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Man shot in restaurant to get $13M

SEATTLE, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- The Denny's chain has agreed to pay $13 million to a Seattle-area man who became paraplegic after he was shot in a Kent restaurant, his lawyer says.

Jurors Monday awarded more than $46 million in damages to Steve Tolenoa, The Seattle Times reports. But lawyer Ron Perey said a settlement was reached before the verdict that limited Denny's damages to Tolenoa to no more than $13 million in return for immediate payment with no appeal.

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Tolenoa and Lisa Beltran-Walker were wounded in January 2007 when a man who had been involved in a fistfight in the restaurant went to a car, got a gun and opened fire. The jury awarded a total of $50,000 in damages to Beltran-Walker, who was wounded in the knee.

Perey said Tolenoa plans to use the money to buy a house where he can live with full-time caretakers. He said his client would have been "doomed to live in an institution the rest of his life" without the compensation.

At the time, the Kent Denny's was directly owned by the Spartanburg, S.C., company. The jury found the company failed to provide security even though police had responded many times to reports of violent crimes at the restaurant.

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The $46.4 million is believed to be the biggest jury award in Washington state in a personal injury case, the Kent Reporter said.

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