Dallas Crane Accident Attorney

Construction Accident Injury Lawyer Michael Grossman Discusses Dallas-Area Crane Accidents

There always seems to be some sort of construction work ongoing in the Dallas area as the Metroplex undergoes almost constant change. A large portion of construction work involves work on large buildings, and one piece of machinery every construction company needs in order to work on a building is a crane. And, unfortunately, accidents that involve cranes are all too common, and all too severe.

Many accidents of this sort lead to significant injuries and, many times, fatalities. If you have suffered an injury, or lost a loved one due to an accident involving a crane, the Dallas crane accident attorneys with Grossman Law Offices are ready to help.

There are an estimated 125,000 cranes in use in the United States alone. They are needed by construction companies to move the supplies and machinery used to build large buildings such as skyscrapers and sports arenas. When used in conjunction with other kinds of construction equipment, however, cranes can be especially hazardous for both the operator and anyone who may be near the crane as it operates.

Debilitating Injuries and Deaths

Whenever any sort of immense machinery is used, it creates a dangerous working environment where the possibility of death or severe injury is always present. A crane presents an especially dangerous environment; it can drop its payload and crush anyone walking or standing below. It can topple due to high winds or other factors and destroy a building and anyone in or near it. Disabling Dallas crane injuries and deaths can also take place when someone gets caught up in the inner workings of the machine. Cranes can also strike live power lines, immediately electrocuting the operator. When this happens, it’s even more tragic because the death could have been prevented if an electricity-arresting device had been installed. One type of such a device is a non-electricity conducting hook that can be easily placed behind the payload hook of a crane.

Who is to Blame for the Accident?

If you have been hurt or you have lost a family member due to a crane accident, multiple parties may share the blame. The most obvious one, of course, is the construction company. If that company can be proven to have, in any way, failed to provide a safe working environment, that company could be held liable in a workers’ compensation case. But another party may have to face responsibility as well. The individual or entity that owns the property on which the accident took place could be liable for leaving debris or equipment in the crane’s path, and that could have led to the accident. If someone else’s negligence caused the accident, the Dallas crane accident lawyers with Grossman Law Offices know how to take legal action against those responsible, and help guide you through the intricacies and complexities of such litigation.

Taking Legal Action Against the Employer

Crane operation is, as has been previously stated, a very dangerous profession. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, also known as OSHA, has enacted a rigid set of guidelines that regulate crane operation on a construction site. Some of them include:

• The construction company has to follow all guidelines the manufacturer has established regarding the crane’s safe operation.
• Load capacity and safety warnings must clearly be visible to the crane operator.
• The company must make sure a detailed safety check of the crane is performed by an inspector before the crane is operated. Any defects – particularly any broken parts – must be repaired or replaced prior to the crane being allowed to operate.
• Crane operation must occur a safe distance from any nearby overhanging power lines. The construction company has to make sure this occurs. If there is no way to avoid having the crane operate in the vicinity of a power line, the construction company has to make sure the line is not live.

Should the construction company fail to comply with any of those regulations, and a Dallas crane accident injury or death occurs as a result, the victim or victim’s family can attempt to obtain restitution. But the manner in which you pursue restitution will depend on whether or not that construction company has purchased workers’ compensation insurance. If that is the case, the company is referred to as a workers’ comp “subscriber.” If not, the company is a “non-subscriber.” It is vital that you completely understand the difference, because that difference will determine what kind of legal action you will undertake.

Companies in Texas are strongly urged – but NOT required – to subscribe to workers’ comp insurance. Even a company in a dangerous profession like construction is not required to subscribe. Workers’ comp insurance is extremely expensive, so many companies choose not to purchase it. Sometimes, however, unscrupulous employers will attempt to claim they are subscribers in an attempt to avoid having to deal with a lawsuit should an injury or death occur in a workplace accident. Never take the word of an employer that it is a subscriber. You will see throughout this article that there are many, many reasons you need the help of a Dallas crane accident attorney should you or your family be affected by a crane accident. You need the experience of a professional who is intimately familiar with the process of exposing the lies some companies will spew to avoid responsibility for an accident. The attorneys with Grossman Law Offices can not only spell out clearly all of your legal options and determine the proper course of legal action, they can get to the truth.

Companies that Subscribe to Workers’ Comp

Subscribers buy more than just insurance; they also buy lawsuit protection. If a crane accident results in an injury or death, that alone cannot be grounds for a suit against a subscriber. The victim, or plaintiff, must establish that the company is guilty of committing gross negligence. The plaintiff must bear the burden of proof, and, as you will find out later, it can be a very difficult burden to bear.

