Workplace Death Caused By Rolling Forklift Reports Austin Injury Lawyer

Austin, TX (Law Firm Newswire) December 16, 2013 – But for a questionable forklift brake, a young Texas man lost his life on-the-job.

“The young man severely injured in an accident with a forklift while on-the-job, clung to life for three days, before succumbing to his injuries. The accident happened at McCoy’s Building Supply Center in Lufkin,” said Brooks Schuelke, an Austin injury lawyer with Perlmutter & Schuelke, LLP. “He was only 19-years-old and was the son of the city’s public works director. He was taken off his ventilator once doctors had determined he sustained unrecoverable brain injuries.”

Just prior to the accident, the young man had been loading sheetrock onto a flatbed truck. He was using a forklift to do so and had dismounted from the lift, setting the emergency brake. For some reason, the brake failed and the man was trapped between the side of the forklift and the truck, pinning him in place. The blunt force impact on his chest caused a heart attack, but emergency medical personnel were able to revive him prior to airlifting him to a trauma hospital in Houston.

“An organ donor, the young man’s death did assist others to obtain a new lease on life,” added Schuelke, “but that would not bring him back.”

There are many unanswered questions arising from this case. The most important one is how did the brake fail? Was the forklift improperly maintained? Was there a mechanical failure? Was the equipment too old to be in use any longer and not considered safe? Was the young man taught proper safety procedures for operating the lift? “An investigation of the accident is likely to reveal the answers to those questions, and those answers may point to negligence on the part of the company. If that is the case, the family may wish to file a wrongful death lawsuit,” Schuelke said.

Most wrongful death lawsuits are about sending messages to the individual or organization deemed negligent in causing someone’s death. While money is involved in terms of asking the court for funds to mitigate a life lost, to allow a family to move forward, it is often far more important for those who file wrongful death lawsuits to make a clear point that what happened to their loved one should never happen to anyone else.

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