Judge Slashes Celebrity Cruises Verdict

NEW YORK — A judge tossed out all but $10 million of a $190 million jury verdict ordering a company that makes water pumps to pay Celebrity Cruise Lines Inc. in a case involving an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease on a cruise ship in 1994.

Calling the jury verdict "manifestly erroneous," U.S. Magistrate Judge James C. Francis IV let stand $10.4 million awarded in May for expenses such as refunding passengers, housing and transporting crew members and decontaminating the ship, the Horizon.

But he tossed out $135 million awarded for lost value to the business and ordered a new trial on the jury's finding that Celebrity should receive $47.6 million in lost profits. Celebrity is a unit of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.

The verdict affected industrial manufacturer Pentair Inc., whose subsidiary Essef Corp. was sued by Celebrity, along with two other companies. Pentair acquired Essef in 1999.

Celebrity claimed several passengers contracted the disease, a respiratory infection.....