A maintenance worker from Bergen County who sued after falling through a condominium’s worn-out steps faces many health challenges despite a $15 million settlement he received last month, his attorney said.
James Visconti, 59, of Saddle Brook, was servicing the community pool at Harmon Cove IV in Secaucus on Sept. 6, 2018, when wooden steps collapsed beneath him, landing him on his back on the pavement, according to court papers.
After multiple visits to different doctors, Visconti was diagnosed with complex regional pain syndrome, known as CRPS. It is a painful, lifelong medical condition affecting the nerves after a traumatic injury.
“He’s a hardworking guy. During the summertime that (pool work) is a seven-day a week job, very long days,” said Visconti’s attorney, Timothy J. Fonseca of Clifton.
“But he’s never going to work again. He’s had to wait 5 1/2 years for any sort of compensation for this case and he still can’t have closure,” Fonseca said, noting the medical challenges in treating CRPS.
Visconti had serviced the same pool for about 30 years as an employee for Preferred Pool Management Inc., of Fairfield, Fonseca said.
The steps were built in 1986, around the same time the condominium went up. The condo association did not show it had a preventative maintenance plan for the steps that collapsed under Visconti, the attorney said in an interview with NJ Advance Media on Monday.
The lawsuit, filed in October 2019 in New Jersey Superior Court, named the Harmon Cove IV Condominium Association and the Wilkin Management Group, Inc., which oversees the property, as defendants.
Jennifer L. Moran, an attorney representing the condominium association and management company, said she had no comment on the settlement.
Visconti had been using chemicals from the pool house to kill algae in the water and was returning the chemicals when the steps broke under him, Fonseca said.
He went home thinking he had injured his back and ankle. His wife gave him a bag of frozen peas to quell the inflammation. But as the days wore on, so did Visconti’s pain, his lawyer said.
CRPS “starts out small, then it grows and grows and grows and builds over time,” Fonseca said. “It will continue to get worse over time. There is no medical treatment that can stop it or prevent it or heal it.”
According to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, people with severe CRPS can develop secondary psychological problems including depression, anxiety and sometimes post-traumatic stress disorder.
“These conditions can make pain feel worse, reduce activity and brain function, and make it hard for people to seek medical care and engage in rehabilitation and recovery,” the institute states on its website.
Treatments can include physical therapy, casts and opiod medications.
However, “there is no medical treatment that can stop it or prevent it or heal it,” Fonseca said. “It has a tendency to spread throughout the body, so it can hop to different limbs.”
Visconti’s treatment includes nerve block injections, sometimes called “lumbar sympathetic blocks” which are administered at an outpatient surgery center by a surgeon and anesthesiologist.
The cost is between $3,500 and $5,000 per procedure, which includes transportation to the outpatient center, Fonseca said.
“He has been on a schedule where he’s getting them two to three times per month, to help take the edge off the pain. It’s the only thing that’s been effective for him,” Fonseca said.
Initially, worker’s compensation insurance paid for the injections. But, once a third party was found liable for the injury, Visconti becomes responsible for paying for the injections himself, along with the costs of prior injections, his attorney said.
“We needed to prosecute the other side to make sure they were going to pay for all the future medical bills,” Fonseca said.
The $15 million, which will also go toward Visconti’s legal fees, will largely pay for Visconti’s medical care.
“Nobody won the lottery here. This is money for future medical treatment that he needs,” Fonseca said.
Visconti received his CRPS diagnosis in July 2019, and the lawsuit was filed three months later. Visconti at first offered to settle his lawsuit for $2.5 million, but the offer was rejected.
“Their first offer on the case wasn’t until over two years later, and it was for $2 million,” Fonseca said.
But by then, Visconti and his attorney were seeking $35 million. The suit, which alleged the condominium association neglected to keep the property free from hazards, was settled in February for $15 million.
The condo association appeared to have replaced or repaired many of the steps around the property years after Visconti’s accident.
But by then, it was obviously too late for Visconti.
“With CRPS, your life is reduced to waking up, having a moment, and then realizing this pain is still here and it’s not going away,” the attorney said.
Stories by Anthony G. Attrino
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Anthony G. Attrino may be reached at tattrino@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on X @TonyAttrino. Find NJ.com on Facebook.