ATRA TESTIMONY CITES ‘FRAUD AND ABUSE’ WITHIN SYSTEM FOR COMPENSATING INJURED RAILROAD WORKERS

Washington, DC, October 25, 2007 -- American Tort Reform Association president Sherman “Tiger” Joyce today told a House committee that injured railroad workers and their employers could be better served by a no-fault system than they are by the current adversarial tort-based system inherent in the Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA).

Joyce testified before the full House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee during a hearing entitled The Impact of Railroad Injury, Accident, and Discipline Policies on the Safety of America’s Railroads. His full testimony is posted at www.atra.org.

Joyce began by explaining several shortcomings of tort litigation relative to more efficient workers’ compensation systems prevalent throughout much of state and federal government. He cited litigation’s delay of payments to injured parties, disparate outcomes for parties that have suffered similar injuries under similar circumstances, and high transaction costs that burden both plaintiffs and defendants. Recent data show the tort system returns to injured parties less than 22 cents of every dollar it consumes, he said.

He then went on to note “significant instances of unlawful fraud and abuse permeating our civil justice system” in recent years, adding that “FELA litigation has not been immune to this trend.”

Too often, Joyce said, “lawsuits are driven by and for the benefit of lawyers, rather than the compensation of truly injured claimants. For example, in 2004, four officials of the Ohio-based United Transportation Union (UTU), which represents some but not all railroad employees, pled guilty to racketeering for accepting payments of as much as $30,000 each from personal injury lawyers in exchange for steering business to these lawyers.

“As UTU, to its credit, took steps to prevent such conduct in the future, West Virginia plaintiff Rodney Chambers and his counsel are alleged to have committed fraud against the freight railroad CSX when they submitted a medical report in FELA litigation that was certified by a ‘Dr. Oscar Frye,’ who has never been located, and whose purported address in Huntington, West Virginia is fictitious.

“In a separate but related legal proceeding, CSX has brought suit against Robert Gilkison and his employer – the law firm of Pierce, Raymond & Coulter, for ‘engaging in fraudulent schemes relating to screening mechanisms used by the law firm to find asbestos plaintiffs.’ Interestingly, Dr. Ray Harron, who also came under national criticism for certifying silicosis claims, is named as a co-conspirator in the suit because of his work on asbestos cases for the Pierce firm.

“My purpose in raising these issues is to suggest . . . that the current injury compensation mechanism for railroad employees fosters behavior that is adversarial in nature and works against the goal of quick, fair and complete compensation. ATRA respectfully urges this committee and Congress to consider alternatives to it,” Joyce concluded.

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The American Tort Reform Association (ATRA) is the only national organization dedicated exclusively to tort and liability reform through public education and the enactment of legislation. ATRA's membership includes non profits, small and large companies, as well as state and national trade, business, and professional associations.