$900,000.00 for Fingers Cut by Table Saw and Reattached

Justice is slow but it comes. On February 29, 2000, Bosco, Bisignano & Mascolo's client, Joe, an experienced mechanic, cut four fingers of his left hand severing two of them when plexiglass being cut on a table circular saw kicked back. There was no anti-kickback safety device on the saw.

The trial began on Monday, May 14, 2007 with the selection of a jury and ended with a $900,000.00 settlement on Wednesday, May 23, 2007.

The long delay between the happening of the accident and the trial was due to the insolvency of an insurance company involved in the case.

Joe was working to install air conditioners at McKee High School in Staten Island. The construction work required that a frame be built and bolted to the existing windows. The air conditioners would slide into a sleeve that was attached to the frame. Plexiglass was needed for the gaps in the frame to keep the weather out of the schools. While ripping plexiglass on a table circular saw, the plexiglass kicked back and cut four fingers on the left hand severing two almost completely. The two almost completely detached fingers were re-attached at Staten Island University Hospital under local anesthesia. The trial began on May 14, 2007.

In New York State, an employee is barred from suing his employer if the employer is covered by Workers Compensation Insurance. Joe had told Bosco, Bisignano and Mascolo that his employer did not supply him with a anti-kick device for his company's table circular saw. Other lawyers had turned the case away, but Bosco, Bisignano & Mascolo, Esqs. were familiar with the New York State Labor Law which requires the owners of a construction site to make sure that table circular saws used on their property are equiped with an anti-kickback device. The case was brought against the City of New York as owner of McKee and the Board of Education of the City of New York as an agent of the owner. It was a tough case. Most saw cases are lost by plaintiffs. The case became tougher when the attorney for the Defendants produced at trial an owner of Joe's employer who testified under oath that they did not own the table circular saw but Joe did and that Joe made a statement giving a different version of the facts. On Monday 21 May 2007, the jury returned a verdict of 50% liability against the defendants and 50% against Joe. The jury reasoned that the Defendant's failed to supply the safety device for the table circular saw and Joe used the table circular saw without it so they both were equally responsible. One juror dissented.

It is important for potential jurors to realize that the assignment of percentages of fault - in this case 50% to Joe - affects the damages trial which on Staten Island comes after the liability trial. Whatever a jury awards as compensation in a damages trial is now reduced by the percentage of fault. In other words, for us to get $900,000.00 we would now have to get a verdict for one point eight million ($1,800,000.00) dollars. Nine hundred thousand ($900,000.00) was a lot of money especially for someone who had put his head into the mouth of a lion so to speak (he used a saw missing a safeguard) so accordingly, in consultation with the client, his wife and ourselves, it was decided to resolve the case rather than take a damages verdict.

The case was tried before the Honorable Joseph Maltese at the Home Port.