Michael counsels corporations and handles significant litigation, primarily in the maritime and energy sectors. He has years of experience in the state and federal trial and appellate courts of Louisiana and Texas for clients. Recent notable cases include:
Personal Injury:
- Michael was lead trial counsel for a marine client that was involved in a multi-party, multi-vessel fleeting incident that resulted in a Jones Act seaman’s personal injuries, including allegations of traumatic brain injury. The court granted summary judgment on all claims of unseaworthiness against the client, and after a weeklong bench trial in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Beaumont Division, the client’s Complaint for Exoneration From and Limitation of Liability was granted, exonerating the client and dismissing all claims against the client with prejudice.
- A service company had an accident in Texas when a unit at its customer’s refinery caught fire. An employee was seriously injured. Michael helped investigate the cause and source of the fire and analyzed issues involving workers’ compensation and third-party claims as well as indemnity issues relating to the premises.
Casualty and Incident Response:
- Michael and his team were onsite with a refinery client’s leadership and HSE teams within 24 hours of an explosion resulting in a fatality and managed the investigation from inception, including OSHA, Chemical Safety Board, and State Police investigations, as well as evidence preservation and site inspections by the experts for multiple parties to the eventual litigation, through the wrongful death litigation that followed. The OSHA citation issued to the client was ultimately reduced from a “serious” violation to “other than serious” violation. Michael was eventually able to negotiate a settlement within the client’s insurance policy limits and eliminate the significant risk of an uninsured punitive damages award in a very hostile venue.
- In the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon incident, Michael was embedded within the claims team for the primary designated responsible party and interacted with the USCG National Pollution Funds Center with respect to response costs and individual and business claims arising from the spill as well as government officials from across the Gulf Coast Region to resolve multi-million dollar government entity claims.
- Michael investigated a refinery fatality and a dockside fatality in which a scaffold to which scaffold builders were tied off collapsed into the ship channel, both in Corpus Christi, in which OSHA representatives immediately began onsite investigations. Michael and his team resolved the wrongful death lawsuits relatively early in the litigation, minimizing the client’s exposure as well as the costs incurred litigating.
Products Liability:
- Michael and his team successfully recovered a significant eight-figure settlement for an oil and gas client prosecuting a products liability claim against a foreign pipe manufacturer after the downhole pipe in a deepwater well failed resulting in the total loss of the well.
- An international oil and gas client had a difficult offshore problem. The mooring system for one of the company’s offshore facilities partially collapsed, falling to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. Michael was part of the team that answered the client’s call to evaluate the damage and help figure out what to do. He investigated, managing a team of experts who reviewed the manufacture, installation, and operation of the structure, looking for technical causes for the collapse and preserving any evidence for testing.
- He also worked with the client’s in-house counsel and management, providing notice to other parties involved of planned testing and recertification of equipment. The client successfully resolved the matter with its insurers as well as the contractors involved.
Other Notable Cases:
- Michael and his team successfully prosecuted two barge breakaway cases resulting from Hurricane Harvey and Tropical Storm Imelda for a maritime client recovering the damages associated with the loss and/or repair of the barges when they broke free from the fleets. The cases also involved successfully defending against claims by other parties seeking recovery of damages allegedly caused by the barges after they broke away from the fleets.
- After obtaining a favorable jury verdict against a major insurance company for underground blowout coverage, Michael successfully argued for the application of statutory penalty interest under the Texas Insurance Code recovering more than $1.2 million in late-payment interest. The award was appealed by the insurer and upheld by the U.S. Fifth Circuit.
