PROVIDENCE — The eight acrobats who suffered permanent injuries after plummeting more 20 feet during an aerial circus act in 2014 are receiving one of the largest settlements in Rhode Island history, an amount their lawyer described as “just.”
The $52.5 million settlement with the Rhode Island Convention Center Authority, which owns the Dunkin Donuts Center, and SMG, a Pennsylvania-based company that manages and operates the arena, was reached during mediation in early October.
“I’m so happy for our clients. They deserve this. They’ve gone through so much since this incident has happened,” said Providence lawyer Zachary M. Mandell, who represented the eight women “This amount of money will have the ability to make their lives that much better. It’s a great settlement, and it’s a number that all of us see as just.”
Mandell told the Globe that the details of the settlement are still being finalized. The payment will be made by the insurers.
During a crowded noontime show on May 4, 2014, the eight Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus acrobats were performing the “Medeiros Hair Hang Act” — dangling by their ponytails from a chandelier-type apparatus that raised them to the ceiling.
A video recorded by an audience member shows the beginning of their performance: A curtain dropped to reveal the women, suspended gracefully by the hair high above the floor of the Dunkin Donuts Center.
“Suspended only by a string,” the announcer boomed. And then, suddenly, the device and the women crashed to the floor.
“Were they meant to fall like that?” one woman is overheard saying on the video, as others rushed to help.
Mandell declined to specify the extent of the injuries suffered by the eight women, citing their medical privacy, though he has said some of them were no longer able to work. At the time, they were described as having broken bones, head injuries, and lacerations. A performer standing on the ground was also injured, but was not part of the settlement.
“There were just girls laying on the floor,” said Eddie Brundage of Wareham, Mass., who was with his wife and daughters, ages 3 and 4, told the Globe in 2014. “We took our kids right out; we didn’t want them to see.”
Ashli Croinex of Peabody, Mass., said she was sitting about six or seven rows away from the ring. She told the Globe in 2014 that after the rig crashed to the ground, a performer who had been standing below was bloody and shaking. That performer was “the only one able to get up,” she said. “The rest of them were just silent. They didn’t even move.”
During a 2016 press conference, the women were wearing neck braces; some of them were in wheelchairs.
“They were life-altering injuries, in the extent that they fell from a great height with a very heavy metal apparatus that fell on top of them,” Mandell said. “You can’t go through something like that and not have it alter your life.”
In 2016, the eight women filed a lawsuit against the Convention Center Authority and SMG, alleging that SMG is responsible for safety protocols at its own venue and was negligent in allowing the performances and not inspecting or inquiring about the safety of the structure used in the act, and failed to discover that the equipment was not safely designed.
The US Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration investigated the crash and determined that circus staff had overloaded the sole carabiner that was holding the apparatus from which the women were suspended.
A spokesman for the Rhode Island judiciary, Craig Berke, said that the company that made the carabiner settled with the performers for $2 million.
OSHA cited the circus’ parent company, Feld Entertainment Inc., of Palmetto, Fla., for a “serious” infraction of industry practice and imposed the maximum possible fine of $7,000. The circus had initially contested the citation and penalties, and in a settlement, agreed to enact ongoing safety enhancements in aerial acts. The circus closed in 2017.
Feld was not included in the performer’s lawsuit.
Feld has been paying worker’s compensation, which under Rhode Island law means the company is not subject to damages. Mandell said that’s the reason the performers did not make any direct claims against Feld.
SMG is suing Feld, alleging that the crash was solely caused by Feld’s negligence, and Feld is responsible for legal fees and settlement costs.
Feld had participated in the mediation sessions with SMG and the Convention Center Authority and was offered an opportunity to contribute to the settlement, according to court files. SMG is requesting a jury trial and asking the court to find Feld responsible for its legal fees and settlement costs.
Amanda Milkovits can be reached at amanda.milkovits@globe.com. Follow her @AmandaMilkovits.