Boeing crash’s echo: the dead’s relatives seeking indemnity in Kazan and Athens courts
Novo-Savinovo Court started to consider actions of people whose relatives were passengers of the crashed plane in 2013, but respondents ask to consider the insurance that was already paid
Examination of lawsuits of relatives of the victims of the air crash in Kazan started very calm against the background of headline-making actions of Tatfondbank. Relatives of the dead ask for compensation of moral damage caused by loss of breadwinners. The number of claims reached 50, 17 companies are among the respondents. Curiously, the consideration of the lawsuits is taking almost simultaneously with legal actions in Greece. A correspondent of Realnoe Vremya visited the start of the process.
''The relatives play it safe''
Novo-Savinovsk District Court of Kazan received lawsuits from 50 claimants – family members of the crew and passengers who died in the air crash. 17 companies including Boeing, TERRA FIRMA – the owner of AWAS Irish leasing company that leased the Boeing 737-500 that crashed in Kazan, C 7 Engineering, Ak Bars Insurance and Tatarstan airline.
According to the claimants' representatives who are Sergis college of advocates, at the moment, there were just three court hearings in total. They all were postponed due to procedural requirements. The court in particular needs to confirm the fact that the foreign respondents were informed about the start of the action. Curiously, Themis' workers in Athens will consider the lawsuit on compensation for moral damage simultaneously with their Kazan colleagues because the respondents have property in Greece. The first analogous hearing on the case is scheduled for 27 April.
''The relatives play it safe this way because the limitation period is 3 years. The case in Greece was not permitted by this term (17.11.2016). Complaints were also made in Russia to avoid the omission of the limitation,'' Sergis representative Lyudmila Bochkareva explained.
''We don't understand the sum''
Representatives of the claimants don't name the total sum of the claims explaining it by the ''specifics of each case''.
''Depending on specifics of each case, lawsuits on compensation of moral damage caused by loss of breadwinners are different. Consequently, the sum of each lawsuit is different,'' Sergis noted.
At the same time, at the hearing on the case of passenger Airat Sadrutdinov's relatives, a representative of the local airline noted that the claimants did not mention the circumstances that affect the sum of the declared moral damage.
''Airline is an entity that is responsible for moral damage. The sum is the point. The claimants mentioned some individual features of their grandmother, brother or sister but they don't explain the sum. We don't understand the sum. We think that while defining the size of moral damage it is necessary to consider that this family already got 2 million rubles as obligatory insurance,'' the airline representative said during the preliminary hearing.
Court hearings scheduled for March-April
According to data of the card indexes of Novo-Savinovo District Court of Kazan, hearings on lawsuits of relatives of the deceased passengers are scheduled for March-April 2017. Sergis says that 17 civil cases were open, and the number of respondents in Russia and Greece is different because in Russia lawsuits against Ak Bars Insurance CJSC that Tatarstan airline signed an insurance agreement of the vehicle with as well as civil liability insurance with were filed.
''It is necessary to consider the presence of a civil liability insurance. The position of Novo-Savinovo District Court of Kazan that already denied reclamation of this insurance in three cases (Editor's Note: at preliminary hearings) is unclear,'' the Sergis representative noted.
The agreement between Ak Bars Insurance CJSC and Tatarstan airline PJSC is needed to explain the responsibility of the insurer, as the claimants' representatives say. It, in turn, gives the affected party the right to file a lawsuit against the insurer.
Reference
A plane that belonged to Tatarstan airline operated a flight from Domodedovo to Kazan crushed on 17 November 2013 in Kazan. The plane crushed during an aborted landing. All 50 people on board died.
Defining the cause of the crash, the Interstate Aviation Committee came to a conclusion that the pilot of the crashed plane went to another circuit. However, he did not have enought skills to recover from this situation. As a result, the plane had an excessive nose-up attitude and crashed. Moreover, the plane had to go another circuit due to flight system errors while finding the location – Boeing was 4 km off the route during the final approach.