Jury Awards $21 million to Injured HAL Passenger

[MsSteinrunner]

Traumatic Brain Injury does not necessarily manifest its full effects immediately. Some effects manifest themselves over time and permanently.

 

Some of the posts in this thread have been a bit too snarky, for we do not know what the long term impact has been - might be severe cognitive difficulties, might be some form of dementia, etc.

 

In short, we have a jury system for a reason, and perhaps some should not be so cavalier in their judgments. TBI can be devastating to the individual and the family.

[take us away]

I wonder if this is the case that the Captain, HD, and one other crew member left the Amsterdam on its current cruise to go back to Seattle for a lawsuit.

 

Thought it was for the 'big announcement'.

[take us away]

Automatic door I remember ( in the lido), but where are the sliding doors?

 

The ones in the video are from the mid-ship elevators and unto the Lido. You go thru these, walk around the pool to get into the Lido buffet. There is a single set from the Lido buffet to the back pool.

[take us away]

The accident date, ship, and the fact the couple and daughter were on the ship for 8 months was in one of the news articles. That article also said it was a world cruse. I did a couple of online searches and it was this couple. As far as HAL's attorneys, I assume they knew this and, since the cruise length was mentioned in one or more news articles, that it was also mentioned at the trial.

 

8 months would make it the Grand Asia (Sept), then thru the Panama Canal and the Christmas Caribbean cruise, then the world cruise which docks back into FLL late April - so 8 months. Wow - did the same, less the Christmas cruise, and know the price for 2 and they were 3 staying in the penthouse - wow! Know these people as remember it was a bit uncomfortable how they treated the crew.

[Rosethorn40]

Why would you want the Plaintiff to have to be present?

He hired counsel to represent him.

Presumably the Judge saw him in court (if he is fit enough to have attended or possibly by video), Jury saw him, Defendant(s) saw him as did Defendant(s) counsel. I would think that is sufficient.

He should not have any responsibility to show himself to the public, IMO

 

Of course he has no responsibility to show himself in public, nor did his wife for that matter. I was curious how badly injured he was to warrant a 21 million dollar payday. The average award for someone killed, by say a drunk driver, is considerably less.

[HamOp]

Keep in mind we don't know what the breakdown of the award was.

 

It may not be so much for the injury, but could have been punitive damages levied against HAL for knowing of a problem and not taking corrective action before the plaintiffs injury.

[sail7seas]

Of course he has no responsibility to show himself in public, nor did his wife for that matter. I was curious how badly injured he was to warrant a 21 million dollar payday. The average award for someone killed, by say a drunk driver, is considerably less.

 

Depending upon quality of life and one's personal perception of 'living', death is sometimes kinder than for ones heart to remain beating. We don't have enough information to begin to guess what expenses are incurred monthly/annually to keep the gentleman alive and taken care of.

 

That certainly is an individual perception and I in no way wish to get into that conversation, however, juries might consider that when making their judgment.

 

One could guess some of the award was punitive.

 

Edited November 2, 2015 by sail7seas

[Zippercat]

Keep in mind we don't know what the breakdown of the award was.

 

It may not be so much for the injury, but could have been punitive damages levied against HAL for knowing of a problem and not taking corrective action before the plaintiffs injury.

 

Bingo! It would not be very hard to characterize HAL as careless and unconcerned about safety with those facts. Would be very difficult to defend.

[idiebabe]

This happened to me last November on the Prinsendam walking into Lido from the Pool area. I was was right behind my Husband. The door was fully opened from him walking through and started to close but opened fully when I proceeded through. It then began to close suddenly and smacked me on my arm. It actually pushed me off balance and gave me a good bruise! Guess I missed my opportunity for a lifetime of free cruises in Pinnacle Suites! :D. We did go down to Front Desk and let them know as an FYI to have the door checked so no one would get hurt. For the rest of the Cruise I avoided that door and would use the one on Starboard!

 

I'm sure that must have really hurt but 21 Million???

[AZNative2000]

If this gentleman gets 21 million, what will the rape (almost murder) victim from last year receive? HAL may have to sell a couple ships.

 

Whatever she gets, it will not be enough!

Edited November 2, 2015 by AZNative2000

[Fouremco]

If this gentleman gets 21 million, what will the rape (almost murder) victim from last year receive? HAL may have to sell a couple ships.

 

Whatever she gets, it will not be enough!

The victim is seeking $50m compensation and $365m in punitive damages.

 

The former HAL employee pleaded guilty in a Miami courtroom last September to rape and attempted murder. He was convicted and is serving 30 years.

[cbr663]

Keep in mind we don't know what the breakdown of the award was.

 

It may not be so much for the injury, but could have been punitive damages levied against HAL for knowing of a problem and not taking corrective action before the plaintiffs injury.

 

I think that this played a part in the award. Negligence is relatively easy to prove against a company that knows a danger exists and does very little to deal with it.

[Aquahound]

The average award for someone killed, by say a drunk driver, is considerably less.

