By Shannon Duffy

A federal jury yesterday awarded a quadriplegic man $10 million in his suit against the seller and maker of a plastic pool liner and $250,000 to his ex-wife for the loss of his companionship.

Richard Fleck, a 28-year-old engineer from Orchard Park, N.Y., was paralyzed from the chest down following the May 1987 accident in West Chester, Pa., in which he dove into a friend’s pool from a wooden deck.

Neck Broken

Fleck broke his neck when his hands slipped upon hitting the pool liner, which made the above-ground pool deceptively shallow, according to the original complaint.

Fleck’s attorneys, David Binder and A. Roy DeCaro, argued that the liner’s warning labels, which measured three by four inches, were inadequate. The labels warned against jumping and diving and described the pool as four feet deep.

The verdict, described by DeCaro as the largest ever in the United States in a case involving an above-ground pool, is likely to be the subject of heated debate in the coming months in part because of oddities in the way the jury answered its questionnaire.

After a 12-day trial on the issue of liability, the jury found on Oct. 18 that the homeowner, James Hubert, was 36 percent negligent, and that Fleck was 64 percent negligent—an answer which has the legal result of exonerating the homeowner. Under law, the homeowner must be at least 50 percent negligent to be held liable, according to DeCaro.

The jury then found that the liner lacked an element of safety, that it was substantially responsible for Fleck’s injuries, and that Fleck had not assumed the risk.

The oddity, which may jeopardize the verdict, came in the third question, on the issue of causation, in which the jury decided that the homeowner was 60 percent responsible and that the liner was 40 percent responsible.

Directed Verdict

Prior to that portion of the verdict, Harry Mahoney, who represented Nichols Pools of Doylestown, was granted a directed verdict on the issue of indemnity against the counterclaim defendant, Doughboy Recreational Inc., a division of Hoffinger Industries, the maker of the liner.

But Mahoney said he will nonetheless be filing post-trial motions asking U.S. District Judge Ronald J. Buckwalter to mold the verdict.

Because Nichols is in bankruptcy and the Flecks agreed to accept a verdict no larger than its insurance coverage, which is slightly less than $1 million, Mahoney said he will be asking for a molding based on that figure.

In the alternative, Mahoney said he would ask the judge to consider the jury’s decision that the liner was only 40 percent of the cause of the accident.

But DeCaro said the jury was aware when it began deliberating on the issue of damages that it would be rendering a figure only as to the seller and maker of the liner.

Robert Korn, Doughboy’s attorney, could not be reached for comment yesterday.