California IN BRIEF : SAN DIEGO : New Trial Ordered in Hare Krishna Case

Nearly a decade after a former Hare Krishna devotee and her mother were awarded $32.5 million in a case that alleged brainwashing, an appellate court has overturned a key element of the decision and ordered a new trial. Marcia and Jim George of Cypress spent months trying to find their daughter, Robin, then 15, in Krishna temples around the country. Jim George died soon after the girl was found in 1975. An Orange County jury awarded $32.5 million to the mother and daughter in 1983, but the sum has been whittled down several times through appeals that have reached the U.S. Supreme Court. In the latest round on Thursday, the 4th District Court of Appeal left intact compensatory damages that now total $900,000 with interest. But it ordered a new trial for the award of punitive damages that now amount to almost $5 million with interest.