Williams v. BNSF Ry. Co.

• Decision Date: 23 January 2015
• Docket Number: No. 117444.,117444.
• Citation: 25 N.E.3d 646
• Parties: Anthony WILLIAMS, Appellee, v. BNSF RAILWAY COMPANY, d/b/a The Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Company, Appellant.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

25 N.E.3d 646

Anthony WILLIAMS, Appellee

v.BNSF RAILWAY COMPANY, d/b/a The Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Company, Appellant.

No. 117444.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Jan. 23, 2015.

Raymond H. Groble III, Sean M. Sullivan and Jeffrey J. Scolaro, of Daley Mohan Groble, P.C., of Chicago, for appellant.

James D. Montgomery, Jr., and John K. Kennedy, of James D. Montgomery & Associates, Ltd., of Chicago, for appellee Anthony Williams.

James A. Fletcher and Peter C. McLeod, of Fletcher & Sippel LLC, of Chicago, for appellee Quality Terminal Services, LLC.

OPINION

Justice THOMAS

delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

¶ 1 Plaintiff, Anthony Williams, filed suit against his employer, defendant BNSF Railway Company (BNSF), pursuant to the Federal Employers' Liability Act (45 U.S.C. § 51 (2006)

), alleging an employment related injury. BNSF filed a third-party complaint for contribution and contractual indemnity against third-party defendant Quality Terminal Services (QTS). A jury rendered a verdict in favor of plaintiff, finding that plaintiff's injuries resulted from his employment. However, the jury assessed 50% of the fault to plaintiff, 37.5% to BNSF, and 12.5% to QTS. The jury also rendered a verdict in favor of QTS on BNSF's claim for contractual indemnity, finding that BNSF's notice of claim was untimely, so that QTS did not owe indemnification to BNSF.

¶ 2 BNSF and QTS filed timely posttrial motions. The circuit court of Cook County denied the posttrial motions, and BNSF filed a notice of appeal. The appellate court dismissed BNSF's appeal for lack of jurisdiction, finding that the notice of appeal was untimely. 2013 IL App (1st) 121901

. The appellate court thereafter denied BNSF's motion to supplement the record on appeal, as well as BNSF's petition for rehearing. This court granted BNSF's petition for leave to appeal. Ill. S.Ct. R. 315 (eff. July 1, 2013).

¶ 3 BACKGROUND

¶ 4 BNSF owns and operates an intermodal rail facility, which handles receipt and shipment of freight in containers that are in, and on, specially designed railcars. Crane operators operate the overhead cranes that lift freight containers on and off train cars or truck chassis. The crane operator is generally assisted by a second person, the crane director. Crane directors perform a variety of job duties, including locking and unlocking freight containers for movement by rail or truck, and also provide assistance to the crane operators with some of the crane operations. The crane operator and the crane director are BNSF employees.

¶ 5 At the time of the accident at issue in this case, QTS provided certain intermodal services to BNSF pursuant to an Intermodal Facility Services Agreement. Pursuant to that contract, QTS provided ramp managers. Ramp managers gave BNSF crane operators and crane directors their assignments to perform their work, and generally supervised them during their shifts.

¶ 6 On August 21, 2003, QTS employee Frank Stephenson assigned plaintiff and crane director Bonnie Daemon to load and unload a train. Following their lunch break, Stephenson directed plaintiff to return to work alone, without crane director Daemon. Stephenson drove plaintiff to the job site and told plaintiff that he did not need a ground person. Plaintiff was directed to perform a series of “flips,” which involves the use of a crane to lift a freight container from the ground and to place it on a chassis.

¶ 7 Plaintiff flipped all the containers to the waiting chassis. After performing the flips in his capacity as a crane operator, plaintiff proceeded to perform the job duties of crane director, locking the front and rear locking mechanisms of all the loaded chassis, which locks the container to the chassis. Plaintiff testified that when he came to the last unit, he locked the rear locks and then attempted to lock the front locking pins. Plaintiff was able to lock the right front locking pin without any problem, but could only insert the left front pin in partway. Plaintiff then used the square end of an iron bar, referred to as a “five-iron,” to tap the pin into place. When the pin still would not go in all the way, plaintiff swung the five-iron in a baseball swing motion in order to hit the pin and knock it into place. Plaintiff testified that he felt a “pop” in his lower back as soon as the five-iron hit the pin.

¶ 8 Plaintiff radioed Stephenson and told Stephenson he had been hurt. Plaintiff was taken to the hospital. Medical testimony at trial indicated that plaintiff is permanently disabled.

