Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani Partner Matthew Peng and Of Counsel Mitzy Fryer prevailed on a motion to dismiss they filed in an Oklahoma district court on behalf of the firm’s freight-broker client.
The lawsuit stemmed from an incident in which two employees were injured while working at a distribution center in southern Oklahoma. The employees’ employer filed a claim against both the freight broker and the trucking company, seeking reimbursement for the workers’ compensation benefits paid to the injured employees. The complaints asserted that the employer had paid several hundred thousand dollars in workers’ compensation benefits and was entitled to reimbursement from either the trucking company or the freight broker.
The GRSM team filed a motion to dismiss, citing the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAAA). They argued that the plaintiff’s claims against the broker client were preempted by the FAAAA and that the safety exception to the FAAAA did not apply.
Overall, there were three separate lawsuits filed against the broker client related to this incident. The court reviewed the briefs, heard oral argument, and ruled in favor of GRSM’s broker client, granting a full dismissal of all three lawsuits against the client. The underlying lawsuit remains against other defendants.
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