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Barge Accident awarded $19.2 million
Eight injured in crash awarded $19.2 million; judge rebukes allegations captain was drunk.
A Jacksonville construction company was ordered Monday to pay $19.2 million to eight people injured when the boat they were on slammed into a dimly lit barge in the Cedar River three years ago.
U.S. District Judge Harvey E. Schlesinger said Superior Construction Co. was entirely to blame fort the collision for inadequately lighting the 128-foot “black invisible” barge and improperly placing it and a tugboat in the channel beneath the Blanding Boulevard bridge. He said the company never notified the U.S. Coast Guard, which could have warned boaters it was there.
“The locations and lighting of the barge and the tug fell far below even the lowest safety requirements,” Schlesinger wrote in a sweeping 48-page order released late Monday afternoon. “The barge was in the shadow of the bridge and visually disappeared into the darkness below the bridge line. … No one from Superior checked the visibility of the tug and the barge from the water.
Superior officials and the company’s lawyer couldn’t be reached for comment Monday. They had argued at the trial in May that the boat’s pilot, Charles Brock, was to blame because he’d been drinking, but Schlesinger found no merit in that claim.
“Others who were looking ahead and who had not been drinking…did not see the barge either,” the judge wrote. He said Brock’s speed of 22 mph wasn’t excessive.
Brock and his passengers, mostly relatives, were on the river to look at Christmas lights Dec. 29, 2001, when the collision occurred just before 7 p.m. Several people were thrown off his 25-foot Bilinear pleasure boat into the frigid water. Brock and eight of his passengers were injured.
The most seriously hurt was family matriarch Betty Wright, who was left with “catastrophic” leg damage and hasn’t been able to stand on her own since the accident, her attorneys said. Schlesinger awarded her $8.6 million and divided the remaining amount among the other seven claimants.
“Because Betty Wright more likely than not has a future need for full-time attendant care, an award including such care is proper,” Schlesinger wrote. “Wright should not be forced to accept housing in a nursing home facility. Instead, she may select from among a number of reasonable alternatives, including full-time attendant care in the comfort of her home.”
Wright was elated when informed of this judge’s decision, but said she didn’t want to speak with a reporter. Her attorney, Campbell Ford, teared up when he spoke of the importance of Schlesinger’s order.
“It awarded these people the money that they so justly deserved, and it also cleared Charles Brock’s name, said Ford, who represented all but one of the claimants. “It said he didn’t cause the accident, which we knew all along.”
Schlesinger awarded Brock $770,000.
Ford’s partner, Mark Miller, said most of their clients have “huge” continuing medical bills.
“They’ll never be made whole again," MILLER said.
Attorney Eddie Farah, whose office represented passenger Jimmie White, said the case shows what the court system is all about. He said Superior offered to settle the case for a “miniscule” amount less that 1 percent of the final judgment.
“They just didn’t take any of the injuries seriously, “Farah said. “They really put profits over safety.”
White, who was one of the passengers who would up in the water, was awarded $3.3 million.
It is unknown if Superior plans to appeal Schlesinger’s decision to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.
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The law firm of Farah & Farah, P.A. represents clients from the Atlantic Coast of Georgia along the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway and the east and west coasts of Florida, including the cities of Fort Lauderdale, Pensacola, Jacksonville, Port Canaveral, Tampa, Brunswick, Savannah, and St. Mary's.
