A Denver jury properly awarded $18 million in punitive damages to Xcel transmission lineman Andrew Blood who sued Qwest after he was paralyzed when a Qwest telephone pole he was on broke from internal rot, the Colorado Supreme Court said today.
The Supreme Court said that Qwest’s failure to implement a periodic pole inspection program during the 46 years prior to Blood’s accident was “willful and wanton.”
It said that the failure to implement the pole inspection program was “sufficiently reprehensible” to justify an punitive damage award.
And the court concluded that the $18 million award is within a “constitutionally permissible range” which is not “grossly excessive.”
“The circumstances surrounding the accident are tragic and our sympathies are with Mr. Blood,” said Mark Molzen, spokesperson for CenturyLink, formerly Qwest. “We are currently reviewing the opinion from the Colorado Supreme Court. At this time, we cannot comment further.”
According to testimony in Blood’s trial, on June 29, 2004, Blood was on the pole taking down wooden cross-arms as part of the effort to remove the pole.
With just five minutes of work left, the rotting pole broke six inches below the ground, dropping Blood about 25 feet. The fall fractured his spine and immediately paralyzed the then 24-year-old from the waist down.
The Supreme Court said there was extensive evidence that a periodic pole inspection program would have detected the pole’s internal rot.
In 1960, Qwest and Xcel entered a “joint utility contract” that allowed Xcel to use Qwest’s poles.
The joint utility contract mentioned a manual which recommended that the first inspection of a wooden pole be conducted 24 years after the pole is installed, followed by periodic inspections every 12 years.
The justices said that had the inspections been conducted the rot would have been detected.
However, the opinion said that Qwest “possessed no evidence” showing that it had ever inspected the pole Blood was on when it collapsed. The pole had been placed 46 years earlier.
Even at the start of Blood’s 2007 trial in Denver, Qwest still had not implemented a periodic pole inspection program, said the justices.
Qwest, in turn, said it relied on pre-climb inspections by linemen to detect internal rot. Qwest said it would replace the poles that linemen found unsafe.
Prior to climbing the pole, said the opinion, Blood visually inspected the pole and determined it was “well-placed” in the ground. He also struck it numerous times with a heavy hammer to detect internal rot.
He believed the pole was solid enough to climb, a belief shared by other experienced Xcel linemen on the scene, said the high court.
The court said that Blood’s injury was not a “mere accident” as Qwest claimed.
Rather, said the justices, the trial transcript showed that Qwest failed to implement a periodic pole inspection program, choosing instead to discontinue immediately a pilot inspection program after only three weeks.
“It was therefore inevitable that a pole would develop internal decay below ground and collapse under the weight of an unsuspecting linemen – the circumstances of Blood’s accident,” said the ruling.
The court also said that the $21 million awarded Blood for compensatory damage was justified as was the jury’s award of $9,917,600 for economic loss.
Blood was also awarded $10 million for physical impairment and disfigurement, and $750,000 for loss of consortium.
Total damages awarded were $39.6 million. It is believed to be the single largest personal-injury judgment ever awarded in Colorado, according to Blood’s lawyers.
Of that, $18 million was awarded in punitives damages.
Compensatory damages were $21,667,600 — $10,000,000 for physical impairment and disfigurement; $750,000 for loss of consortium; $1,000,000 in non-economic damages; $9,917,600 in economic damages.
Today’s ruling focused primarily on whether the $18 million in punitive damages was proper.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com.
