By John Cooper, FELA Attorney in Virginia

Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway has been ordered by a jury to pay a Billings, Montana (MT), railroad engineer who suffered a permanent back injury after tripping over a radio headset cord while operating a BNSF locomotive. Ten years after the 2001 workplace accident, the man continues to suffer high degrees of pain and may have to take medical retirement because of the herniated discs in his back.

One thing I found particularly interesting about this case is how unprofessionally lawyers and executives for BNSF acted. I learned from the engineer’s attorneys, Montana-based Jon Moyers and Russ Yerger, that the defense

• Inappropriately contacted the engineer’s treating physician
• Got rid of the radio cord so it couldn’t be admitted into evidence
• Tried to hide other evidence and  misrepresent statements already given as part of the discovery process, and
• Took disciplinary actions against the engineer that were clearly related to the injured man’s chronic pain from his on-the-job injury and the filling of his lawsuit for compensation.

Railroads often try to deny liability for employees’ injuries, and my Virginia (VA) and North  Carolina (NC) FELA attorney colleagues and I have written about several cases of rail companies retaliating against and trying to intimidate workers who report workplace injuries and unsafe working conditions. It is in the interests of corporations to not fairly compensate its employee’s for harms the corporations caused or allowed to happen.

I’m glad BNSF was not successful in deterring this engineer from exercising his legal rights and holding the railroad accountable. I congratulate my fellow railroad employee injury attorneys on securing this verdict for the engineer.

EJL

About the Editors: Shapiro, Cooper Lewis & Appleton is an injury law firm whose attorneys have long histories of representing railroad workers in FELA and other railroad injury cases.  Attorneys will our firm have served as chairmen of the Railroad section of the American Association for Justice. One of our attorneys wrote a major attorney’s encyclopedia section on railroad safety litigation. Check out our railroad injury case results to see for yourself. Our offices are in Virginia Beach and Hampton, Virginia (VA), and Elizabeth City, North Carolina (NC). Our lawyers also hold licenses to practice in South Carolina (SC), West Virginia (WV), Kentucky (KY), Florida (FL) and Washington, DC, and have handled hundreds of railroad injury and FELA cases throughout the eastern United States. Rick Shapiro and James Lewis were included in the 2011 issue of Best Lawyers in America. They, along with fellow attorney John M. Cooper, were also named 2011 Virginia Super Lawyers for Personal Injury Law, an honor which fewer than 5 percent of outstanding lawyers receive. We would like to send you one of our FREE reports about railroad injury and FELA cases, such as Dos and Don’ts When Injured at a Railroad — Yours FELA Rights and What Railroad Claim Agents Won’t Tell You (But You Must Know). We provide free initial confidential injury case consultations, so call us toll free at (800) 752-0042 before giving any statement or talking to a railroad claims agent. Our injury attorneys also host an extensive injury law video library on Youtube. Further, our lawyers proudly moderate the Yardlimits Railroad Community Forum and donate to the Fallen Brother Fund.