Trespassers sue property owners
- Year: 2002
- Result: Plaintiff won
A federal jury awarded two men a total of $24.2 million for getting severely burned by a 12,500-volt electrical wire when they were just teenagers trespassing on a railroad property in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in 2002.
Attorneys for Amtrak and Norfolk Southern Corp. claimed the two men, Jeffrey Klein and Brett Birdwell, aged 17 at the time of the accident, were old enough to know that they were putting themselves in danger. The plaintiffs’ lawyer, while conceding his clients were trespassers, said the property owners were still responsible.