Returning to the term “gross negligence,” it is much more difficult to prove than “standard” negligence. Gross negligence occurs when an entity habitually fails to provide safe working conditions. An example is an employer that continually ignores OSHA requirements regarding the operation of a crane near a power line. If the employer has a repeated pattern of inadequate safety measures, it can be labeled grossly negligent. Another example of gross negligence is a company continually using a crane with a faulty part. However, “standard” negligence is a worker’s temporary lack of attention or focus, or an isolated error, which results in an accident. You cannot file a lawsuit against a subscriber for standard negligence because that is covered under workers’ comp insurance.

But even if you can successfully prove that gross negligence led to the accident, that is no guarantee that you will obtain just compensation. The insurance business is, by its nature, cold and harsh. Insurance companies aren’t exactly the most compassionate on earth. They are not in the business of helping injury victims or family members of an accident fatality get through an incredibly difficult time. They won’t agree, out of compassion, to reimburse accident victims for medical and other expenses. All they care about is protecting their profit margin, and they’ll do whatever is necessary to protect it. If that requires soiling the memory of your loved one, or making you out to be an inept employee, they’ll try to do it. Should they feel the only way to goad you into accepting an unfair settlement is by sending an operative to your family member’s funeral, they’ll do it. They will stop at almost nothing to ensure you or your family are unable to get the fair restitution you deserve.

That sounds harsh, and it is. It’s also reality. And it happens way too often in Dallas crane accident injury cases, and similar cases throughout Texas. There are thousands of victims who are denied justice every year. Workers’ compensation insurance was created to lessen the burden on an over-worked justice system by eliminating most workplace-related injury lawsuits. The only way accident victims and their families can get the compensation they deserve, however, is often through a lawsuit. If that is the case, victims need a seasoned and skilled Dallas crane accident lawyer on their side to protect their rights.

You need to be a well prepared as possible when it comes time to initiate legal action, because you’ll have to deal with a lot of tricks from both employers and their insurance providers. A team of highly skilled and very competitive lawyers will be retained by the opposition, and they will obviously be highly motivated to win the case. First, they will try and convince you to accept a settlement offer so laughably inadequate it won’t come anywhere close to compensating you for all you’ve experienced due to the crane accident. Should the case go to trial, they will do whatever they can to prove that it was the negligence of you or your loved one that led to the accident. Again, all of this will be done to shield the insurance company’s profit margin. It is incredibly vital that you have an experienced Dallas crane accident lawyer by your side to work for justice, and to protect your reputation or the memory of your loved one. The lawyers with Grossman Law Offices have two decades of experience combating the questionable tactics employed by insurance companies.

Suing a Subscriber to Workers’ Comp

As we stated previously, there are times you can sue an employer or third party even if it subscribes to workers’ comp. The key, once again, is to establish the responsible party’s gross negligence. Here is a more detailed explanation of when a plaintiff can pursue this kind of lawsuit against a subscribing company.

• If gross negligence can be proven, then a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit can be filed. We had one extremely troubling case when we were hired by the family of an employee who perished in a crane accident after his employer directed him to work on the crane even though his safety harness was faulty. After the accident that led to the man’s death occurred, the employer raced to the nearest equipment supply store to purchase a new harness. He then placed the harness on the corpse in an effort to cover up the company’s brazen safety violation. That employer paid dearly after a Grossman Law Offices attorney exposed the disgusting attempt at a cover-up.
• There could be an instance where an injury or death occurs due to the negligence of a third party. A property owner, for example, may have been responsible for creating a hazardous workplace. The crane’s manufacturer could have been responsible by building defective equipment. There could be other employees or contractors with the construction company who exhibited gross negligence. Should any of the above be the case, then a plaintiff can sue one of those third parties even if he or she cannot sue the employer. This is, again, a reason to have a seasoned lawyer working for you – someone who is intimately familiar with planning a rock-solid strategy. Someone who knows all the complexities involved with this kind of litigation, and how to bring those responsible to justice. There is also the chance that both the subscribing employer and a third party committed negligence in causing the accident. If this is the case, plaintiffs might be able to seek restitution through a workers’ comp claim against the employer as well as a personal injury or wrongful death suit against the other responsible party or parties.

