Woman Files Suit After Son Fatally Electrocuted While Working

A woman has filed suit alleging that her son died of the personal injuries he suffered when he was electrocuted while working under contract for Forrest Lerch Enterprises.

Star A. Lange filed suit in Illinois’ Madison County Circuit Court on March 30 seeking damages in excess of $200,000 for the wrongful death of her son, Christopher L. Lange, on November 19.

According to Lange, her son was working for K.O. Construction, which had been contracted by Forrest Lerch for residential construction services.

Lange says that her son moved a ladder while he was working at the site on November 19. She claims the ladder came into contact with a 7,200-volt power line in the work area, which caused his electrocution and death.

Lange claims that her son’s death has caused his family to suffer the loss of his society, love, affection, care, attention, companionship, comfort, guidance, and financial support in addition to substantial grief and sorrow. She also claims his family has incurred substantial medical, hospital, and funeral expenses.

The suit alleges negligence on the part of Forrest Lerch for failure to reasonably inspect the premises, failure to shut off the power to the overhead lines, providing a workplace that allowed workers to work around power circuits with no protection, failure to ensure that workers and their tools would not come into contact with power lines, failure to warn, and providing a workplace where a worker using a ladder without nonconductive siderails could contact exposed power lines.