Carbon Monoxide Lawsuits Settled Out-of-Court
Posted by Administrator (admin) on May 20 2009 at 11:30 AM
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Two lawsuits filed over carbon monoxide exposure were settled out of court for an undisclosed amount.

The first one was a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Jeff Rodliff, a man who died in 2005 as a result of carbon monoxide poisoning at an apartment building in Vermont. The second one was a personal injury lawsuit filed b y Rodliff’s girlfriend who had been in a coma for two weeks as a result of exposure to the lethal gas.

The trial had been scheduled to start this week, however settled out of court last month.

The carbon monoxide exposures occurred on January 30, 2005. Some problem with the building’s boiler caused a faulty pipe to dislodge, causing toxic fumes to come into four apartments. By the time the problem was noticed, Jeff Rodliff had passed away from carbon monoxide poisoning. Ginger Aldrich, Rodliff’s girlfriend, was found unconscious and left with everlasting injuries.

In addition to the suits filed by Aldrich and the family of Rodliff, six other lawsuits were filed by tenants who were injured by the leakage of the toxic gas.

New England Air Systems of Williston, which was supposed to handle maintenance for the heating system, was the first defendant in all the cases as the company failed to replace the vent pipe after it was recalled due to durability problems. It was in 1998 that the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a recall for the pipe.

There were 15 other defendants too, including the maker of the pipe and the heating unit, the construction and building companies, the installers of the heating system and the landlord.

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