The attorney for two Dallas Cowboys employees injured in the 2009 collapse of the team's practice facility says each has received about $5 million from companies controlled by team owner Jerry Jones as legal settlements.
Attorney Frank Branson says that lawsuits filed by scout Rich Behm and special teams coach Joe DeCamillis were settled last week.
Behm was paralyzed from the waist down and DeCamillis suffered a broken vertebrae when the steel and fabric building collapsed in a wind storm back on May 2nd, 2009.
The two previously settled with the builder, Summit Structures. Branson says Behm received $19.5 million and DeCamillas was paid $4.5 million.
Cowboys spokesman Rich Dalrymple says the team had no comment Monday.
Naturally...
More when we know more...
Until then, here's an anniversary piece that Sophia Reza did on the collapse
((HT: MyFoxDFW))
Showing posts with label Joe DeCamillis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joe DeCamillis. Show all posts
Monday, August 30, 2010
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Lawsuits Filed In Cowboys Practice Facility Collapse
((HT: MyFoxDFW/Kalthoff))Two Cowboys employees seriously hurt in the collapse of the team's practice facility last spring filed lawsuits against the companies involved in the structure's construction.
Rich Behm, a scouting aide who is permanently paralyzed and now confined to a wheelchair, and Joe DeCamillis, a special teams coach who broke his neck but recovered, both filed lawsuits in Dallas County court Tuesday.
The separate lawsuits, filed by the same law firm, allege that the builders and installers were negligent, and at least two of the defendants knew the structure was unsafe.
The suits are the first to be filed in connection with the May 2 collapse. Neither suit names the Cowboys organization.
Here's the Behm lawsuit and here's the DeCamillis lawsuit...Brooks Egerton's piece from the Dallas Morning News has the two plaintiffs calling for a conspiracy charge. They claim that Summit Structures knew two years before the collapse that the facility was unsafe.
From Egerton...
The conspiracy allegations target:
The steel-framed facility's designer and manufacturer, Canada-based Cover-All Building Systems.
Its U.S. sales and construction affiliate, Summit Structures.
The Las Vegas consulting firm JCI. As previously reported in The Dallas Morning News, JCI helped Cover-All and Summit design reinforcements for the tent after a building-collapse expert discovered engineering problems.
The facility underwent repairs in summer 2007 that the Cowboys believed were "a temporary fix," the lawsuits say. They allege that Cover-All, Summit and JCI "were to design and install a permanent fix after the 2007 football season was over" but did not.
Instead, they "agreed to hide and conceal the practice facility's shortcomings," the suits say.
KTVT/CBS-11's John Knicely was standing in front of Valley Ranch and interviewed Coach De's and Behm's attorney...Those of us here at the HQ think any and all of the defendants need to learn one word: "settle"
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Tuesday Cowboys Update: DeCamillis, Behm
((HT: picture, thanks Ron Jenkins/ Star Telegram. Story- DMN/MacMahon/Townsend))
"We're pleased everything went as well as we expected it to," said DeCamillis' father-in-law, former NFL coach and Cowboys player Dan Reeves.
He said the family is encouraged but cautious about any complications.
"We're not out of the woods," Reeves said. "We'll keep praying. We're just thankful and truly blessed and hope everything continues."
Given the location of the injury and the absence of paralysis, "the prognosis is excellent," said Dr. David Rothbart, a neurosurgeon and founder and medical director of Southlake-based Spine Team Texas.
Dr. Rothbart, who is not involved with DeCamillis' treatment, said the typical recovery for most operations of this type is six to eight weeks. Based on that timetable, DeCamillis could return for training camp, Dr. Rothbart said.
Reeves said DeCamillis faces about two months of physical rehabilitation, according to his doctors. DeCamillis, 43, was hired in January to turn around a special teams unit that struggled much of last season.
"Once he has completely healed, he should have an excellent chance at being able to take part in the full aspect of coaching activities," Dr. Rothbart said.
