The family of Gloucester fisherman Giuseppe “Joe” Cracchiolo, who died in a 2011 fall from a New Bedford dock, has received a total of $1.35 million in two settlements, the second reached while the jury still deliberated at the end of a 10-day trial.
Eastern Fisheries, which leased and legally controlled the dock on New Bedford Harbor, ended a three-year legal battle last week when it agreed to pay $900,000 to settle the wrongful death lawsuit the Cracchiolo family filed against it and the O’Hara Corp.
The first settlement came in September 2012, when O’Hara Corp, based in Rockport, Maine, agreed to pay the family $450,000 to settle its portion of the action.
Cracchiolo, 47, was a crewman aboard the herring fishing vessel Sunlight on Jan. 28, 2011, when he fell into the frigid waters of New Bedford Harbor while returning from dinner.
The boat had docked at the New Bedford pier to undergo repairs. Cracchiolo and another crew member stayed with it while the maintenance was being performed. The two were returning to the boat after having gone out to eat, when Cracchiolo slipped on the icy dock and fell into the harbor.
Gloucester attorney Joseph M. Orlando, who represented the Cracchiolo family in the trial in U.S. District Court in Boston, said Cracchiolo slipped and fell because the dock was covered with snow and ice.
“We argued that it was a violation of OSHA regulations not to make that dock perfectly safe,” Orlando said Thursday.
Eastern Fisheries resisted settling, claiming in its defense that Cracchiolo shared negligence in the event. The company also claimed it was an act of God.
Orlando countered with video and photographic evidence that showed the perilous state of the dock. He said the most compelling was a piece of police surveillance video showing Cracchiolo trying to hoist himself up onto a platform to board the Sunlight about 1 a.m., only to slip and plunge about 20 feet into the freezing waters.
His body was found at 7:30 later that morning, floating next to the Sunlight.
The trial already had gone to the jury, according to Orlando, when he was approached by attorneys for Eastern Fisheries about a possible settlement.
“Part of me wanted to wait on the jury, because I believe (the compensation) would have been higher,” Orlando said. “But the most important thing was making sure the Cracchiolo family was going to be taken care of.”
