Mason Falls Five Feet Through Scaffold Gap on Longfellow Bridge, Wins $26.6 Million Verdict

On May 9, 2014, John Rooney, Jr. was working as a union mason steward on the Longfellow Bridge rehabilitation project, a major public construction job spanning the Charles River between Boston and Cambridge. While moving across interior scaffold decking inside one of the bridge towers, he stepped into a two-foot opening in the planking and fell more than five feet onto concrete debris below. The gap violated OSHA scaffolding regulations and basic site-safety requirements.

Rooney sustained catastrophic injuries to his back, neck, and legs. Over the years that followed, he underwent nine operations in total, including seven spinal surgeries that left his spine largely fused with plates and screws. He has not been able to return to work. Medical expenses reached roughly $400,000 by late 2018, with further treatment anticipated.

Andrew Abraham of Keches Law Group served as lead trial counsel, joined by Melissa Brennan of Feinberg, Dumont and Brennan as co-counsel. They targeted the construction joint venture White-Skanska-Consigli, which held the general contract for the rehabilitation project. The theory centered on the adequacy of the scaffold decking, the absence of required fall protection, and the failure of the joint venture's safety oversight to catch an obvious open hole in a work platform workers crossed daily.

After an eight-day trial in Middlesex County, the jury deliberated for under three hours before returning a $26.6 million verdict in August 2021. The award broke down to $1 million in past medical expenses, $2.1 million in past lost earning capacity, $5.5 million in past pain and suffering, and $18 million in future pain and suffering. Because the case had been delayed by COVID-19, pre-judgment interest accrued on top of the verdict, bringing the total compensatory judgment to approximately $45.5 million.

The litigation continued beyond that judgment. Rooney separately pursued a bad-faith claim under Massachusetts Chapter 93A and Chapter 176D against the Liberty Mutual insurers that covered the construction joint venture, alleging they had refused to investigate or attempt settlement for six years despite clear liability. In September 2025, a Suffolk Superior Court judge found the carriers had willfully violated the state's unfair claims settlement statutes and doubled the compensatory amount under the statute, producing a total judgment of more than $91 million.