In a significant defense victory, the First District Appellate Court of Illinois has affirmed the judgment in favor of Birmingham Steel in the Amtrak/Bourbonnais crash involving 82 bodily injury claims and 11 fatalities. The case was tried to a mistrial, and later won on appeal by Bob Franco. The Appellate Court affirmed that Birmingham Steel did not cause the crash between the truck carrying Birmingham Steel’s rebar and the Amtrak train, that there was no agency relationship with the driver, and that Birmingham Steel did not owe a duty to determine whether the driver was fatigued when he left the steel plant. This is not only a significant victory in its own right, but is a significant victory for the transportation industry.
