Ron Olivier was working as a commercial diver for Cal Dive International. On September 13th, 2000 he was in an offshore accident in the Gulf of Mexico. When he returned from a routine dive, there was a failure to properly decompress Mr. Olivier. Deep sea divers must spend time in a hyperbaric chamber after deep sea diving. This is so their bodies have time to readjust to the surface air pressure. Sometimes their bodies don’t have enough time to re-adapt. In these cases, they get decompression sickness (aka the bends).
In Mr. Olivier’s case, his decompression wasn’t done properly. Additionally, there wasn’t a doctor on duty at the time of the accident. Consequently, it made his decompression sickness worse. This is despite the decompression process being routine to deep sea diving. Mr. Olivier suffered permanent neurological damage. He was eventually classified as being permanently disabled from this accident.
Results:
The case went to trial and was resolved with a judgment in favor of our client. The Law Offices of L. Clayton Burgess had expected a quick case. But, the initial 2001 judgement was appealed by Cal Dive. Two years later in 2003, the case was denied an appeal. The original judgment was upheld. Our client was awarded approximately 2.2 million in damages.
Settlement amounts can be misleading. Every case is unique and has different circumstances. You can’t base expectations for your settlement on another person’s case. An attorney will perform a investigation of your case and determine expected amounts from there.
