Cruise Ship Lawyers Blog
What was meant to be an unforgettable trip, marking her first time traveling out of the country, turned out a bit differently for a mother of four now represented by Leesfield & Partners.
“I was in shock,” this is what our 64-year-old client had to say regarding the immediate aftermath of a fall on a cruise ship deck that was slick with water.
The woman, a public school bus driver and school cafeteria worker, was on the ship with her daughter, grandchildren, her son-in-law, and his mother for a family vacation when she fell. Her daughter rushed to her side and described her mother’s leg as appearing “deformed” from her injury.
When a member of the cruise ship’s medical staff arrived, she put our client in a wheelchair and used a tight grip on a white towel to keep her injured leg elevated. The medical staff member held the towel while pushing our client toward the ship’s medical unit despite her agonized cries.
“I personally feel like her leg was further injured by this maneuver,” our client’s daughter said. “Once in medical … they stated our worst fear — that her femur was significantly deformed and broken and that she needed to get off the ship to be ‘stabilized.’”
Following her ordeal, she was diagnosed with a spiral fracture of her left femur, which required surgical repair and 50 staples. The firm’s Founder and Managing Partner, Ira Leesfield, is handling the case along with Trial Attorney Bernardo Pimentel II.
“They kept moving me and every time they moved me, I was just cringing,” she said. “They [cruise ship personnel] told me they couldn’t do anything for me.”
Terrible Conditions
Following her agonizing fall, she was disembarked from the ship and taken to a crude medical facility in Honduras, where she knew no one and did not understand the language. Luckily, her son-in-law, a police officer in Virginia, was able to go with her.
Once there, she spent more than 24 hours in a windowless, cinderblock room with no food and very little water. Eventually, her son-in-law was forced to leave and spent the night in a hotel. In his room, he anxiously waited for news of his mother-in-law and struggled to make plans to get them back to the U.S.
Back on the ship, our client’s daughter said she received messages from her mother begging for help to leave the medical facility.
Our client waited in pain with nothing more than liquid Tylenol to treat her life-changing fracture. With no available restroom, they inserted a catheter that later gave our client a urinary tract infection. She said that the conditions were terrible and that she did not see medical staff for hours on end during her stay.
Her family raised the thousands of dollars needed to medevac our client and her son-in-law back to the U.S. but, before they could get her out, medical staff demanded over $10,000 from them.
Once back in the U.S., her doctors categorized this as a life-altering injury that will require at least a year to fully heal. Even then, she will need to use a cane going forward — a significant limitation given her long career as a school bus driver and cafeteria worker.
Before this nightmarish experience, our client enjoyed her work and had no previous plans of stopping any time soon. Today, that future has been abruptly and painfully disrupted.
“This cruise line failed our client from the moment it neglected to address the hazardous condition that caused her fall,” Mr. Pimentel said. “From that point forward, she endured unnecessary and unacceptable suffering while already in pain. We intend to pursue justice for her to the fullest extent of the law.”
‘Not Even Bare Minimum of Accepted Medical Care’
Leesfield & Partners is a personal injury law firm with over five decades of experience going to bat for individuals and families injured due to the negligence of corporations and other entities. During that time, the firm has achieved numerous record verdicts and settlements for clients while also helping drive legislative changes that provide greater protection for the public.
With headquarters in Miami — a city home to a passenger cruise port often called the “cruising capital of the world” — our attorneys are all too familiar with the horrific incidents that can occur aboard these vessels, as well as the many ways some companies attempt to avoid the responsibilities they owe to their passengers. From medical malpractice incidents resulting in amputations to mismanaged shore excursions, our attorneys work diligently to ensure the best possible outcome is secured for every client.
“The negligent care was not even a bare minimum of accepted medical care,” Mr. Leesfield said.
