A Hall County State Court jury has cleared a neurosurgeon in a medical malpractice suit that accused him of negligence in surgery that left a patient paralyzed below the waist.

The jury of eight women and four men deliberated for about 90 minutes Tuesday before finding in favor of the defendant, Karl D. Schultz Jr. of Specialty Clinics of Georgia.

The trial lasted seven days in Judge B.E. "Gene" Roberts’ court.

The plaintiffs, Randall Scroggs and his wife, Gail, alleged in a lawsuit that he was left a paraplegic following a 2005 procedure in which Schultz attempted to insert a spinal cord stimulator in Randall Scroggs for treatment of an ongoing medical condition.

Scroggs suffered from numbness and pain in his upper legs and lower spine and leg tremors and weakness.

The lawsuit claimed Schultz failed to perform imaging tests that would have helped diagnose a condition in the upper back portion of Scroggs’ spinal column.

"A reasonably prudent physician acting generally under the same or similar circumstances should not and would not have proceeded with the procedure," plaintiffs’ attorney Thomas J. Venker wrote in the suit.

James Brim III, the Gainesville attorney who successfully defended the doctor, said the evidence at trial showed that Schultz performed the surgery properly.

The outcome was "very unfortunate" due to Scroggs having a "very rare spinal disorder that was unknown and unforeseeable at the time of the surgery," Brim said. "That pre-existing spinal disorder is what caused the complication."

Scroggs suffered from severe thoracic spinal stenosis from three herniated discs, a condition Brim called "exceedingly rare."

He noted that Schultz and two other specialists who treated Scroggs did not find evidence of the disorder in "multiple examinations."

"The same result would have happened with any skilled surgeon, unfortunately," Brim said.

The jury was asked to decide whether Schultz exercised a reasonable degree of medical care and skill that would be exercised by other members of his profession under the same or similar circumstances.

"The jury obviously agreed that Dr. Schultz was not negligent in either his medical or surgical care of the patient," Brim said.