A Las Cruces man who sued a surgeon that he alleged was negligent in repairing a colon perforation after a colonscopy has been awarded $1 million by a jury, the Las Cruces Sun-News reported.

Jurors deliberated 12 hours Tuesday before returning a verdict in the six-day trial of the medical malpractice lawsuit filed by Michael Salopek against Dr. David Friedman, the newspaper said.

Salopek’s attorney, Marci Beyer, said Friedman operated on Salopek in February 2005 to repair a tiny perforation he had sustained during a colonscopy, according to the Sun-News. But Beyer said Friedman did not find the perforation, which continued to leak into Salopek’s abdominal area for 11 days.

The attorney said that medical expenses just to find the perforation totaled $165,000, the newspaper reported.

According to the Sun-News, Beyer said that over the past four years, Salopek’s abdomen was “filled with infection” that caused his internal organs to start to stick to each other.

“He’s had a total of 13 operations now,” Beyer said. “They had to remove part of his colon, it was so infected.”

The newspaper reported that defense attorney Thomas Sandenaw Jr. said it would be inappropriate to comment before a final judgment is entered by state District Judge Jerald A. Valentine.