A trust fund has been established for the family of Rich Behm. Bank of America, in conjunction with the Dallas Cowboys, will begin accepting donations on behalf of Behm and his wife and three young children starting today.
"We've had an overwhelming number of phone calls and correspondence from friends and fans who want to know how they can help Rich and his family," said Cowboys public relations director Rich Dalrymple. "We are grateful to Bank of America for helping us get this moving so quickly."
Behm was paralyzed from the waist down during the accident involving the Cowboys indoor practice facility on Saturday.
BY MAIL:
Donations will be accepted by mail at the following location:
Bank of America
c/o Shelby Kirksey
5500 Preston Road, Suite B
Dallas, Texas 75205
Checks made payable to Rich Behm Family Trust Fund
Donations will be accepted by mail at the following location:
Bank of America
c/o Shelby Kirksey
5500 Preston Road, Suite B
Dallas, Texas 75205
Checks made payable to Rich Behm Family Trust Fund
IN PERSON:
Also, those wishing to help the family can walk into any Bank of America branch and specify that they would like to make a donation in person to the Rich Behm Family Trust Fund.
Also, those wishing to help the family can walk into any Bank of America branch and specify that they would like to make a donation in person to the Rich Behm Family Trust Fund.
Fox4's Matt Grubs has the update on the investigation...
Encouraging Word on DeCamillis
((HT: DMN/Carlton))
The Cowboys sent out a short e-mail Monday night updating the status of special teams coach Joe DeCamillis...
"Joe DeCamillis underwent successful surgery today at Parkland Hospital to stabilize fractured vertebra in his neck. He remains in stable condition and should be released from the hospital later this week."
The Cowboys sent out a short e-mail Monday night updating the status of special teams coach Joe DeCamillis...
"Joe DeCamillis underwent successful surgery today at Parkland Hospital to stabilize fractured vertebra in his neck. He remains in stable condition and should be released from the hospital later this week."
Cowboys Tuesday Update: OSHA Investigates
((HT: myfoxdfw/KDFW-TV))
Government investigators began sorting through the Dallas Cowboys' flattened practice facility Monday, trying to figure out why fierce winds sent the tentlike structure crashing down during a rookie workout session.
Twelve people were hurt, including Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis, who was set to have surgery on his fractured cervical vertebrae Monday. The most seriously injured was Rich Behm, the team's 33-year-old scouting assistant who was permanently paralyzed from the waist down after his spine was severed. Greg Gaither, 35, had surgery on his fractured right leg and was expected to get out of the hospital this week.
Here's the 911 call from the facility...
Inspectors were at the collapse site Monday, said Elizabeth Todd, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration. OSHA, which investigates workplace accidents, has six months to make a report, she said.
Records obtained by The Associated Press show that the city of Irving granted the Cowboys' request to replace the fabric roof last year, five years after the structure was built. The team listed itself as the contractor for the roof replacement, but Cowboys spokesman Rich Dalrymple said the team would not comment about the work.
The records do not show that the Cowboys sought an inspection of the facility after replacing the roof, although city code requires it, according to Gary Miller, Irving's director of planning and inspections.
"In a perfect world, there's some report from an installation company or an engineer in there, but we don't have it," Miller said.
The company that built the facility -- Summit Structures LLC of Allentown, Pa. -- issued a statement that said proper engineering was used during the original construction and the installation of the new roof. Summit president Nathan Stobbe said he was in Irving on Monday, working with team and local officials to "fully assess this severe weather event." The company said it has few answers so far about precisely what happened.
About 70 people, including 27 players at a rookie minicamp, were inside when the storm hit. Winds were clocked at 64 mph, 1 mph shy of the threshold for a weak tornado. A "microburst" may have pushed the wind beyond 70 mph at the top of the structure, National Weather Service officials said
Behm, DeCamillis and Gaither were standing on the field when the $4 million structure gave way, sending framework, lights and other debris crashing to the ground.
Most players at the minicamp were drafted the previous weekend or signed as undrafted rookies, but none was hurt. No veterans were involved. Coaches, support staff and media were also in the no-frills building, essentially a 100-yard football field with a few more yards of clearance all the way around. The roof was 80 feet high.
