Luwisch v. American Marine Corporation

956 F.3d 320 (5th Cir. 2020)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

On November 2, 2014, P was on board the M/V American Challenger, a vessel owned by D, as the chief engineer of the vessel. One of his jobs was to store line on board. P climbed to the upper deck of the vessel, where he had never previously been, to see whether there was room to store the line. He discovered that there was already line lying on the upper deck and that it was obstructing part of the walkway, creating a hazard. P then attempted to climb back down the ladder but in doing so tripped over the line and fell ten feet, to the lower deck. He was taken to the hospital, where a CT scan revealed damage to several of his cervical discs. P never returned to work for D. In December 2014 and February 2015, P saw Dr. Alden, complaining of pain and numbness in his left arm and headaches, among other things. Dr. Alden found that P had damage to three of his cervical discs and referred him to Dr. Beaucoudray for treatment. Between March 2015 and February 2016, Dr. Beaucoudray gave Luwisch a series of epidural steroid injections. These injections provided Luwisch only short-term relief. Dr. Beaucoudray ultimately referred P to Dr. Bartholomew for surgery. With disagreements over who would pay, the surgery never took place. Between March 2015 and June 2016, P worked intermittently as a mechanic for a series of different employers. In July 2016, Luwisch resumed working as a chief engineer. When applying for employment as a chief engineer, Luwisch denied having any previous neck injuries or neck pain. In May 2018, P quit his job and moved to Georgia to sell shrimp and run an RV park. In April 2017 P filed suit seeking maintenance and cure as well as compensatory damages. The case was tried without a jury. The court determined that, after an unrelated workplace accident in 2011, P had been diagnosed with degenerative disc disease and a herniated disc. Because P had not disclosed this condition to D when he applied for employment, the district court ruled that P was not entitled to maintenance and cure. The court found that the placement of the line on the upper deck rendered the vessel unseaworthy and that D had violated its duty to provide P with a reasonably safe place to work. It held that the placement of the line directly contributed to P's fall and that D was eighty-percent responsible for the accident. P was found to be twenty-percent responsible. The court determined that although P had degenerative disc disease before the accident, his condition was asymptomatic until the fall exacerbated it. P was awarded damages. D appealed.