BOSTON—The Massachusetts Appeals Court on Tuesday upheld a $260,000 civil judgment against a former Harvard graduate student found liable in the death of a Cambridge man he stabbed.
Alexander Pring-Wilson was convicted of manslaughter in the 2003 death of 18-year-old Michael Colono. His conviction was later overturned. He reached a deal to serve two years in prison after his second trial ended in a hung jury.
Pring-Wilson, who was from Colorado Springs, Colo., testified that he pulled out his pocket knife to protect himself after Colono and his cousin attacked him following a verbal altercation on a Cambridge street.
Pring-Wilson was found liable in a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by Cindy Guzman, Colono’s girlfriend and the mother of his daughter. After a jury-waived trial, a judge found Pring-Wilson negligent for “failing to avail himself of reasonable alternatives to combat” and for using “more force than was reasonably necessary.”
The judge found that Pring-Wilson and Colono were equally at fault for Colono’s death, and ordered Pring-Wilson to pay Colono’s estate $10,000 and $250,000 for the benefit of Colono’s daughter.
Pring-Wilson appealed, but the Appeals Court affirmed the judgment Tuesday, finding there was ample evidence to support the judge’s finding that Pring-Wilson was negligent.
