A Pulaski County jury has ordered Union Pacific Corp. to pay a former engineer $2 million for "severe, painful and disabling" injuries he suffered in a March 2013 train crash.
Nine of the 12 jurors sided with 51-year-old Johnnie Ray Walker of Little Rock on Thursday to end a six-day jury trial before Circuit Judge Tim Fox.
Union Pacific had admitted its liability for compensatory damages to Walker, leaving the question up to the jury of how much he should be paid. Walker had requested $15 million in damages.
Jurors were asked to decide on an amount that would reasonably and fairly compensate Walker for his injuries. To reach that total, jurors were instructed to balance the nature and extent of his injuries against the cost of medical treatment, with consideration for the value of lost earnings, past and future, along with his pain and suffering.
Walker was represented by Little Rock attorneys Phillip Duncan, Richard Quintus, Justin Zachary, Rob Pointer and Timothy Reed of the Duncan Law Firm. He also had lawyers from Missouri.
According to the lawsuit, Walker was an engineer who had stopped his locomotive to wait for three northbound Union Pacific trains to cross ahead of him at a junction near McRae in White County on March 23, 2013.
The final locomotive, traveling 50 to 60 mph, derailed, with a container car and parts of other cars it was pulling striking Walker's locomotive. The force of the impact threw Walker out of his seat against the locomotive's steel electrical cabinet and then onto the floor, injuring his head, neck, back and limbs. Union Pacific later said a broken rail caused the derailment.
The lawsuit, filed in January 2014, states that Walker suffered debilitating injuries that turned him from a "strong able-bodied man" earning wages and benefits of about $10,000 a month into a man left permanently weakened and impaired. He's also had to undergo spinal surgery and has continued to undergo medical treatment, court filings state.
Union Pacific was represented by attorneys James Baker and Jamie Huffman Jones of the Friday, Eldredge & Clark firm in Little Rock.
A newspaper account of the derailment said the accident caused delays in Amtrak travel between St. Louis and Little Rock.
Metro on 01/14/2017