocked it down, Sarber y. Once she discovered the birds, she killed them because "it was the least cruel thing to do."

Edwards, however, argued that Woody was cruel in the way she yelled at Campagna and then threw at her a wadded-up invoice for new carpet for the patio.

"She seems to think that all birds are big, bad and ugly," Campagna said. "She doesn't realize that the little ones give joy to people."