Media were restricted from the Cowboys headquarters for at least a week because of ongoing work that is scheduled to take place in the aftermath of the accident.
Summit lists on its Web site several other facilities it built, including one at Texas A&M and one for the New England Patriots. The company also built the Windstar Casino just across the Texas-Oklahoma border.
The A&M facility is a $35.6 million project that includes both a football practice facility and an indoor track. A&M athletic director Bill Byrne said the school has had no problems with the project, completed late last year, but will re-evaluate its policy on bad weather practices considering the collapse in Irving.
"Our facility was put to the test this past fall when Hurricane Ike hit the Texas gulf coast," he said in a statement. "Our buildings withstood the high winds and our football team was not in the facility at that time."
At the University of New Mexico, which also has a Summit-built football practice facility, associate athletic director Scott Dotson said the collapse hasn't generated significant concerns there.
He said the school's facility "has been tested with some strong winds and held up."
A Pennsylvania court ruled in 2006 that Summit was negligent in the design and construction of a membrane-covered building that collapsed in 2003 after a major snowstorm in Philadelphia. The building was constructed for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority.
City of Irving construction records list Oklahoma-based Manhattan Construction Group as the contractor for the Cowboys' facility and Summit as the structural engineer. Manhattan is the general contractor for the new Cowboys stadium that will open next season in Arlington.
Bob Bowen, Manhattan's executive vice president, said his company helped protect the outdoor practice field from damage during construction but all the planning and other work was done by Summit.
In a 2003 letter to then-Irving Fire Chief Paul White, Cowboys director of football operations Bruce Mays described the planned facility as "a semi-permanent structure supported by lightweight steel trusses and clad with a fire resistant polymer fabric."
Mays said preliminary discussions between the team and the city had concluded that the building was "a unique type of structure and there could be a variety of interpretations as to what standards should be applied in evaluating the structure to comply with building and fire codes."
Miller, the Irving planning official, said the structure was built to a code that required it stand up to a three-second wind gust of 90 mph.
Records show a city inspector signed off on the building's piers in July 2003. An additional inspection dealing with other facets of the building would have been completed and submitted to the city by Summit, Miller said. That document could not be provided to the AP because it wasn't retained by the city, he said.
Miller said the city would have relied on the contractor's engineer to inspect the job because it differed so markedly from others.
"There's nothing in the code book that says, `Here's how the gauge for lightweight steel membrane structures is supposed to work,"' he said. "We rely in engineers to design something like that and check and make sure it's installed properly."
Here's Monday's report from Valley Ranch...
MyFoxDFW's Peter Daut and Shaun Rabb have the details...
Government investigators began sorting through the Dallas Cowboys' flattened practice facility Monday, trying to figure out why fierce winds sent the tentlike structure crashing down during a rookie workout session.
Twelve people were hurt, including Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis, who was set to have surgery on his fractured cervical vertebrae Monday. The most seriously injured was Rich Behm, the team's 33-year-old scouting assistant who was permanently paralyzed from the waist down after his spine was severed. Greg Gaither, 35, had surgery on his fractured right leg and was expected to get out of the hospital this week.
Here's the 911 call from the facility...
Inspectors were at the collapse site Monday, said Elizabeth Todd, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration. OSHA, which investigates workplace accidents, has six months to make a report, she said.
Records obtained by The Associated Press show that the city of Irving granted the Cowboys' request to replace the fabric roof last year, five years after the structure was built. The team listed itself as the contractor for the roof replacement, but Cowboys spokesman Rich Dalrymple said the team would not comment about the work.
The records do not show that the Cowboys sought an inspection of the facility after replacing the roof, although city code requires it, according to Gary Miller, Irving's director of planning and inspections.
"In a perfect world, there's some report from an installation company or an engineer in there, but we don't have it," Miller said.