Non-Subscribers to Workers’ Comp

It is an extremely risky proposition for a company to decide not to purchase workers’ compensation insurance. As stated before, the State of Texas strongly urges all companies to buy workers’ comp. And it punishes those that don’t by making it much easier for accident victims or their families to sue non-subscribers. Those companies that choose to take the gamble and not subscribe face an unbelievable amount of financial damage and a whole slew of litigation. If a non-subscriber loses a personal injury or wrongful death case, the resulting financial hit could cripple the company forever. However, that doesn’t mean you’ll automatically get a huge pile of money just because you’re suing a non-subscriber and you have a slam-dunk case. You will still need the experience of a Dallas crane accident lawyer to make sure you get the compensation that’s coming to you.

Sole Proximate Cause

This defense – which is really the only true one a non-subscriber has – usually results in a case taking a personal and ugly turn. The employer is basically saying that the victim was 100 percent to blame for the accident; that he or she was a habitually incompetent person and such an accident was eventually going to take place. No one else was to blame in any way, shape or form.

This is a pretty desperate attempt at avoiding responsibility, but again, a non-subscriber’s options are so limited they basically have no other choice but to impugn the worker’s reputation. This is the essence of punishment for non-subscribers. The downside for the plaintiff, however, is the tarnishing of the injury victim’s reputation or that of the deceased.

And just because the non-subscriber didn’t see fit to spring for workers’ comp insurance, don’t assume it will scrimp on a defense as well. The opposite will likely be the truth; that company will probably shell out some big money to a high-powered defense team. You might think you’ll have an easy time winning your case, but you won’t. You need a strong team on your side as well to have the best chance possible of protect your or your family member’s reputation and getting fair compensation.

Defeating the Non-Subscriber’s Second Defense

The only other way a non-subscriber can even hope to successfully defend a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit is by proving the accident victim was not a “true” employee, but rather a contractor. In Texas, contractors are solely responsible for their own workplace safety. The company hiring him or her is not required to provide a safe working environment. More than likely, the company will say that since the worker was not an employee, the company should bear no responsibility for his or her injury or death.

However, just because a company claims no employer/employee relationship existed, that doesn’t mean the court will agree. Even if the company claims otherwise, the court will often times decree that the worker was an employee. The attorneys with Grossman Law Offices are very experienced at establishing the existence of the employer/employee relationship. There are several standards that establish the existence of such a relationship, and they include:

• The employer taking taxes or withholding Social Security from the worker’s paycheck.
• The existence of tools and other necessary equipment – provided by the employer – for the worker to perform his or her job requirements.
• The establishment of a specific work schedule on the part of the employer; for example, the employer telling the worker when to show up for work, how many breaks he or she could take during the work day, and when the work day was over.
• The employer inspected and supervised work performed by the worker on a regular basis.
• Either the injured or deceased worker signs something that basically reduced his or her rights. He or she, for example, signed a form stating that he or she read and understood an employee handbook, or he or she submitted to a company drug test.
• The company hired the worker not just for a single job, but instead for an undetermined period of time.
• The company paid the worker with either a salary or hourly wage instead of being paid per job.

How We Can Help You

We have mentioned several times in this article that you have to enlist the services of a skilled and seasoned Dallas crane accident attorney in order for you to have a chance to win your personal injury or wrongful death case. Inexperienced lawyers, or those with no legal background, can easily be overwhelmed by all the complexities surrounding this litigation, even if it seems on the surface that a case will be easy to win. It’s just not realistic to think you can get all the knowledge you need through a Google search. Take that attitude and you’ll be doomed to leave the courtroom with nothing.

The employer and the insurance company will be well armed – you need to be just as well armed. Experienced lawyers can determine all responsible parties, and make them pay for the accident that has upended your life. The Dallas crane accident lawyers with Grossman Law Offices have 20 years of experience successfully litigating cases, and have won millions and millions of dollars in compensation for thousands of families. We have the experience, tenacity and resources necessary to successfully pursue litigation regardless of how many defendants there are. We know OSHA guidelines and requirements front and back, and we have a group of expert witnesses who know all about workplace safety and the safe operation of large equipment; these experts can make an even more compelling argument on your behalf and sway a judge or jury to rule in your favor. For a confidential and free consultation regarding the circumstances of your case, call us as soon as you can at 1-855-326-0000 (toll free). If you believe we would be a good fit for you and you hire us, we will immediately act to make sure all parties responsible for your accident are held accountable, and you or your family get the fair restitution you have coming.