The recent incident faced by United Airlines, which involved dragging off one of its passengers from the plane, caught the attention of many people around the world.
Even though there seem to be several versions and sides of the story, David Dao, who was on board United Airlines Flight 3411 suffered injuries including a concussion and a broken nose. With this, Dao's hired lawyers revealed in a press conference on Thursday that they may file a lawsuit against the airlines.
"This lawsuit will hopefully generate not just a national discussion, but an international discussion about how [passengers] are going to be treated going forward," said Thomas Demetrio, the lawyer representing Dao.
If Dao's camp indeed pursues the case, he may get a sizeable amount of money from the settlement. Arthur Wolk, an Aviation law expert, told Town & Country that the victim has a very good case against the airline. Wolk also believes that it would be more beneficial for United Airlines to talk to Dao and offer him a reasonable compensation as settlement for the case.
Likewise, in an interview with International Business Times on Thursday, James Goodnow, a lawyer at Lamber-Goodnow Injury Law Team, said that Dao will likely receive millions in compensation. "The only question is how many zeros will follow the first number," he added.
Goodnow also shared that the case clearly favors Dao, especially since there were several videos taken during the incident. Also, regardless of the airline's reasons to justify their side, they breached other rights of the passenger including breach of contract, defamation and inflicting emotional distress.
"The real money is going to come in the area of emotional distress damages — the pain and suffering. We call those general damages. That's where you can juice this up from a monetary perspective," Goodnow explained.
The lawyer elaborated that the settlement is typically pegged at around three or four times more than the estimated medical cost of the injured party. However, since Dao's case caught the public eye, United Airlines will most likely offer a settlement.
"Imagine what would happen if you have a public trial and every reporter is covering it. Every day will be another paper cut for United," Goodnow said. He added that the airline will not even attempt to give a lowball offer, saying, "I think they're going to come in with the biggest number they can to get this put to bed as soon as possible."