The company that built the facility -- Summit Structures LLC of Allentown, Pa. -- issued a statement that said proper engineering was used during the original construction and the installation of the new roof. Summit president Nathan Stobbe said he was in Irving on Monday, working with team and local officials to "fully assess this severe weather event." The company said it has few answers so far about precisely what happened.
About 70 people, including 27 players at a rookie minicamp, were inside when the storm hit. Winds were clocked at 64 mph, 1 mph shy of the threshold for a weak tornado. A "microburst" may have pushed the wind beyond 70 mph at the top of the structure, National Weather Service officials said
Behm, DeCamillis and Gaither were standing on the field when the $4 million structure gave way, sending framework, lights and other debris crashing to the ground.
Most players at the minicamp were drafted the previous weekend or signed as undrafted rookies, but none was hurt. No veterans were involved. Coaches, support staff and media were also in the no-frills building, essentially a 100-yard football field with a few more yards of clearance all the way around. The roof was 80 feet high.
Media were restricted from the Cowboys headquarters for at least a week because of ongoing work that is scheduled to take place in the aftermath of the accident.
Summit lists on its Web site several other facilities it built, including one at Texas A&M and one for the New England Patriots. The company also built the Windstar Casino just across the Texas-Oklahoma border.
The A&M facility is a $35.6 million project that includes both a football practice facility and an indoor track. A&M athletic director Bill Byrne said the school has had no problems with the project, completed late last year, but will re-evaluate its policy on bad weather practices considering the collapse in Irving.
"Our facility was put to the test this past fall when Hurricane Ike hit the Texas gulf coast," he said in a statement. "Our buildings withstood the high winds and our football team was not in the facility at that time."
At the University of New Mexico, which also has a Summit-built football practice facility, associate athletic director Scott Dotson said the collapse hasn't generated significant concerns there.
He said the school's facility "has been tested with some strong winds and held up."
A Pennsylvania court ruled in 2006 that Summit was negligent in the design and construction of a membrane-covered building that collapsed in 2003 after a major snowstorm in Philadelphia. The building was constructed for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority.
City of Irving construction records list Oklahoma-based Manhattan Construction Group as the contractor for the Cowboys' facility and Summit as the structural engineer. Manhattan is the general contractor for the new Cowboys stadium that will open next season in Arlington.
Bob Bowen, Manhattan's executive vice president, said his company helped protect the outdoor practice field from damage during construction but all the planning and other work was done by Summit.
In a 2003 letter to then-Irving Fire Chief Paul White, Cowboys director of football operations Bruce Mays described the planned facility as "a semi-permanent structure supported by lightweight steel trusses and clad with a fire resistant polymer fabric."
Mays said preliminary discussions between the team and the city had concluded that the building was "a unique type of structure and there could be a variety of interpretations as to what standards should be applied in evaluating the structure to comply with building and fire codes."
Miller, the Irving planning official, said the structure was built to a code that required it stand up to a three-second wind gust of 90 mph.
Records show a city inspector signed off on the building's piers in July 2003. An additional inspection dealing with other facets of the building would have been completed and submitted to the city by Summit, Miller said. That document could not be provided to the AP because it wasn't retained by the city, he said.
Miller said the city would have relied on the contractor's engineer to inspect the job because it differed so markedly from others.
"There's nothing in the code book that says, `Here's how the gauge for lightweight steel membrane structures is supposed to work,"' he said. "We rely in engineers to design something like that and check and make sure it's installed properly."
Here's Monday's report from Valley Ranch...
MyFoxDFW's Peter Daut and Shaun Rabb have the details...
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Cowboys Update: Behm Paralyzed
((HT: Dallas Morning News/Todd Archer))
Rich Behm, a scouting assistant, sustained a fracture to the thoracic spine that caused a severing of his spinal cord and permanent paralysis from the waist down. He underwent surgery Saturday night and remains at Parkland Hospital in stable condition. ((The collapse is pictured, thanks Michael Ainsworth/DMN))
Behm moved from the team's video department to scouting a few years ago and worked closely with Chris Hall, the team's college scouting coordinator, and director of college and pro scouting Tom Ciskowski.
