The law firm of Motley Rice has filed suit against Bombardier and numerous other defendants over the October 2004 crash of a Canadair regional jet operated by Pinnacle Airlines near Jefferson City, Mo., on behalf of the plane’s pilots. Aero-News.net editor Jim Campbell is decidedly critical of the suit. (“Barnstorming: Pinnacle Suit Pushes Aero-Litigation ‘Cringe-Factor’ Too Far”, Jan. 11).
Posts Tagged ‘airlines’
“2005’s Top Ten Jury Verdicts”
The new WSJ Law Blog summarizes (Jan. 16) Lawyers Weekly’s annual compilation of cases. As Lawyers Weekly tells it, the top verdicts this year were both somewhat lower and more closely linked to actual damages (i.e., less crazy) than last year’s. Among the ten: the Miami bus shelter electrocution discussed by Ted Jul. 10 (and linked to by the WSJ); Coleman v. Morgan Stanley, discussed in this space May 18 and Nov. 17; the $253 million verdict in Ernst v. Merck; the $105 million verdict against beer servers at New Jersey’s Giants Stadium (Jan. 21 and Feb. 2); and Hall-Edwards v. Ford Motor, involving an Explorer rollover.
Another interesting case on the list: Baker v. PrivatAir, in which a pilot forced out of his California job at age 63 won $64 million for age discrimination, wrongful termination, emotional distress and defamation. Some other employees with whom the pilot had had conflicts had joined forces to get him fired; one of the steps they took against him was to get him written up on safety charges, which the employer then did not adequately investigate.
Update: UK nixes “economy class syndrome” suits
Britain’s highest court, the Law Lords, “ruled that lesser courts correctly threw out an application by passengers or their families seeking to sue two airlines, British Airways and China Airlines, for death and injury from deep vein thrombosis (DVT). The action was a test case that could have thrown the air industry open to compensation claims for millions of pounds.” (Martin Hickman, The Independent, Dec. 9; Simon Calder, The Independent, Dec. 9; Joshua Rozenberg, Daily Telegraph, Dec. 9). More: see Jun. 25 (Australia), Oct. 3, 2004 (U.S.), etc.
JetBlue emergency landing
Will the popular airline get sued by outwardly uninjured but psychologically traumatized passengers following yesterday’s L.A. incident? Precedents are discussed here, here, and (the most famous such incident, also with an L.A. angle) here. (cross-posted from Point of Law; and see Ted’s post there).
“Sit down, strap in, shut up”
Eenie Meenie Minie Update
Grace Fuller claims that she suffered two epileptic seizures because a flight attendant used the phrase “Eenie, meenie, minie, mo, pick a seat, we gotta go” to passengers boarding an open-seating flight late; Fuller and her travelling companion, both African-Americans, ascribed racist meaning to the phrase, and sued under a variety of federal and state claims. Some claims were thrown out, and a jury did what a judge should’ve done sooner, and bounced the rest. (Feb. 9, 2004; Jan. 22, 2004 and links therein).
The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court judgment for defendants. After a full trial, and briefing for an appeal, the cost to Southwest Airlines of “Eenie Meenie Minie Moe” was surely in the six digits. But, though the law in questions permit plaintiffs to recover attorneys’ fees if they are successful (surely the only reason an attorney agreed to bring this suit), defendant Southwest Airlines is going to have to swallow the cost of this ridiculous suit. The opinion creates no precedent, so if Sawyer wants to sue someone else for using a nursery rhyme, she can do so in the future. (Sawyer v. Southwest Airlines Co., No. 04-3109 (10th Cir. Aug. 10, 2005) (hat tip to P.N.)).
Update: DVT claim fails in Australia
The High Court of Australia has dismissed a claim against British Airways and Qantas by a businessman who suffered a stroke arising from deep-vein thrombosis (DVT), sometimes known as “economy-class syndrome”, after a long-distance flight (see Sept. 12, 2004). “If his case had succeeded, it could have opened the floodgates to dozens of DVT cases which had been prepared to go before Australian courts.” (Chris Herde, “Court throws out DVT-related case”, The Australian, Jun. 23). More: Oct. 3, 2004 and links from there.
Payne Stewart air crash verdict
After golfer Payne Stewart and several others were killed in a 1999 plane crash, Stewart’s survivors sued a list of defendants starting with the aircraft’s owner and its operator; perhaps the deepest pocket sued was that of Canadian-owned Learjet, which stood its ground, took the case to trial and was entirely vindicated by a jury last week. (“Jurors clear Learjet in Payne Stewart crash”, AP/FoxSports, Jun. 10; “Payne Stewart family sue over air crash”, GolfToday (U.K.), undated 2000). DropZone has a comment thread which includes a discussion of the practice of suing multiple defendants after air crashes (and then working up theories against them individually as needed) and also includes some jaded comment about Instance #785,423 of It Not Being About The Money:
Tracey Stewart, her teenage son and college-aged daughter and Fraley’s widow, Dixie Fraley Keller, said through a statement that “their hope in this effort was to make air travel safer …”
“They brought this litigation not because of money in any capacity; it was always about responsibility,” said attorney Gregory McNeill.
The suit had demanded $200 million.
Southwest’s zany safety announcements
…probably don’t raise much of a liability problem for the airline, according to commenters at Dissemination.org (Jun. 7). More: although the announcements may not pose a problem safety-wise, they did land Southwest in legal hot water a couple of years back in the famous “Eenie Meenie” brouhaha: see Jan. 22, 2004.
Update: first-WTC-bombing case drags on
Eleven years after the first terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center, a suit against New York’s Port Authority still hasn’t reached trial, though it’s inching closer (Tom Perrotta, “Liability for 1993 WTC Bombing Argued in Appeals Court”, New York Law Journal, Nov. 10)(see Oct. 12-14, 2001).