 

That might be true when a drunk driver is any Joe Schmoe, but not when the driver is working for a multi billion dollar corporation.

 

You have to remember...Compensatory Damages are relative to the victime. Punitive Damages are a punishment. Punitive damages aren't just for the benefit of the victim, but also a punishment against the offender that's relative to their worth.

Edited November 2, 2015 by Aquahound

[chengkp75]

I think that this played a part in the award. Negligence is relatively easy to prove against a company that knows a danger exists and does very little to deal with it.

 

Negligence would also require a review of the maintenance history of the device in question, whether it met the requirements of the manufacturer, whether the operation of the device at the time of the incident met the design parameters of the manufacturer, whether the complaints and incidents had caused a review of these procedures and design criteria, and finally whether or not the cruise line had met "reasonable" standards of safety and warnings concerning the device. None of which, barring access to the court records, we can answer.

[Hlitner]

Simply another example of "deferred maintenance." Rather then making adjustments/repairs there is a tendency to just ignore issues until another day.

 

Hank

[Tarpeian Rock]

Traumatic Brain Injury does not necessarily manifest its full effects immediately. Some effects manifest themselves over time and permanently.

 

Some of the posts in this thread have been a bit too snarky, for we do not know what the long term impact has been - might be severe cognitive difficulties, might be some form of dementia, etc.

 

In short, we have a jury system for a reason, and perhaps some should not be so cavalier in their judgments. TBI can be devastating to the individual and the family.

 

 

Without defending HAL or questioning the facts in this matter, as regards jury awards, the last several decades have seen some stunning abuses in terms of jury awards - those incidents of the spilled McDonald's hot coffee, the lady turned into a "nymphomaniac" after a cable car accident, the man awarded damages because the manufacturer of his rotary lawn mower didn't tell him not to use it to trim hedges all come to mind - and many have been reversed or severely reduced on appeal. In these kinds of cases the "jury system" is so easily manipulated by personal injury lawyers and compliant physicians with the ethics of a common night walker. The story of the asbestos trust fund and the legal-medical abuses surrounding it make interesting reading. Again, this is a general observation, not a defense of HAL for something it should have addressed.

[Aquahound]

Without defending HAL or questioning the facts in this matter, as regards jury awards, the last several decades have seen some stunning abuses in terms of jury awards - those incidents of the spilled McDonald's hot coffee....

 

That McDonald's case is probably the most misquoted court case on the internet. Have you actually read it? Do you know what 3rd degree burns are?

[Lizzie68]

If anything good comes out of this it will be that HAL will be much more responsive to mechanical breakdowns and stop band-aiding them, and front office will take complaints seriously. What jumps out at me from the judgement is that they knew about the issue and did not rectify it. Sound familiar? Hence, the large award.

[Fouremco]

That McDonald's case is probably the most misquoted court case on the internet. Have you actually read it? Do you know what 3rd degree burns are?

I think that the point being made was that juries have made overly generous awards that have subsequently been reduced. In the McDonalds case, the initial award was in the amount of $2.86 million, the judge reduced this to $640,000 and the final undisclosed settlement was for under $600.000.

[durangoscots]

Simply another example of "deferred maintenance." Rather then making adjustments/repairs there is a tendency to just ignore issues until another day.

 

Hank

 

Not necessarily.... I had an issue with an elevator door on the Princendam this year .... mentioned it at the front desk and later saw them working on the elevator which worked perfectly after that. Like the previous poster mentioned in her incident.... I had a bruise on the arm. It would have been very hard for the door to hit my head.

[chengkp75]

Simply another example of "deferred maintenance." Rather then making adjustments/repairs there is a tendency to just ignore issues until another day.

 

Hank

 

If anything good comes out of this it will be that HAL will be much more responsive to mechanical breakdowns and stop band-aiding them, and front office will take complaints seriously. What jumps out at me from the judgement is that they knew about the issue and did not rectify it. Sound familiar? Hence, the large award.

 

I have to take exception to these two posts, as this badly impugns the professionalism and work ethic of the ships' engineering staffs. As I've said, without seeing the court documents related to the maintenance of this equipment, you are all just speculating about negligence, pretty much as even the jury of laymen would be without sufficient expert testimony. I am not a cheerleader for any cruise line, but will defend their integrity and the integrity of the ISM Code until proven otherwise.

 

I really love it when laypersons go on and on about the "deferred maintenance" that the cruise lines are supposedly guilty of. Does it happen? Perhaps, but I cannot say for sure, and I am a maritime professional who knows what is required by the ISM and the classification societies with regard to maintenance, records, and condition of every piece of equipment onboard a ship. When flaws were found in Carnival's maintenance system after the Splendor fire, I posted these for those who don't read these incident reports. I still defended Carnival when the Triumph fire happened, and even when there were again flaws in their system (different from those on the Splendor), which did not contribute to the cause of the fire I continue to defend their integrity over those who claim the Triumph fire was caused by "deferred maintenance".