Owner and general manager Jerry Jones and coach Wade Phillips spent a large part of Saturday night/Sunday morning with the Behm family. More coaches and players visited the hospital today.
"To the Behm family we extend our love, comfort, and the full support of every person and resource within the organization," Jones said in a statement released by the team." Rich is a courageous member of our family and someone for whom we care deeply. We ask for all friends and fans of the Dallas Cowboys to join us in embracing him and his family with their thoughts and prayers at this very difficult time."
The release also stated special teams coach Joe DeCamillis will undergo surgery Monday for a fracture of one of his cervical vertebrae. He is in stable condition without paralysis at Parkland Hospital.
Assistant athletic trainer Greg Gaither had surgery Saturday to repair a fracture of his right tibia and fibula at Baylor University Medical Center. He should be released later this week.
Here is the rest of Jones' statement: "As we share concern for everyone who was touched by this accident, we also extend our heartfelt and best wishes to Coach Joe DeCamillis and his family as they prepare for Joe's surgery tomorrow.
"We are grateful that Greg Gaither's surgery was successful, and we feel blessed that others involved were able to walk away from this accident after receiving medical attention yesterday afternoon.
"The Dallas Cowboys organization would like to express its deepest appreciation to the City of Irving's Fire, Police and medical emergency teams that collectively responded to the accident in the most timely and thorough manner yesterday. We are also grateful to those Cowboys players and staff members who acted so quickly and heroically in the face of personal danger to help those around them who were in need of immediate assistance."
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Saturday Night Update: DeCamillis Breaks Back
((HT: AJC/Marcus Garner))
Dallas Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis broke his back and 11 more were injured when winds just shy of tornado strength ripped through the roof of the team’s indoor practice facility during a rookie minicamp Saturday.
DeCamillis was the Atlanta Falcons special teams coach from 1997-2006.
Former Falcons coach Dan Reeves, DeCamillis’ father-in-law, said the first-year Dallas coach has a couple of broken vertebrae in his lower back.
“They say he’s lucky not to be paralyzed,” said Reeves, adding that DeCamillis probably will have surgery. The coach was seen being removed on a stretcher wearing a neck brace.
The storm hit while 27 players were going through workouts. There were about 70 people in the facility, counting coaches, other team personnel and media, officials said.
Ten of the injured were taken by emergency vehicles. Two others went to hospitals on their own.
"This worked out very, very well from a medical point of view," said Dr. Paul Pepe, head of emergency medical services for Dallas County. "Right now, I think we don't have anybody who is in a life-threatening situation."
Here's the early part of the video shot by FoxDFW's Larry Rodriguez...
You can actually hear someone telling Rodriguez "to be careful. You cut your hand." Rodriguez kept working and would need six stitches to close the wound on his left hand...
((Some audio, obviously, NSFW))
Dallas Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis broke his back and 11 more were injured when winds just shy of tornado strength ripped through the roof of the team’s indoor practice facility during a rookie minicamp Saturday.
DeCamillis was the Atlanta Falcons special teams coach from 1997-2006.
Former Falcons coach Dan Reeves, DeCamillis’ father-in-law, said the first-year Dallas coach has a couple of broken vertebrae in his lower back.
“They say he’s lucky not to be paralyzed,” said Reeves, adding that DeCamillis probably will have surgery. The coach was seen being removed on a stretcher wearing a neck brace.
The storm hit while 27 players were going through workouts. There were about 70 people in the facility, counting coaches, other team personnel and media, officials said.
Ten of the injured were taken by emergency vehicles. Two others went to hospitals on their own.
"This worked out very, very well from a medical point of view," said Dr. Paul Pepe, head of emergency medical services for Dallas County. "Right now, I think we don't have anybody who is in a life-threatening situation."
Here's the early part of the video shot by FoxDFW's Larry Rodriguez...
You can actually hear someone telling Rodriguez "to be careful. You cut your hand." Rodriguez kept working and would need six stitches to close the wound on his left hand...
((Some audio, obviously, NSFW))
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