Jury Awards $536,472 to Meatpacking Worker for Hand, Neck and Back Injuries at Nonsubscriber Plant
After trial: The Amarillo Court of Appeals affirmed in March 2001, but the Texas Supreme Court reversed on June 27, 2002, holding there was no evidence Excel's negligence caused the injuries, and rendered a take-nothing judgment. Nothing from the verdict stood.
Won by Fadduol, Cluff, Hardy & Conaway and Fadduol, Glasheen & Valles.
Jimmy Apodaca, a 17-year employee at Excel Corporation's beef-packing plant in Friona, Texas, sued the non-subscribing employer over cumulative trauma injuries to his hand, neck and back. A Lubbock County jury found Excel negligent in August 1999 and awarded $536,472, and the Amarillo Court of Appeals affirmed. The Texas Supreme Court reversed in 2002 for lack of causation evidence and rendered a take-nothing judgment.
What happened
Jimmy Apodaca worked 17 years at Excel Corporation's beef-packing plant in Friona, Texas. For his last three years he ran a cryovac machine. Bags of meat weighing up to forty pounds came down a conveyor, and he bent, grabbed each one, turned, and slid it onto a plate where the machine drew out the air and sealed it. In a typical eight-hour shift he handled a bag about every three seconds.
On April 29, 1995, he filled out an employee statement of injury reporting pain in his hand. He went on to see several doctors about his neck and lower back as well, never returned to work after early May, and eventually had operations on his neck, lower back and wrist. Excel paid for the carpal tunnel treatment until a physician reported in August 1995 that the condition had resolved. The company did not pay for the rest. Doctors disagreed on whether the neck and back problems were work related, but his treating physicians agreed the wrist condition was.
Excel did not carry workers' compensation coverage, which in Texas left it open to an ordinary negligence suit. Apodaca sued for negligence and gross negligence in failing to provide a safe workplace. His lawyers from the Lubbock firm then known as Fadduol, Glasheen & Valles, Kevin Glasheen, Christopher Carver and Jeffrey Cluff, tried the case to a Lubbock County jury in August 1999. The suit had started in federal court in 1996 before landing in state court.
The evidence at trial came largely from Excel's own people and paper. Employees testified that they had asked for a photo eye on the cryovac machine to regulate the flow of bags, and Excel never installed one. OSHA guidelines for meatpacking plants recommended limits on how far operators should reach and bend, and annual symptom surveys to catch cumulative trauma early. Excel ran those surveys in 1991, skipped 1992 through 1994, and brought them back in 1995, after Apodaca was hurt. Its safety and ergonomics coordinator testified that such disorders are reversible when caught early.
The jury found Excel negligent and awarded actual damages of $536,472, including $65,000 for past medical care and $50,000 for future medical care. The trial court entered judgment on the verdict with prejudgment interest. In March 2001 the Amarillo Court of Appeals affirmed over a dissent, rejecting Excel's challenges to a juror, the jury charge and the interest award.
The Texas Supreme Court took the case and, on June 27, 2002, reversed. It agreed the injuries were work related and that the safety evidence showed Excel should have done more, but held there was no evidence that those changes would have prevented Apodaca's injuries or caught them early enough to avoid surgery. It rendered judgment that he take nothing, and rehearing was denied that August.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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