Mediation leads to settlement of Quality Stone Veneer employee's lawsuit

CLARKSBURG - A lawsuit against Cargotech Solutions has been settled and dismissed from federal court.

Cargotech is doing business as Princeton Delivery Systems Inc.

Kalmar Industries USA LLC, which is doing business as Princeton Delivery Systems In.; Princeton Delivery Systems Inc; and Garden State Engine & Equipment Company Inc. were also named as defendants in the suit.

A notice of mediation was filed on July 1 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia at Clarksburg. Mediation was held at 10 a.m. on Sept. 5 at Berthold Law Firm by Donald O'Dell.

On Oct 30, an agreed dismissal order was filed, in which both parties represented that all matters in controversy had been settled.

On Aug. 26, 2010, Shane Ressler was an employee of Quality Stone Veneer, which is located in Tower City, Pa., and had traveled near Morgantown on behalf of Quality, according to a complaint filed Aug. 16, 2012, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia at Clarksburg.

Ressler claimed in order to make delivery, he utilized a piggy back forklift loader that belonged to the defendants and was sitting in the driver's seat as required when he engaged the forks into the receiving tracts built into the rear of the truck bed and began lifting the piggy back loader vertically to its stowage position.

At some point, something broke in the forklift assembly, so that the machine dropped back to the ground and the abrupt deceleration when it hit the ground injured Ressler, according to the suit.

Ressler claimed he sustained a closed head injury; lumbar disc injury at the L5/S1 level, which required a spinal surgical procedure; and lumbar and thoracic strain.

As a result of the defendants' conduct, Ressler sustained a loss of earnings by reason of not being able to fulfill his employment, according to the suit.

Ressler claimed the defendants were aware of the propensity of the scissors and pin joint mechanism to fail prior to his accident and failed to take adequate measures to notify Quality of the problem.

The defendants failed to affix sufficient warnings to the machine or to include warnings with literature provided with the machine, according to the suit.

Ressler was seeking compensatory damages in excess of $75,000 with interest. He was represented by Robert V. Berthold, Jr. and Robert V. Berthold III of Berthold Law Firm PLLC and Joseph M. Melillo of Navitsky, Olson & Wisneski LLP.

Garden State was represented by Boyd L. Warner and David L.T. Butler of Waters, Warner & Harris PLLC. Cargotech, Princeton and Kalmar were represented by Jenna Perkins Wood of Rawle & Henderson LLP.

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia at Clarksburg case number: 1:12-cv-00130