- Defective products
- Trucking and motor
vehicle collisions - Insurance claims and
disputes - Nursing home neglect
- Medical negligence,
drugs, and medical
products - Aircraft, railroad, and
boating accidents - Construction and
industrial accidents - Fire, toxic, and
chemical injuries - Public interest and
environmental work
Your Case
Representative Cases
Improper equipment moving: loss of an eye
A testing company supervisor asked two heavy equipment operators from a road construction company to help him move a several hundred pound piece of asphalt testing equipment on a job in eastern Oregon, near the town of Juntura. The workers suggested that heavy equipment be used to move the testing machine, a recommendation that the testing company supervisor rejected, apparently as he was in a rush to wrap up the job and go home. Instead, the supervisor had the workers help him move the machine by hand, without providing any safety equipment. When they got the machine to the trailer, the supervisor suddenly tipped the machine backwards, into the right eye of one of the heavy equipment operators. The impact ruptured the eye, resulting in a permanent loss of vision on the right side. The case involved the application of Oregon's Employers Liability Law, and settled before trial for $600,000.
Farm equipment accident: defective tractor causes brain injury
A 19 year old employee of a Lane County grass seed farm was part of a team bringing in the grass seed crop, using specialized tractors that cut the grass and pushed it through augers to form windrows. A co-worker, whose machine became jammed, had placed an unplugging wrench on the machine before the 19 year old was sent over to help get that tractor running again. A supervisor soon arrived and sent the young man back to his own tractor. The supervisor did not realize that a wrench was on the jammed machine and started it up, causing the wrench to fly up into the air and down into the young man's head, resulting in severe brain injury.
We brought a product liability claim in behalf of this man, and eventually tried his case against the manufacturer of the specialized grass seed harvesting machinery because of the machine's dangerously defective design. Most of the design deficiencies could have been taken care of by a $2.88 interlock switch, the kind that is used throughout industry and in innumerable consumer products, and indeed elsewhere on the same grass seed harvesting machine.
The trial involved testimony by experts in mechanical engineering, product design, brain injury medicine, physical therapy, life care planning, vocational consulting, economics, farming, and human factors, in addition to numerous witnesses. The jury found that the manufacturer was negligent and that its machine design was defective and unreasonably dangerous. It assessed the employee's losses in the amount of $4,040,000.00. The case is currently on appeal
Construction accident: collapse of canopy framework
Don Corson was the lead liability lawyer on the successful prosecution of multiple cases arising out of the collapse of a large metal canopy at a manufacturing plant that was under construction. Injuries ranged from severe orthopedic injuries to paralysis; three workers were permanently disabled, never to work in the construction field again. The case involved extensive document discovery, analysis of extensive construction plans and documentation on a multi-million dollar project, depositions up and down the west coast, and working with engineers, construction supervision experts, union ironworkers, and others to determine the causes of the failure and the responsibility for the canopy collapse. Prosecution of the claims indicated faulty design and specifications, an overly aggressive building schedule, and failure of safety measures.
Industrial chemical system malfunction: blindness in one eye
This case involved a Lane County, Oregon man who worked at a wood products factory and who suffered loss of sight in one eye. A chemical delivery system malfunctioned, resulting in a toxic chemical spraying the worker's face. Development of the case included taking testimony from key personnel of the supplying chemical company back east. The case settled after depositions.
Wood products mill explosion: death
This case involved a Central Oregon man who worked at a mill in Deschutes County. The man was working on a green dryer that malfunctioned, resulting in an explosion which caused his death. Prosecution of the case included working with industrial and computer engineers to discover the cause of the control system defect that allowed the pressure to build to explosive levels. The case settled after the key engineer for the defendant company admitted in his deposition that the system was not designed in accordance with correct engineering principles.
Permanent Injuries from Industrial Accident
After an injured worker's first attorney died, we were asked to continue the prosecution ofa case for a log truck driver who was injured by a defective "wrapper rack" at an Oregon wood products mill. A wrapper rack is intended to protect drivers from injury from falling logs during the process of unloading log trucks. The rack in this case did not extend evenly against the logs on the truck, allowing a gap between one end of the rack and the logs. The mill lacked instructions about what to do when that happened. Two logs fell, one breaking the driver's leg, the other causing a brachial plexus injury (damage to the nerves through the shoulder), which caused weakness and loss of function in the man's arm and hand. We worked with experts in forest engineering, log truck driving, wood products industry safety training, mechanical and hydraulic engineering, vocational counseling, and rehabilitation medicine to prepare for trial. The case settled for a confidential amount shortly before the trial date after one of our engineering experts was allowed to test the machine, which demonstrated that the rack did not operate as the mill intended.
Other construction and industrial accidents
The attorneys of the Corson & Johnson Law Firm have worked on the prosecution of other construction and industrial accident cases, including injury from a maintenance shop equipment malfunction, death from an aerial lift malfunction in a factory, death from improper construction site management, fatal accident at a road maintenance/construction area, and others.
Benton County • Clackamas County • Coos County • Crook County • Deschutes County • Douglas County • Jackson County • Jefferson County • Josephine County • Klamath County • Lane County • Lincoln County • Linn County • Marion County • Multnomah County • Polk County • Tillamook County • Washington County
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