Judge rules Dixon estate won't collect interest

HEATHER CHAPIN-FOWLER

The jury decided in March the Department of Job and Family Services and the Huron County commissioners were liable for death of Connre, an 11-year-old foster child, killed by her foster father. The jury said the county should pay $600,000 in damages to her estate whose beneficiaries includes her grandfather, father and three siblings.

Attorney Jim Martin, who represented Connre's estate said interest should start accruing on the award from the date the suit was filed instead of the day of the verdict. But, visiting Judge Judith Cross denied the motion yesterday.

"You don't get that very often. You have to show bad faith and there was none," said Cross, following a nearly hour-long meeting with the attorneys yesterday afternoon.

The hearing was also scheduled to determine motions filed by the county's attorneys after the verdict was decided asking the court to overturn the verdict or award a lesser amount.

That part of the hearing was postponed until Oct. 1, Cross said.

"We've asked them to continue to talk to see if they could work it out," she said.

Dixon died Oct. 18, 2004, when she was stabbed five times and bled to death in a barn following an altercation with her foster father, Paul Efaw, at his Ridgefield Township home. Efaw was sentenced to a three-year prison term in October 2005 for voluntary manslaughter.

The Huron County Department of Job and Family Services placed Connre in the Efaw home in 2003 after it gained custody of her and her three siblings.

During the trial, Huron County Department of Job and Family Services officials testified they had several child abuse complaints involving sexual, physical and emotional allegations against Efaw in their files, but they didn't deter them from certifying him as a foster parent.