Construction Law

A federal jury in Michigan delivered what is believed to be the largest civil jury verdict in state history, awarding Consumers Energy Company and DTE Electric Company $394,424,138 in damages against Toshiba America Energy Systems Corporation and Toshiba Corporation. The six-week trial centered on a botched $500 million overhaul of the Ludington Pumped Storage Plant, one of the world's largest hydroelectric facilities. The jury found Toshiba breached its contract by delivering defective work on critical turbine components, including discharge ring extensions that suffered cracking and degradation. The defects restricted two units to just 50 hours of annual operation and made the promised 30-year service life impossible. The jury rejected all of Toshiba's affirmative defenses and counterclaims, holding the contractor fully accountable for its failure to meet contractual standards.

The civil action, Susanne E. Skaf, as Trustee of the Susanne E. Skaf Revocable Trust v. Beydoun Construction, LLC (Case No. CACE-22-004051), centered on a failed renovation project in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Plaintiff Skaf claimed the contractor, Beydoun Construction, fundamentally breached the renovation contract by performing substandard and incomplete work, in addition to acting negligently and filing a fraudulent construction lien. The defense argued Skaf breached the contract first by failing to pay the final balance of $18,800.00 and asserted the economic loss rule as a bar to the negligence claim. After hearing the arguments, the jury in the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit returned a verdict on July 30, 2025. The jury found that Beydoun Construction, LLC, did breach the contract and was negligent, resulting in a total damage award to Skaf of $38,407.00. Crucially, the jury found that the contractor did not file a fraudulent lien and that Skaf did not breach the contract, effectively dismissing the contractor's $18,800.00 counterclaim.