Jury awards $1.2 million to injured BNSF worker

By GREG TUTTLE Of The Gazette taff
Copyright © The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises.

A Yellowstone County District Court jury has awarded $1.2 million in damages to an injured BNSF Railway worker.

The verdict was reached late Friday following a two-week trial before Judge Susan Watters.

Ken R. Dellos, of Sheridan, Wyo., is a 52-year-old former engineer who worked for the railroad for 30 years before he suffered a spinal injury in April 2006.

Dellos filed a civil lawsuit against the railroad later that year. The jury found the railroad violated the federal Locomotive Inspection Act and was liable for Dellos' injuries.

Dellos was awarded $840,000 in lost wages and $360,000 for pain and suffering, said Dellos' attorney, Fred Bremseth.

Dellos said after the verdict that he was relieved by the jury verdict. He said he is taking college classes toward a career in social work.

Bremseth, who has represented former BNSF employees in similar claims against the railroad, said he hopes that the case encourages the railroad to take more seriously the safety of its employees.

"The tragedy is these things are preventable," Bremseth said.

Michelle Friend, a Billings attorney who represented the railroad, was not available for comment Monday.

The jury rejected two other claims filed by Dellos against the railroad, including injuries from a second railroad accident in 2006 and injuries related to repetitive motion.

Last November, a Yellowstone County jury awarded another former BNSF engineer $1.7million in damages. Bremseth said at the time he believed the verdict was the largest amount awarded by a Montana jury in a personal-injury case against a railroad company.

In 2005, a BNSF employee was awarded $1.5 million in damages following a trial in Yellowstone County District Court. Also that year, a local jury awarded $1 million to a BNSF employee who was injured in a head-on collision between two coal trains.