Jury holds New York railroad company responsible for railroad crossing accident in 2015 that killed six people

A commuter railroad bears primary responsibility for a violent and fatal collision between a train and an SUV at a railroad crossing in a New York suburb in 2015. This was the decision of a jury in a verdict that also determined how any damages should be divided.

The verdict handed down Tuesday found Metro-North Railroad 71% responsible for the deaths of five passengers and injuries to others, and 63% responsible for the death of the SUV driver whose car was on the tracks. The jury blamed the train’s engineer, Steven Smalls, a Metro-North employee, and the railroad’s oversight of the line’s electrified power rail.

The jury in White Plains, New York, also found SUV driver Ellen Brody 37 percent responsible for her own death and 29 percent responsible for the deaths and injuries of her passengers.

The damage will be decided at a later court hearing. A date has not yet been set.

Andrew Maloney, a lawyer for some of the 30 or so injured passengers, estimates that compensation for all those killed and injured could amount to several hundred million dollars.

He and another lawyer for the injured passengers, Ben Rubinowitz, said Thursday they were satisfied with the verdict.

“Hopefully Metro-North will really pay more attention to passenger safety from now on,” Rubinowitz said.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which operates the railroad, disagrees with the ruling and is “exploring all legal options,” said spokesman Aaron Donovan.

A lawyer for Brody’s family said he was pleased the jury agreed the railroad company and the engineer were negligent, but he was disappointed by the amount of blame assigned to them.

“When you look at the facts of the case, she really did nothing wrong,” said attorney Philip Russotti.

Messages have been sent to the engineer’s lawyers and other parties involved in this complex case requesting comment.

A Metro-North train struck Brody’s SUV at a railroad crossing in Valhalla, about 20 miles north of New York City, during the evening rush hour on February 3, 2015.

Brody, a jewelry store employee on her way to a business meeting, had driven through a traffic jam in an unfamiliar area onto the tracks in the dark. When the barrier hit her SUV, she got out, took a look at the car, got back in, and continued driving toward the tracks.

Three seconds before the collision, the train driver applied the emergency brake, but the train crashed into Brody’s SUV at a speed of about 80 km/h and pushed him across the tracks.

A piece of the live conductor rail was ripped from the ground, piercing the SUV’s gas tank and cutting through the train’s first passenger car, which was carrying burning debris.

“It was like a burning spear,” Rubinowitz said.

The National Transportation Safety Board found that the design of the conductor rail played a role in the deaths and injuries. The board said it was a potential safety issue because the railroad did not have a mechanism for “controlled failures” that would sever the conductor rail in such situations.

The NTSB concluded that Brody’s conduct was the probable cause of the accident, but her family and attorney contend that she was put in danger by inadequate warning signs, a poorly designed railroad crossing, a traffic light that gave cars too little time to clear the tracks of oncoming trains, and the failure of the train engineer to reduce speed when he spotted the reflection of something dark on the tracks ahead.

“All she needed was two or three more seconds” to cross the tracks, Russotti said by phone Thursday.

Lawyers for the injured passengers argued that the train driver bore greater responsibility than Brody.

“We put it very simply: He was obligated to slow down,” Rubinowitz said by phone.

Smalls, the train driver, testified in court that he did not know what the reflection was, according to LoHud.com. He told jurors he honked his horn instead of immediately hitting the brakes, fearing that an abrupt stop could injure passengers.

“I have to relive this every day of my life,” said Smalls, who was injured in the accident. According to LoHud.com, he settled with Metro-North for $1 million in 2019.

The settlement angered the injured passengers, Maloney said.

“It was quite insulting that the guy who was partly responsible for the collision was paid a substantial sum several years ago and the injured passengers have received nothing until now,” he said by phone.