Longshoreman Who Lost His Leg to a Haphazard Barge Stow Wins $1.72 Million Judgment Against Stevedore

On December 14, 1987, Ray Couch III was unloading steel from a barge at the dock in Peoria, Illinois, when a bundle of steel billets weighing between one and a half and four tons fell and crushed his left leg. He was a 27-year-old longshoreman for Central Illinois Dock Company, with three months on the job. Before the injury he had been a black belt in karate and an amateur boxer who hoped to turn professional.

The steel had been loaded months earlier in New Orleans by James J. Flanagan Shipping Corporation, doing business as New Orleans Stevedoring Company. Photographs taken by an independent marine surveyor showed the contrast. In the New Orleans wharf shed, the steel sat in neat tiers with wood dunnage between the layers. In the barge bound for Peoria, it had been dumped in irregular piles, some dropped at an angle that left no walking surface, with dunnage used as a bridge under the weight rather than as a separator. The owner of the Peoria stevedoring company, who had thirty years of experience on the Illinois River, called it one of the worst barge loads he had ever seen.

Couch and a co-worker spent about twenty-one hours working the cargo out with pry bars and choker chains. When only eight bundles remained, leaning against the bow, one of them let go. Five surgeries failed to save the leg, and doctors amputated it above the knee. By the time of trial he had undergone fourteen operations, including revision of the stump. He wears a prosthesis that needs regular maintenance and replacement parts, lives with severe ghost pain in the missing leg, and has back and knee pain from the strain of compensating. At his own initiative and expense he trained as a diesel mechanic and returned to work for the same employer in December 1992.

Couch sued in federal court in Illinois. The case was transferred to the Eastern District of Louisiana, where the claims against the barge owner and the cargo owner were dismissed before trial and the case went to a bench trial against the loading stevedore alone. Morton H. Katz and T. Daniel Pick of Herman, Herman, Katz & Cotlar represented Couch. The district court found the stevedore negligent and held that Couch's employer was not at fault.

The court entered judgment for $1,722,640: $134,225 for past medical and prosthesis expenses, $150,000 for future medical and prosthesis expenses, $88,415 for past lost wages, $200,000 for lost future earning capacity, and $1,150,000 for pain and suffering, disability, impairment and mental anguish.

The stevedore appealed, arguing that it owed a discharging longshoreman only the limited duties a shipowner owes under Scindia Steam Navigation Co. v. De Los Santos. The Fifth Circuit disagreed. It held that a loading stevedore must stow cargo so that an expert, experienced stevedore can discharge it safely with reasonable care, found that the drop stow failed that test, and upheld the findings on negligence and on the damages for pain and suffering and future wages. The only part sent back was prejudgment interest on the portion of the pain and suffering award that compensated future suffering.