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April 22, 2024
California Division of Workers’ Compensation Posts Updated Time of Hire Notice

April 22, 2024
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April 15, 2024
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A U.S. District Court handed down one of the largest awards ever for a non-paralyzing injury. For its failure to provide a safe work environment, Burlington Northern & Santa Fe Railway Co. (BNSF) was ordered June 12, to pay $2,125,000 to Ronald Puckett.

A month out from the trial, Puckett was offered a questionable position with BNSF nearly two years after the crash that led to his injuries. The position would have compromised doctors’ orders despite hallow assurances that third parties would handle the tasks Puckett couldn’t perform. It was reported that BNSF denied Puckett’s vocational rehabilitation firm’s request to have an expert perform a job analysis. Without the analysis, there was no way to obtain an adequate job description for the treating physician to determine if his patient could perform the job duties.

Pfiester Law Corp. represented Puckett and release a statement regarding the ruling. R. Edward Pfiester, Jr. said that the job offer was a ploy to make it appear that Puckett rejected a legitimate job offer.

"In the end, the jury rejected the BNSF's arguments and decided in favor of Ronald Puckett, a man who has lived in pain every day since June 13, 2000, and who much would prefer to support his family by working at the railroad job that he loved," said Pfiester.

Puckett retained the Pfiester Law Corporation to file suit against BNSF under the Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), which is the injured railroad employee's sole remedy for an on-duty injury. Unlike other industrial workers, railroad employees are not covered by state workers' compensation laws. Under FELA, a railroad has "a nondelegable duty to provide its employees with a reasonably safe work place." FELA also directs that if the railroad's negligence played any part, even the slightest, in injuring the employee, then the employee can recover full damages, including past and future medical expenses, past and future loss of earnings, and past and future general damages for physical pain and mental anguish.

A U.S. Navy veteran, Puckett served in Desert Storm and received the Naval Achievement Award, is a married father of six children, ages 2-15. He was a six-year BNSF employee and locomotive engineer when he reported to duty at the Richmond rail yard in the San Francisco area on the morning of June 13, 2000.

As a result of a locomotive accident involving Puckett that day in the yard, he suffered serious injuries to his lower back, shoulder, head, neck and left knee. In February 2001, Puckett underwent a lumbar fusion with titanium metal cages using bone harvested from his hipbone. A year later, an orthopedic surgeon replaced the anterior cruciate ligament of his left knee with that of a cadaver. All of his injuries except the lumbar spine and left knee have healed since the crash. Puckett's doctors precluded him from any repetitive squatting, bending, twisting or walking on uneven ground. They also have limited him to lifting or carrying no more than ten pounds.

The morning of the accident he was operating a BNSF locomotive that was "shoving"— pushing ahead of it—a group of railroad cars, commonly called a "cut," to connect them with another group of cars ahead. Puckett was part of a three-man crew headed up by the yard foreman, an experienced switchman named J.A. Johnson. Johnson was directing Puckett via portable radio, a method that is standard in such operations because the view of the engineer is blocked by the sheer bulk of the rail cars that the locomotive is pushing.

By regulation, the engineer never moves the locomotive without being directed to do so by another crew member whom he relies on to be his eyes and ears. Long-standing BNSF safety rules also required Johnson either to ride the lead car that was being pushed by the locomotive or to walk alongside of it in order to direct the locomotive engineer's actions precisely.

According to trial records, Johnson did not abide by these safety rules; instead, he stood near the switch, attempting to look ahead and guess where the head car was moving. Johnson misjudged the distance between the cars and misguided Puckett. As a direct result, Puckett's train collided with the parked railcars, causing a violent jolt as the moving train came to a sudden stop. Puckett was hurled out of his seat, and his body was slammed against the metal console, then back onto his buttocks on the steel floor.

“BNSF is responsible for this crash and Mr. Puckett's resulting injuries because BNSF failed its duty to provide a reasonably safe place to work," said Pfiester. "The incident occurred in plain sight of upper BNSF management, yet they did not oversee their operation adequately to prevent an incident that robbed Ronald Puckett of his ability to be employed gainfully for the remaining 30-plus years of his working life.”