BANGOR – A Penobscot County jury awarded a Dover-Foxcroft woman $200,000 Thursday after finding unanimously that she was improperly passed over for promotions and wrongfully fired from her job as a nurse at the Northern Maine Juvenile Correctional Facility in Charleston.

The jury of four women and five men deliberated for just over two hours before returning the verdict in favor of 67-year-old Joan Gilles, who filed the suit against Prison Health Services of Brentwood, Tenn., which provides medical services for prisons in Maine and across the country.

Portland lawyer James E. Fortin, who represented Prison Health Services, said Thursday that he planned to meet with PHS officials to determine whether the company wanted to appeal the case.

Gilles argued that her supervisors at PHS failed to promote her and eventually fired her because of her age and because of attempts she made to improve medical services at the juvenile facility.

The jury was limited by state statute to a reward of $300,000.

Bangor lawyer Arthur Greif said that the jury awarded Gilles $75,000 in compensatory damages and $125,000 in punitive damages.

Now a judge will decide the amount of back pay and “front pay” owed to Gilles based on the jury’s verdict. Greif said that the jury found that Gilles was discriminated against and passed over for two promotions. On Thursday Greif said he estimated Gilles would be entitled to $100,000 in back pay and $75,000 in front pay or money paid in lieu of reinstatement.

Those figures, along with Greif’s fees of approximately $30,000, could bring the total judgment up to about $400,000.

There will be a hearing sometime next month on the back- and front-pay issues, Greif said.

“Joan Gilles feels vindicated,” Greif said

During his closing remarks Greif stressed the testimony of two nurses who worked with Gilles and praised her ability as a nurse. He also reminded jurors of testimony suggesting that the male nurse Gilles was replaced by had improper contact with female inmates and on two occasions had incorrect narcotic drug counts in the cabinet at the end of his shift.

“I told the jury that Joan Gilles simply felt that a job worth doing was a job worth doing well” and that her supervisors at PHS were tired of her trying to make sure proper medical services were provided to the juveniles at the Charleston facility.

Fortin said he was disappointed with the case and believed that PHS did the best it could to work with a very difficult employee who was driven by vindictiveness and revenge.