Shopper hit during checkout wait yields $1.6 million

From the April 17, 2006 Missouri Lawyers Weekly.

More than small change recovered from falling merchandise
$1.6 million settlement

A Springfield woman with a history of spinal problems received a $1.6 million settlement when one more injury compounded her condition.

On Oct. 6, 2001, Beverly Bottoms and her 9-year-old son were waiting in the checkout line at Staples when a store employee pushing a 30-pound boxed folding table on a dolly stopped behind her to pick up debris from the floor.

While the employee attempted to be tidy, the piece of merchandise he was moving tumbled and fell forward and struck Bottoms in the lower back.

Although feeling the impact from the toppled table, Bottoms initially thought she would be fine. Shortly after the accident, Bottoms development radicular pain in her leg and experienced that pain on occasion during the next two years.

In January 2004, Bottoms had an L4-L5 laminectomy and the following November underwent a fusion of the L4-L5 and S1 vertebra.

In time Bottoms and her physician agreed that the table incident led to her latest injuries, and she decided to seek legal counsel.

“Here in southwest Missouri, people are pretty conservative,” said plaintiff attorney Steve Garner of The Strong-Garner-Bauer in Springfield. “When she first came in to me she said, ‘I just want to make sure my medical bills are paid.’ So I said why don’t we get hold of the [insurance] carrier and see if they will reach an agreement to pay your medical bills that your doctors say are due to this box [falling]. I won’t charge a fee or sue anybody. Well, the carrier wouldn’t do that. Then we made an offer to settle for $300,000 just to make sure she had medical money in case she needed it. They wouldn’t do that. So we sued them.”

Garner said that the insurance company for Staples contended that because Bottoms already suffered from degenerative disk disease and because her previous spinal injuries left her unable to work as a hair stylist, which she had previously been by trade, being hit by a box did not cause her injuries.

Garner called on Dr. Norbert Belz, an occupational medicine specialist, to offer a lesson in physics and calculate the future medical needs of his client.

By re-enacting the situation and taking into consideration the size and weight of the boxed table with the velocity at which it fell, it was shown that Bottoms had been hit by the corner of the 30-pound object as it traveled at a speed of between eight and 15 miles per hour. “The sharp edge of the box gives it a different perspective. It hit her just right,” Garner said.

Garner said that while a 20-year-old athlete might not suffer much from such an incident, the impact means an entirely different thing to a woman in her mid-40s who already was having spinal problems.

“I always try to look at cases and think ‘what are the issues a jury is going to want to know about, and what my cause me problems?” Garner said. “It really puts perspective on it when you’ve got a sharp edge coming into a 44-year-old back at 15 miles per hour. When you hear that, you can understand how it caused damage.”

Type of Action: Personal Injury
Type of Injuries: Herniated and ruptured disk
Court/Case Number/Date: Greene County Circuit Court/104cc4456/Feb. 3, 2006
Caption: Bottoms v. Staples
Judge, Jury or ADR: ADR, mediation
Name of Mediator: Jim Condry
Verdict or Settlement: $1.6 million settlement
Special Damages: $224,000 past medical, $428,000 future medical
Allocation of Fault: N/A
Last Demand: N/A
Last Offer: N/A
Attorney for Plaintiff: Steve Garner, The Strong-Garner-Bauer, Springfield, Mo.
Insurance Carrier: Confidential
Plaintiff’s Experts: Bruno Schmidt, Ph.D. (accident reconstruction) Springfield, Mo.; Larry Cox (economist) Springfield, Mo.; Norbert Belz, M.D. (occupational medicine) Springfield, Mo.; Paul Olive, M.D. (treating physician) Springfield, Mo.; William Campbell, D.O. (treating physician) Nixa, Mo.
Defendants Experts: Michael S. Clarke, M.D. (orthopedics) Springfield, Mo.; Steve Hendler (occupational and rehab medicine specialist) Leawood, Kan.