A Cook County jury has awarded $85 million to a man who had both of his legs amputated after a crane incident in Rockford. At the time of the case, the amount set a record in Illinois for lawsuits involving double leg amputations, according to Jury Verdict Reporter data.
The53-year-old man sued Leading Edge Group and Hydraulics alleging several bundles of carbon steel tubing were not loaded properly onto the man’s trailer bed. Once the tubing was unloaded, a full bundle fell on him, fracturing his tibia and fibula and leading to the amputation of both legs, among other life-threatening injuries.
The plaintiff claimed Bedford Park based Metal-Matic failed to stack and load the carbon steel bundles in a way that would prevent them from rolling and failed to warn employees to place heavy bundles on the bottom of the stack to prevent rolling. It was discovered that the crane operator operated the crane while the truck driver was outside the line of sight.
Attorney Joe Power said, “Evidence Video was able to help break up the Progressive Video to help us reinforce testimony for our client. It helped to show visually the damages we wanted to portray.”