Diamond Generating Corporation Found Responsible for the Death of an Employee Resulting in a $150 Million Verdict
J. Jude Basile of the The Basile Law Firm Basile was lead trial counsel.
A jury in Palm Springs Superior Court PS2, has returned a wrongful death verdict of $150 million dollars against Diamond Generating Corporation (DGC), a wholly owned subsidiary of Mitsubishi Corporation.
The jury found Diamond Generating Corporation 97% responsible for the death of Daniel Collins age 47. The death occurred on March 6, 2017 when an explosion occurred as Daniel Collins was removing a lid from a high pressure natural gas line at the Sentinel Energy Center located just outside of Palm Springs.
The jury found Diamond Generating Corporation failed to exercise reasonable care in providing safety at the plant. Evidence presented numerous safety violations at the plant that occurred over 3 years before the explosion, including failure to properly supervise plant management, providing dangerous safety procedures without proper training of workers and ignoring a similar incident 4 years before the explosion that killed Collins. Diamond Generating Corporation was the parent company of their wholly owned subsidiary that Diamond Generating corporation claimed was responsible for safety at the plant. Evidence showed the plant management reported directly to DGC executives including review of plant safety procedures, annual reviews of the plant manager’s safety performance. DGC gave the plant manager bonuses and raises each year along with high marks for safety inspite of the numerous safety violations.
The jury found past non economic damages for Collins wife in the amount of 5 million dollars for the past 5 years and 54 million for the future 27 years of the loss of her husband. Daniel Collins life expectancy was 32 years based on actuarial tables. Daniel Collins son was found to have damages of 10 million past and 81 million future. The total verdict was 150 million dollars with 97% attributed to negligence of DGC, 2% to the subsidiary of DGC and 1% to Collins.
