Berkeley woman who lost legs to Austrian train can’t sue in U.S.

A Berkeley woman who lost her legs when she fell through a gap on a railway platform in Austria and was hit by a train can’t sue the railroad in the United States, where she bought her ticket, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday.

A federal appeals court in San Francisco ruled two years ago that Sachs could sue OBB, the Austrian national railroad, in a U.S. court because the railroad’s duty to treat its passenger with care arose from the commercial relationship it had established with her in the United States.

“All of her claims turn on the same tragic episode in Austria, allegedly caused by wrongful conduct and dangerous conditions in Austria, which led to injuries suffered in Austria,” Chief Justice John Roberts said in the unanimous decision.

Stanford law Professor Jeffrey Fisher, who represented Sachs before the high court, said the ruling was disappointing but relatively narrow and did not necessarily offer blanket protection to foreign government-owned railroads or airlines that solicit customers in the United States.

Sachs, who works as an administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in San Francisco, was boarding a train in Innsbruck in April 2007 when she slipped through a gap, fell through the tracks and was struck by the train.

The railroad said the train had already been moving before Sachs tried to board it, but first sought to dismiss the suit based on a U.S. law that shields foreign nations from lawsuits for governmental actions.