L.A. Woman Gets $75,000 for Bloomingdale’s Spritz
NEW YORK — A Los Angeles woman who said she nearly died from an unwanted spray of perfume in Bloomingdale’s has accepted a $75,000 settlement of her assault lawsuit, her lawyer said today.
Deborah Martorano was hospitalized with “respiratory distress” and was “close to death” three days after a salesperson at the department store spritzed her with perfume April 30, 1984, said her lawyer, Michael Gluck.
Martorano, 36, said she has a long history of asthma and allergies to perfume, horses, trees, ragweed and dust. She said her first asthma attack in eight years was triggered by the unwanted spray.
“I heard somebody behind me,” she said in court papers. “I turned around, and the next thing I knew I was sprayed. My nose started to burn and my eyes started to tear.”
Gluck said Martorano was in New York Hospital for 11 days and ran up $12,000 in medical bills.
Martorano was an office administrator for a New York law firm when she was spritzed and now works for a Los Angeles law firm, Gluck said.
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