Legionnaires’ Disease:
Claims and Compensation

In January 2010, Gail Stevens of Bennington, Vermont successfully sued the Cortina Inn in Mendon, Vt. and was awarded approximately $490,000 by the Bennington County Superior Court. Lawyers for Ms. Stevens were able to prove that she contracted Legionnaires’ disease while staying at the Inn in March 2008, after it was ascertained that the Inn’s water tested positive for the Legionella bacterium.

Judge John Wesley granted Stevens’ request for about $42,000 in compensation for medical bills that were caused by Legionnaires’ disease, and after about an hour of deliberation, the jury awarded Stevens an additional $450,000 in damages for pain and suffering, and loss of enjoyment of life.

The irony in this case is that the Inn’s owners had already declared bankruptcy two years before Stevens received her judgment, so collecting the award was never going to be a strong probability.

Marilea Navis had worked for Premium Standard Farms, since 1996. In February 2002, she was given the job of power washing the walls, ceilings, pens, rooms and concrete hallways where the company’s sows and piglets roamed. Her last day of work was in April of that year, after which she was diagnosed with Legionnaire’s disease. She spent two weeks in a coma and six more, unconscious, while in a hospital in Des Moines, Iowa.

In May 2002, her claim against her employer and its insurer, the Travelers Indemnity Co., was heard before an administrative law judge (ALJ). The judge determined that Navis was exposed to the Legionella bacteria while operating the power sprayer and ordered Premium Standard Farms, Inc., to reimburse her $63,357.43. The ALJ also ordered the company’s insurer to pay Navis $290.25 per week, commencing 200 weeks after September 6, 2002, for the rest of her life, as well as the costs for any future necessary and reasonable medical treatment. The defendants subsequently lost their appeal of the ALJ’s decision.

In August 2012, Dr. Luis Acevedo Muro, an 80 year-old physician, died of Legionnaires’ disease two weeks after staying at a five-star, JW Marriott hotel in Chicago. The wrongful death suit, initiated by his estate, claimed that Acevedo died after inhaling aerosolized water from a hotel fountain that was contaminated with Legionella bacteria.

Lawyers for the decedent’s widow claimed that the hotel failed to implement control measures that would have detected the bacteria in the fountain, maintain appropriate water temperatures and biocide levels, remove the bacteria, or notify hotel guests of the bacteria’s presence. Several dozen other guests were also infected, and the hotel initiated remediation procedures to remove the Legionella bacteria.

After unsuccessful attempts to settle the case via mediation, it went to trial in April 2014. A federal jury was asked to return a verdict of $12 million, but subsequently awarded Acevedo’s 83 year-old widow nearly $2.3 million for the loss of her husband.

Rodney Handley and Emanuel Howard were two workers contracted to help clean up tornado damage in the town of Heflin, Alabama, in May 2008. The pair stayed at the Wingate Inn in Oxford, and used the hotel’s hot tub, which was located in the public area near the swimming pool. Within two weeks, both men became ill and subsequently were diagnosed with Legionnaires’ disease.

Both men suffered long-term health consequences requiring extensive medical intervention and their associated expenses. While they both sought and received workers’ compensation benefits, they also initiated separate lawsuits against Wingate Inns and the manager of the hotel, Manju Purohit.

In their suits, the plaintiffs claimed negligence in the maintenance of the hot tub and accused Purohit of hiring a maintenance man who had no training on proper spa maintenance. The two lawsuits were consolidated before trial. Handley died before the trial and his estate replaced him as plaintiff.

After less than an hour of deliberation, a jury in Calhoun County, Alabama returned a verdict of $1,500,000 in compensatory damages for Handley’s estate and the same amount for Howard. It also awarded each plaintiff $750,000 in punitive awards, for a total $4,500,000 verdict.

The plaintiff’s attorney suggested that one reason that the verdict came in so quickly and the amount awarded was so high, was because the jury was angered by the hotel’s disregard for proper procedure. Even though it was told to close the hot tub so that the Alabama Department of Public Health could test the water for Legionella bacteria after the two men became ill, the hotel proceeded to clean and disinfect it instead, thereby destroying any potential evidence. It was also alleged that the hotel had falsified some maintenance records.