BROOKLYN, N.Y. (PIX11) — A Brazilian tourist whose limbs were severed after she was struck by a train at a Brooklyn subway station nearly 10 years ago has been awarded almost $82 million, according to court records.
The jury last week sided with Luisa Janssen Harger Da Silva in her civil case against the MTA, claiming the train operator should have been able to stop the train before it hit the then 21-year-old student.
Da Silva was with her boyfriend on the platform of the B and Q lines when she fainted onto the tracks and was struck by a train at the Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Center subway station on Aug. 2, 2016, according to the civil complaint filed in Brooklyn Federal Court in 2017.
Her left arm was severed above the elbow, and her left leg was amputated above the knee, lawyers said. She underwent multiple surgeries during a 24-day stay at Bellevue Hospital.
The jury decided the MTA was negligent and awarded Da Silva $70 million for physical pain, suffering, and emotional distress, and another $10 million for medical expenses, according to court records. The tourist got an additional $1.7 million for future lost earnings.
“Almost all of the deaths and the more than a thousand catastrophic injuries could have been prevented had the authorities used platform edge protection to stop people from falling onto the subway tracks,” the complaint said.
The MTA installed platform barriers at 56 subway stations in three boroughs earlier this year, officials said. The metal barriers were placed on the Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 lines as well as on the E, J, L, M, R, and Z lines in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens in July.
The MTA has appealed the case.
The agency could not immediately be reached on Wednesday.
Mira Wassef is a digital reporter who has covered news and sports in the NYC area for more than a decade. She has been with PIX11 News for two years. See more of her work here.
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