¶ 9 Plaintiff filed suit against BNSF on August 10, 2006. Kevin Bell, a BNSF claims representative, testified at trial that BNSF did not assert an indemnity claim against QTS when it received plaintiff's complaint because the complaint did not mention QTS at all, and the allegations of the complaint primarily addressed equipment failure. Bell testified that the first time plaintiff told anyone from BNSF that Stephenson had ordered him to work alone was at plaintiff's May 2007, discovery deposition. Following plaintiff's testimony at his discovery deposition, BNSF provided written notice to QTS on August 9, 2007, of its intent to seek indemnification under its contract with QTS. QTS did not accept BNSF's demand for indemnity and defense, so BNSF filed a third-party complaint against QTS for contribution and indemnity on August 26, 2008.

¶ 10 As noted, following a jury trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff and awarded total damages in the amount of $2,676,960. After reducing the amount of damages based upon plaintiff's 50% comparative negligence, plaintiff was awarded $1,338,480. The jury found in favor of BNSF on its contribution claim against QTS. QTS was assessed 12.5% at fault for plaintiff's injury, for a total of $334,620. The jury found in favor of QTS on BNSF's indemnification claim.

¶ 11 BNSF filed a timely posttrial motion. BNSF's motion raised 46 assignments of error. BNSF sought a new trial on all issues, judgment as a matter of law on the indemnification claim, remittitur for a disability annuity plaintiff was receiving, and a setoff for future taxes BNSF would owe.

¶ 12 A hearing on the posttrial motions was held on April 18, 2012. Following argument, the trial court stated:

“Thank you so much. I've had occasion to read all of the briefs that were presented to me and to hear oral argument of counsel. The post-trial motions that have been filed are respectfully denied, with the exception of the taxation issue which I will take under advisement. I will issue an order on that probably within the next ten days or so and my clerk will let you know when that's ready for pickup.”

No written order was entered or prepared following the trial court's April 18 ruling.

¶ 13 On May 31, 2012, BNSF filed an emergency motion for leave to cite supplemental authority relating to a claim raised in its posttrial motion that it was entitled to a remittitur for the amount of disability payments received by plaintiff. At a June 1, 2012, hearing on BNSF's emergency motion, the following exchange took place:

“THE COURT: * * * And let me just recap because your motion seems to indicate, Mr. Scolaro [BNSF's counsel] that I've taken under advisement the entire post-trial motion. Were you unclear on some of my rulings?

MR. SCOLARO: No. Your Honor, in advance of the written ruling that was forthcoming and the final appealable written ruling on all issues we wanted to submit for the Court's consideration what we believe is a case that was kind of, that was on point with certain issues in the post-trial motion, in BNSF's post-trial motion. * * *

THE COURT: I don't have the benefit of the transcript, and I know I was on trial the last time you came. I was very engaged in something that was going on. You have the transcript?

MR. MONTGOMERY [plaintiff's counsel]: I do, [Y]our Honor.

THE COURT: Okay. What did I say?

MR. MONTGOMERY: If you turn to Page 21, there was no plan to file a written ruling. The ruling was the ruling. We could have chosen as lawyers to put it in an order.

* * *

THE COURT: Okay. This was my memory, that I had denied the post-trial relief with the exception of the taxation issue which I thought I'd take under advisement. And on that I hoped to get a written ruling; but if not, I will give you a cohesive ruling from the bench that I can cite some case law for you that I'm using. And, quite frankly, I just want to wrap my mind around the argument that you have. Why don't you review for me what's going—I think your argument is that the jury gave an award of lost wages.”

¶ 14 Later, in discussing the case that BNSF sought leave to cite as additional authority, the following exchange took place:

“MR. MONTGOMERY: It doesn't impact our case. I don't think counsel has any right at this stage after more than 30 days has [sic ] passed to seek reconsideration of your prior ruling on the 18th. I think after 30 days your order is your order.

THE COURT: Well, to whatever effect that may have any consequences with taxation I do want to look at that, and, you know, just to be very candid with you I want to be aware of all the case law out there so I'm not just putting a big block of case law out there. Just bringing it to my attention I think is appropriate.

I do believe my ruling was that that portion of the post-trial motion was denied.

Now, there was the separate issue of taxation * * *.”

At the conclusion of the argument on BNSF's motion, the court stated:

“Okay. Thank you. I'm glad we're all here and you came back with us, and it offers me some clarity. This is what I'm going to do though. I'm going to ask you to come back one last time. I'm going to give you a record that you can take up because I assume you're going to take up this case.”

The court then directed the parties to return on June 6, 2012.

¶ 15 On June 6, the trial court heard additional argument on the remaining posttrial issue and denied BNSF's motion. The trial court directed the parties to prepare an...