NEW ORLEANS – An injury lawsuit filed against the owner of an oil drilling ship by a worker who claimed he was exposed to hazardous substances while at sea was recently dismissed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
In a Dec. 3 ruling, U.S. District Judge Nannette Brown dismissed the punitive damages lawsuit filed by Gerald Wiltz against Rowan Companies Inc., the owner of the drilling ship M/V Deepwater Reliance. Wiltz sued Rowan, his employer M-I LLC and other companies as a result of the exposure to hydrogen sulfide while he was working on the Deepwater Reliance on Apr. 7, 2016, filings said.
On Dec. 27, 2017, the court granted a motion to dismiss filed by M-I; one month later, codefendant Halliburton filed the same type of motion and obtained a dismissal as well.
Rowan filed the motion to dismiss May 18 claiming that punitive damages were unavailable under the Jones Act or general maritime law, court filings said.
As stated in the ruling, "On May 15, 2017, plaintiff filed a “Seaman’s Complaint for Damages” in this court asserting claims under the Jones Act and general maritime law against: (1) M-I LLC, as his Jones Act Employer; (2) Rowan, as owner of the vessel; (3) Cobalt, as the “leaseholder and operator as per BSEE rules and regulations;” and (4) Halliburton Energy Services, Inc., as a non-employer tortfeasor."
In its motion to dismiss, Rowan alleged that maritime law "is not settled on the issue of whether punitive
damages are available to a seaman against non-employer defendants," and cited court rulings that found "punitive damages are unavailable under the Jones Act or general maritime law."
In her ruling, Brown said that "there are no issues of fact in dispute," and that, based on previous cases, Wiltz "is precluded from recovering non-pecuniary damages against Rowan under general maritime law."