$2 Million Recovery in Lancaster County for Injured Industrial Worker

Galfand Berger’s 28-year-old client was operating a cable unwinding machine, known as a “payoff machine,” when a bolt attached to the unguarded and rapidly rotating arm of the machine caught his shorts and pulled his leg into the path of the machine’s metal bar. What initially seemed to be a deep laceration developed into debilitating complex regional pain syndrome.

Galfand Berger attorneys Debra Jensen and Bradley Smith filed suit against the manufacturer of the payoff machine, arguing that it should have provided guarding to prevent operators from being exposed to rotating parts. Debra and Bradley proved the payoff machine was defective by showing that their client’s employer designed a suitable guard for the machine after the accident, which the manufacturer could have done. They also discovered that the manufacturer provided a safer and better guarded version of the machine to European customers. To its U.S. customers, that additional guarding was optional. Safety should never be an option—workers’ lives are too important.