A Kentucky woman sued a woodchipper manufacturer Wednesday, saying the company negligently caused her son’s 2024 workplace death in Wyoming by selling a less-safe type of woodchipper as a cheaper alternative to types that could have prevented his death.
Brenda Crnkovich filed her wrongful death suit in the U.S. District Court for Wyoming against Michigan-based Bandit Industries, Inc.
Her son William Crnkovich died June 18, 2024, at the age of 43. He was born in Montpelier, Idaho, graduated from Wyoming’s Star Valley High School in 1998, and deployed in Iraq as part of his decade of service in the Army National Guard, his obituary says.
He was medically discharged in 2007, the obituary adds.
He left behind a daughter and other family.
Signed by Etna-based attorney Jack Edwards, the lawsuit brings three causes of action against Bandit: negligence, wrongful death and liability for an allegedly dangerous product.
The complaint calls for a jury trial to recover compensatory and punitive damages, plus other costs, pre- and post-judgment interest, and other relief “to which she may be justly entitled.”
Kaden Canfield of Edwards’ firm Edwards Law Office and Robert E. Ammons and Elizabeth Lawrence of the Texas-based Ammons Law Firm are also listed as counsel for Brenda Crnkovich.
Bandit did not return an email and voicemail request for comment by publication.
On this Date…
William Crnkovich was clearing land for home construction in Lincoln County on June 18, 2024, using a Bandit Intimidator 18XP woodchipper, the lawsuit says.
That’s a drum-style, hand-fed chipper marketed as “highly productive” with an 18-inch capacity and two hydraulic motors providing around 4,480 pounds of pulling power, the document adds. Edwards wrote that the woodchipper was designed without a pressure-activated “bump bar,” or safety feature that, the complaint asserts, would have prevented William’s death by triggering a hydraulic shut-off valve that stops the feed rollers.
While Bandit can build the bump bar and offers it on other models, wrote Edwards, the manufacturer “chose to treat this life-saving feature as a revenue opportunity rather than a safety obligation.”
The complaint says the woodchipper also lacked a woodchipper safety shield, which deactivates when it detects magnetic bands worn on the user’s wrists and ankles.
The machine pulled William’s left leg into it. He tried “frantically” to grab for the last-chance cable to kill the machine, the complaint says.
Another worker turned the machine off and ran for help, it adds.
Edwards wrote that William “remained alive and conscious for approximately 35 minutes until succumbing to his catastrophic injuries,” and that he “was left frantically reaching for a last-chance cable while being pulled into the blades by 4,480 pounds of force.”
The attorney called this a “preventable consequence of Bandit’s choice to sell safety.”
Don’t Send A Bank Teller
The fire department was called to the scene near Alpine, Wyoming, at 1:34 p.m. that day on a report that a man had gotten entangled in a woodchipper, Alpine Fire Chief Mike Vogt told Cowboy State Daily at the time.
One of about five firefighters on scene, Vogt pulled the man out of the device, he said.
A Star Valley Health Ambulance supervisor and five EMTs were on scene as well, said ambulance director Bud Clark at the time.
Two Lincoln County Sheriff’s deputies also responded.
The fire crew extricated William by disassembling part of the woodchipper and lifting the cutting drum. The woodchipper appeared brand new, Vogt noted.
Edwards alleges that it was kept stock or unaltered from its factory state.
Clark said some of his EMTs knew William personally, and one had served with him in the military.
“That’s the problem with doing (emergency medical service) in a small community like ours,” said Clark. “We always end up running on people that we know.”
That can add to the trauma responders face, he said.
Clark hosted a critical incident stress debriefing that evening, where the first responders who attended were able to discuss the incident and shed tears. He said counseling and mental health are important components within the agency.
“This is not a normal job,” said Clark. “If you sent a bank teller to the scene we had up there, they’d be messed up for life.”
Not Survivable
Clark said the woodchipper incident was not survivable.
Vogt agreed, saying the injuries to the victim were too fatal to plague responders with thoughts of how they could have saved the man.
Though bleak, the thought helps fight back waves of guilt, said Vogt at the time.
“There’s no way on this you could question: ‘We could have done this, or we could have done this to save him,’” he said. “There wouldn’t have been enough … time.”
