In August 2013, Jose Martin Sandoval was working on Qualcomm’s campus to help upgrade a main circuit breaker. While working, another party on the site removed a protective panel and exposed a live circuit, resulting in Sandoval suffering burns to over 35 percent of his body.
After the accident, Sandoval was hospitalized for over a month in San Diego, surpassing over $1 million in medical bills. In Sandoval’s claim against the company, his lawyers Dan Powell and Michael O’Connor asserted that Qualcomm and others were negligent, failing to fulfill their duty of providing a safe work environment.
On the day of the incident, Frank Sharghi, an electrical engineer, had traveled to the site in order to inspect on-site generators that were to be upgraded. Sandoval was informed that the entire system would be shut off while the equipment was being inspected, but an arc flash occurred and set Sandoval on fire after he approached a live 4,160-volt circuit breaker after Sharghi removed its protective cover.
Qualcomm defended themselves stating that permission was not given to the contractor to remove the protective cover, and that Sandoval contributed to his own accident by not properly heeding safety warnings or following the rule of “assume it is hot until you prove it’s not” when working around electricity.
In February 2016, a San Diego Superior Court jury ruled in favor of Sandoval. The jury cited Qualcomm as being 46 percent at fault, Irvine-based Transpower Testing Inc. who was contracted on the job was 45 percent negligent, and Sandoval himself was minimally negligent for 9 percent of fault.
The jury determined that Jose Martin Sandoval should receive excess of $7 million in damages.
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