Two lawsuits filed in Amtrak deaths

The survivors of two men killed in the May 12 Amtrak crash in Philadelphia filed wrongful-death lawsuits Monday.

The widow of Robert Gildersleeve Jr. alleged that Amtrak's negligence caused last month's derailment, which injured scores and killed eight passengers, including the Maryland executive.

A second suit was filed Monday by Jacqueline Mercita Gaines of Plainsboro, N.J., over the death of her husband, James Marshall Gaines, an Associated Press video-software architect.

Gaines, a 48-year-old father of two, died of a severe chest wound at Temple University Hospital a few hours after the crash.

Several suits have been filed by passengers and Amtrak employees injured in the derailment of Train 188 in Port Richmond, but the suits brought by the families of Gildersleeve and Gaines were the first two involving passengers who were killed.

The Gildersleeve suit alleges that Amtrak's "willful, wanton, and reckless disregard for the safety of its passengers" led to the May 12 derailment when the train approached a dangerous curve at Frankford Junction traveling at 106 m.p.h. The area is subject to a speed limit of 50 m.p.h.

According to the complaint, Gildersleeve, 45, was riding in the first passenger car, which "bore the brunt of the derailment and was unrecognizably mangled as a result."

Rescue and search crews did not recover Gildersleeve's body from the wreckage until nearly 36 hours later.

While he was missing, Gildersleeve's relatives, including his 13-year-old son, Marc, handed out photo fliers in Center City seeking information about him.

Gildersleeve, vice president of corporate accounts in North America for Ecolab, a technology company based in St. Paul, Minn., was traveling from his home in Elkridge, Md., to New York on business when the accident occurred.

"He was a loving, devoted husband and father," lawyer Thomas R. Kline said Monday. "This is the very tragic death of a man in the prime of his life."

Danna Gildersleeve is seeking unspecified damages on behalf of herself, the couple's two teenage children, and Gildersleeve's parents.

Amtrak spokeswoman Christina Leeds declined to comment on the lawsuits.

In all, 19 injury suits have been filed over the derailment in federal courts in New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. Thirteen of those suits were filed in federal court in Philadelphia.

Kline said last week that his Center City firm, Kline & Specter, and lawyers from Salz, Mongeluzzi, Barrett & Bendesky asked a federal court panel to move all the cases and any filed later to Philadelphia so they can be coordinated and handled by a single federal judge.

"They will involve the same factual and legal issues in advance of trial," the filing said.