Dancer Paralyzed By O'Hare Bus Shelter Wins $115M Settlement

CHICAGO, IL — A Vernon Hills dancer who won a nearly $150 million judgment in a personal injury case last summer after she was paralyzed by a collapsing bus shelter at O'Hare International Airport has reached a settlement with the City of Chicago, the injured woman's lawyers said Tuesday. The $115 million settlement with Tierney Darden, 26, was reached after the city challenged the $148 million verdict in her favor, according to a press release from Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard, the law firm representing Darden.

Darden — a 2009 Vernon Hills High School graduate who was a dancer at Truman College at the time of the accident — was paralyzed from the waist down when a 750-pound bus shelter near the airport's Terminal 2 fell on her during a storm Aug. 2, 2015. She was with her mother and sister, then 19, and the three had returned to Chicago from Minneapolis, where they had been shopping for bridesmaid dresses for a wedding, Darden's lawyers said.

During the trial, medical experts testfied that the falling shelter stretched and ripped Darden's spinal cord, severing it. Darden now requires 24-hour care because of the injury.

"My face hit the ground, there was a crack and a white light and everything went numb," Darden said during her trial. "I knew I was paralyzed. The pain I feel every day is like torture."

RELATED: Paralyzed Dancer Wins Nearly $150M In Lawsuit Against Chicago

According to court documents, bolts were missing from the shelter, and the city admitted wrongful conduct in the accident five months before the trial. Both sides tried to reach a settlement during the trial, but neither side could agree to terms then.

The jury deliberated for only four hours following a 10-day trail before reaching a decision in favor of Darden. The $148 million verdict had been the largest handed down by a Cook County jury.

But both parties revisited negotiating a settlement when the city argued that the jury award was "excessive," according to Darden's attorneys.

"Although we believed the verdict would have been upheld on appeal, when weighing the risks and benefits, we felt this was a fair compromise," Patrick A. Salvi, Darden's lead lawyer in the case, stated in a release. "Tierney has a long, difficult life ahead of her; these funds will help her obtain all the necessary medical care for the remaining decades of her life."

The $115 million, personal injury settlement is the largest for an individual plaintiff in Illinois history, according to the Illinois Jury Verdict Reporter. In May, the state settled a Cook County medical malpractice case for $47.5 million.

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