RANCINE, Wisconsin (20 Sep 2003) - Johnson Outdoors Inc. lawyers will be in a California courtroom in November to fight allegations that the Racine-based outdoor equipment manufacturer covered up a defect in a Uwatec dive computer that injured five divers. The trial is just one in a series of problems this year relating to Johnson Outdoors' global diving equipment business. Last month, the company fired the head of its international scuba business, Mamdouh Ashour, a 30-year company veteran. The California case, to be tried before a federal court jury in Oakland on Nov. 7, focuses on the 1995 Aladin Air X Nitrox, a product that was produced by Uwatec AG in Switzerland before Johnson acquired the company in 1997. In the lawsuit, Robert Raimo, an experienced diver who has explored the wrecks of the Andrea Doria and USS Kendrick, claims that he suffered from decompression sickness - commonly known as the bends - because he relied on the Aladin computer. Raimo, a former dive equipment dealer and dive instructor who lives in New York, was stricken after diving in Bonaire, in the Netherlands Antilles, in April 2002, according to the lawsuit. "I was one of their biggest retailers," Raimo said in an interview. "I'm on the cover of one of their owner manuals." Raimo said he continues to have symptoms from his decompression sickness and is no longer able to dive. "The more I think of it, I just get angrier and angrier and angrier," Raimo said. "This was preventable." Johnson Outdoors recalled the 1995 Aladin computers on Feb. 5, the same day that attorney David Concannon filed the lawsuit on behalf of Raimo in Oakland. The timing is coincidental, according to the company, a publicly traded business that is controlled by the family of Samuel C. Johnson and headed by his daughter, Helen Johnson-Leipold. Johnson Outdoors spokeswoman Cynthia Georgeson said the company's policy is not to comment on pending litigation "even though we believe the facts surrounding these allegations will show Johnson Outdoors acted responsibly." Georgeson said: "In the course of our investigation of a complaint filed in 2002 (the first that provided any substantiation that a 1995 Air X Nitrox was even present during an alleged incident), we discovered that under extreme and rare dive situations, the product could malfunction. We reported our findings and intention to recall the product to the CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) in October of 2002, and the recall was executed upon CPSC's approval in February 2003." Johnson Outdoors settled a case filed in 2002 by diver David Sipperly, who claimed to have been injured after relying on an Aladin Nitrox computer for dives in 2000. Three other cases, filed by divers Mitchell Skaggs, Rezvan Iazdi and Stewart Esposito, are pending in the Oakland Federal Court and are listed as related cases to the Raimo action. The Raimo case has been divided into phases, the first of which will determine whether the 1995 Aladin computer was defective. Johnson's recall of the product is not an admission that the computer was defective, and the company has denied allegations of a defect in its response to the Raimo complaint. "The simple fact that they have recalled the product doesn't mean anything," said Allen Schlinsog, an attorney with Rinehart Boerner Van Deuren Norris & Rieselbach. Schlinsog, who specializes in product liability cases, has no connection to the Johnson Outdoors lawsuits. According to the company's recall notice filed with the Safety Commission, the Aladin Air X Nitrox computers may inaccurately calculate desaturation times, resulting in possible decompression sickness. Designed for repetitive dives The Aladin Air X Nitrox computer was designed to help divers who breath nitrox, a form of enriched air that consists of up to 50% oxygen and as little as 50% nitrogen, and who make multiple-day, repetitive dives, according to the company's response to the lawsuit. | | Raimo's lawsuit claims that he and the other divers suffered from decompression sickness because they relied on the defective computers to calculate the amount of time they could safely stay beneath the surface on their repetitive dives. Decompression sickness results from the formation of gas bubbles in the diver's tissues during ascent. Symptoms, which may occur at any time within 24 hours after a dive, include skin itching, mottling and severe pains in and around larger joints. In severe, untreated cases, there may be long-term complications such as partial paralysis, according to the American Medical Association Encyclopedia of Medicine. Johnson Outdoors, in its response filed with the court, admits that "certain Aladin Air X Nitrox computers manufactured during 1995 would, when a diver using enriched air surfaced and ended a dive, continue to calculate as though the diver were breathing whatever percentage of enriched air had been used on a previous dive." The company denies that a design or manufacturing error caused a defect in the computer. Johnson also denies Raimo's allegations that its executives knew about the alleged defect as early as 1996 and refused to recall the product. In the lawsuit, Raimo alleges that Uwatec managers, prior to the sale of the company to Johnson Outdoors, became aware of a defect, notified Uwatec's owners and prepared a recall notice. The managers were fired and the recall didn't happen, the lawsuit says. Two of the managers, Frank Marshall and Patricia Daugherty, filed a lawsuit against Uwatec in Greenville, S.C., where the company's U.S. headquarters was located. The pair won a $2 million jury verdict in that case in 1998, then later settled with the company for an undisclosed amount and signed a confidentiality agreement. The Raimo lawsuit refers to Marshall and Daugherty as "whistle-blowers." Johnson Outdoors denies that description and says the company was told that they were disgruntled former employees when Johnson bought Uwatec in 1997. "We had no reason to disbelieve what we were told by the Uwatec management at that time, especially since the former employees' initial complaint didn't mention anything about either a product defect, or allege that their release was due to whistle-blowing," Georgeson said. Johnson Outdoors asked questions later, after the former Uwatec managers amended their complaint to include the whistle-blower allegations, but Uwatec assured Johnson that there was no validity to the allegations, Georgeson said. Coverup allegation is key The allegations of a coverup are key to Raimo's claim for punitive damages. "Plaintiffs seek punitive damages all the time," Schlinsog said of product liability cases in general. "They're not awarded very often." Johnson Outdoors issued another, unrelated, recall in July of three recently-manufactured dive computers. The July recall involves Uwatec brand SmartPro, ProUltra and SportPlus dive computers. Johnson Outdoors also disclosed this year that the company's global Scubapro business in France was being investigated by the European Commission's competition division. The commission said it was considering imposing an unspecified fine on the company, but the reason for the inquiry was not disclosed. Johnson has filed a lawsuit against Ashour, alleging that the former diving division executive filed phony expense reports, paid unauthorized bonuses to certain employees and attempted to harm the diving division so he could buy it for a price below its true value. |
