LIHUE — A federal jury found that Hawaiian Airlines was partially responsible for injuries suffered by a Hanapepe man who tore an arm tendon trying to pull a 50-pound piece of luggage off an airport baggage carousel after an airline employee reportedly refused to help.
James Armstrong, a 70-year-old disabled veteran, won his lawsuit against Hawaiian Airlines after a year and a half of litigation and a week-long trial that ended Wednesday, when the jury awarded him $12,000 in compensation for injuries.
Armstrong called the verdict “ridiculous” during a phone interview Friday, and said he doubts he’ll see a dime of the airline’s money after taxes and attorney’s fees.
The jury found that $60,000 in damages were attributable to the accident, but decided the airline was only 20% responsible, according to court documents. Either way, according to Armstrong, financial compensation wasn’t the point of the lawsuit.
“It’s not about the money. It’s about truth and honesty,” he said. “If they would have just said ‘sorry’ and bought me a ticket back, I probably would have dropped it.”
Armstrong filed a lawsuit against Hawaiian Airlines after an accident at Brisbane Airport in Australia in March 2016, when he ruptured a tendon in his left bicep and aggravated an existing knee injury while trying to pull the last of four heavy bags off of the carousel.
In the suit, he claimed that a Hawaiian Airlines employee pushed him in his wheelchair to the baggage claim area but refused to provide any further assistance. Armstrong often uses a wheelchair when traveling or when required to walk for extended periods of time but is capable of standing on his own.
“Having no other option but to remove the luggage from the baggage carousel himself,” the lawsuit said Armstrong “stood up and grabbed each bag as it came around,” until he felt a pain in his arm and leg while trying to lift the fourth piece of luggage.
“I just cussed a word and fell back in the wheelchair,” Armstrong said, describing the pain of tendon injury, which he believes will never get better.
Even though the jury returned a verdict in his favor, Armstrong believes Hawaiian Airlines was really the winner in the case.
“Now they have a decision saying they don’t have to help disabled passengers,” he said.
A Hawaiian Airlines spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication of this article.
The company’s lawyers maintained from the start of litigation that Armstrong’s accident was his own fault and said in a court document filed earlier this year that his injuries “indisputably resulted from his own internal physical reaction — based on his pre-existing conditions — to the usual, normal and expected activity of retrieving one’s own checked-in luggage.”
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Caleb Loehrer, staff writer, can be reached at 245-0441 or cloehrer@thegardenisland.com.
