An Essex County jury awarded $18.5 million on April 29 in a birth defect case in which the plaintiff benefited from a finding that negligent doctor was an employee of the hospital and covered by its insurance.

Joan Lieser, a part-time contract physician at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, who had $1 million in coverage, was found liable for failing to perform a timely Caesarean section during a delivery, causing cerebral palsy at the birth of the child, now 12.