Worker Injured in Coliseum Accident to Get $22.5 Million

A worker who was critically injured during earthquake repairs at the Los Angeles Coliseum has been awarded $22.5 million in a Los Angeles Superior Court verdict that found negligence on the part of prime contractor Tutor-Saliba.

Michael Francois, 40, of Granada Hills, who was left a quadriplegic after he fell on the job July 23, 1994, was awarded $10 million in economic damages for full-time medical care lasting 35 years, and $12.5 million for pain and suffering.

Francois’ wife, Brenda, was awarded $150,000 for loss of consortium in the same case.

The verdicts rendered Thursday in Judge Alexander Williams III’s court are subject to appeal.

The Francoises’ attorney, Larry Grassini of Woodland Hills, said Friday that testimony at the trial from inspectors and an employee of Tutor-Saliba who was injured in another incident on the job the same day made it “obvious that Tutor-Saliba put speed over safety.

“They were going to get that job done by the start of the USC football season, come hell or high water,” Grassini said. “That was a job that should have taken 34 months, and they completed it in six.”

Inspectors for the firm of Smith-Emery testified at the trial that faulty scaffolding caused the accident, in which Francois fell 16 feet while trying to put fencing around a power substation just outside the Coliseum.

Tutor-Saliba attorney George Dale declined to comment on the verdict and Ron Tutor, chief of Tutor-Saliba, was not available for comment.