$27.7 Million Verdict for Offshore Rigger Killed by a Broken Rope, Paid Out at $6.45 Million
After trial: Paid and satisfied. The $27,707,930 verdict of February 2, 2023 was cut by fault allocation and remittitur, the Fifth Circuit affirmed on March 28, 2025 except for the widow's award, which was reduced on remand, and a Satisfaction of Judgment was filed July 1, 2025.
Won by Arnold & Itkin.
Walter Jackson, 48, was a rigger on an offshore platform 65 miles south of Lake Charles. The crew was lowering sections of corroded firewater pipe when the manila rope holding a 131-pound section broke. He was standing in a landing zone nobody had cleared, and it killed him instantly.
What happened
Walter Jackson was 48 and worked as a rigger for the offshore marine contractor DLS. On February 17, 2018 he was on the West Cameron 215A platform, about 65 miles south of Lake Charles in the Gulf of Mexico, operated by Talos ERT.
The crew was cutting corroded firewater pipe into sections and lowering them about forty feet to the main deck. The rope holding a 131-pound section was manila. It broke.
Jackson was standing in what the crew called the landing zone. Nobody had cleared it before the load came down. The pipe struck him in the head and killed him instantly.
The case against Talos was not about the rope alone. It was that Talos, as the platform operator, owed a safe place to work and did not provide one: there was no adequate safety plan, and the landing zone was not cleared before a load was lowered into it. On February 2, 2023 the jury agreed, awarding $20,120,000 to Jackson's young son and $7,587,930 to his widow Vantrece Jackson, and assessing Talos 88 percent at fault with the remaining 12 percent to DLS. None of the fault was assigned to Jackson himself, so there is no comparative-negligence story here.
What happened after the verdict is the part worth reading, because it is the clearest illustration in Louisiana of the distance between a headline and a payment.
The February 2023 final judgment applied the 88 percent allocation, which is arithmetic and not a reduction. In September 2023 the district court granted remittitur and cut the son's general damages from $20 million to $4,360,708.59 and the widow's from $6.6 million to $5,104,226.22. On March 28, 2025 the Fifth Circuit affirmed everything except the remittitur of the widow's general damages, which it vacated and remanded. On remand the district court cut her general damages again, to $1,115,808.70. An amended judgment was entered on June 13, 2025, and a Satisfaction of Judgment was filed on July 1, 2025.
The family ended up with roughly $6.45 million, about 23 percent of the jury's number, and unlike most large verdicts this one is actually paid.
Jackson's son was represented by J. Kyle Findley and John G. Grinnan Jr. of Arnold and Itkin with Michael K. Cox of Cox, Cox, Filo, Camel and Wilson in Lake Charles. His widow was represented by Ryan H. Zehl of Zehl and Associates. The child is not named.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.Warner v. Talos ERT, LLC, 133 F.4th 412 (5th Cir. Mar. 28, 2025), No. 23-30755·Archived copy
- 2.Final Judgment of Feb. 10, 2023 in W.D. La. 2:18-cv-01435, applying the 88 percent fault allocation
- 3.W.D. La. docket 2:18-cv-01435 (Judge James D. Cain Jr.), consolidated with 2:19-cv-00044
- 4.Louisiana Jury Verdict Reporter, February 2023·Archived copy
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