 

Shipboard maintenance is like a hospital doing triage. There is always more work to be done than assets to complete them. You have to prioritize the jobs, so not all customer complaints get dealt with immediately. Like the new TV series, a ship frequently goes into "code black".

[Lizzie68]

I have to take exception to these two posts, as this badly impugns the professionalism and work ethic of the ships' engineering staffs.

 

<snip>.

 

I am sorry you took exception to my post, because I can only base my comment on my own personal experience as a passenger dealing with ongoing unrectified, or very slowly rectified, issues in a cabin, and not as an engineer with inside knowledge of how things work. I have related my experience on here before, so no point in repeating. There were times I thought I had to stand and yell and stamp my feet to get some attention to flooded cabin, no hot water (for 2 weeks) continually blowing fuses etc etc etc. And we have all read some pretty nasty reports about backed up toilets, and front office insisting "there hasn't been a problem before" when we knew for a fact that it has been ongoing. So, I stand by my post while I respect your knowledge. You speak from your perspective, I speak from mine as a passenger who has experienced these issues.

[The-Inside-Cabin]

Google the persons name and cruise bruise for another perspective

Edited November 2, 2015 by The-Inside-Cabin

[Fouremco]

Google the persons name and cruise bruise for another perspective

A very interesting article. If the information is credible, it appears that Hausman was extremely fortunate to win the suit. On the other hand, the fact that HAL had reportedly faced a dozen or so lawsuits over the automatic doors in the prior three years certainly suggests a level of negligence on HAL's part.

[chengkp75]

I am sorry you took exception to my post, because I can only base my comment on my own personal experience as a passenger dealing with ongoing unrectified, or very slowly rectified, issues in a cabin, and not as an engineer with inside knowledge of how things work. I have related my experience on here before, so no point in repeating. There were times I thought I had to stand and yell and stamp my feet to get some attention to flooded cabin, no hot water (for 2 weeks) continually blowing fuses etc etc etc. And we have all read some pretty nasty reports about backed up toilets, and front office insisting "there hasn't been a problem before" when we knew for a fact that it has been ongoing. So, I stand by my post while I respect your knowledge. You speak from your perspective, I speak from mine as a passenger who has experienced these issues.

 

I sympathize with you, I really do. Do these problems happen? Yes. Do they happen more often than they should? Also yes.

 

From my personal experience, I would break down these "long running" or unresolved guest complaints into 3 categories:

 

First are those that maintenance knows nothing about. NCL used, when I was there, a program for hotel management, that among many other things would allow the front desk to issue a work order for any guest or crew complaint requiring technical assistance. I can't tell you how many times I went into the morning meeting between the 2 Captains, the 2 Chiefs, and the Hotel Director, and the HD would start in on me about why the problem in cabin XYZ hadn't been addressed in 3 days. I would ask for the work order number, and he couldn't give it to me (should have been his first resource), and when I later looked for a work order, there either wasn't one or it had been entered after the morning meeting. Unfortunately, the front desk staff are trained in hotel service practices, and know nothing about the technical aspects of a ship, even having lived on one for a few years. They would get the information wrong, would not understand the severity of the situation, or would be busy and forget to enter the work order. This is a failure of guest services, and was something I tried hard to rectify by having two technical people man the "hot line" to get the information right, and get it to the correct maintenance department.

 

The next group are the "behind the scenes" repairs. Sometimes we are working on your problem, but not where you can see it. I had to placate a group of 8 guest cabins who did not have working toilets for 3 days, because one of them had decided to flush a bikini down the toilet. I had two plumbers working 24 hours a day for 3 days to roto-root that clog out. We were working below the guest cabins in the crew areas where the clog had travelled to. Given that I only had 8 plumbers, who all work day shift, and by law they cannot work more than 14 hours a day, with mandated rest periods, this took some scheduling to get guys swung over to night shift to keep working on this. Did I make it a point to personally let the guests know daily what was happening? Yes. Do all engineering officers take that much pride in customer service? Probably not, and the hotel department would deflect any questions with "no problem" since they had no clue.

 

The final problem is one where there is no quick remedy, due to requirements for access or lack of spare parts. These should be identified to the guests and compensation afforded as required.

 

These are all failures of guest services, not of poor or deferred maintenance, and these account for about 98% of all guest problems that are not resolved within an hour or two.

 

One thing to remember, about 5% of the crew, maximum, are engineering staff, and these are the people who maintain everything onboard from the flag halyard on the mast to the propeller, from bow to stern, whether passenger or crew related. Most of our problems came with equipment that we had no operational control over, whether it be in passenger cabins or hotel crew operated equipment.

 

We had one electrical engineer whose sole job was to service the elevators and automatic doors. This is a full time job. Many things like these auto doors are caused by crew banging carts or mop buckets into a sliding door and setting it out of adjustment, and not telling anyone.

 

Again, all I'm saying is; was HAL negligent? I for one cannot say for sure, and neither can anyone here on CC without a whole lot more information.

 

Sorry for the rant.