Thompson Coe Trial Team Successfully Defends Workplace Injury Case Seeking $17 Million in Damages

Background

The suit stemmed from an incident where the plaintiff sustained a laser injury to his eye while performing maintenance on fiber optic cables in San Antonio, Texas. Plaintiff alleged that our client, the general contractor for the maintenance project’s customer, and a subcontractor caused Plaintiff’s injuries by failing to maintain safe working conditions on the worksite. The plaintiff claimed that workers on two different days shined a visible fault laser into his eye that caused a lesion to develop, which impaired his vision. He further argued that our client failed to implement a laser safety program and failed to train workers properly. He sought over $10 million.

Determination of No Fault

The Thompson Coe trial team spent four days presenting our client’s defense. The case featured testimony from several witnesses who worked for the various contractors and expert testimony regarding laser technology and how the incident had factually occurred. Zandra conducted voir dire and delivered the opening statement explaining that our client should not be held liable because there is no evidence that they were the cause of the Plaintiff’s injuries. After four days of the plaintiff’s case-in-chief, Steve argued our client’s motion for a directed verdict, which the judge granted after finding that our client was not liable as a matter of law and dismissing our client from the trial.

The jury was very attentive to all the testimony and consisted of six men, six women, and a West Highland White Terrier dog.