U.S. District Judge James Bredar on Wednesday refused to delay a civil trial scheduled to begin June 1 for lawsuits stemming from the deadly 2024 collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. The ruling keeps the case on course despite the recent filing of criminal charges against the companies that managed the container ship Dali.
Six construction workers who had been filling potholes on the bridge’s roadway were killed in the early morning hours of March 26, 2024, when the Dali lost power and struck a support pier, sending the span into the Patapsco River.
Bredar’s order rejected requests from Singapore-based Synergy Marine Pte Ltd. and India-based Synergy Maritime Pte Ltd., which had argued that the criminal charges filed May 12 by federal prosecutors warranted a delay of the civil proceedings. Also charged in the indictment was Radhakrishnan Karthik Nair, an Indian national who served as the Dali’s technical superintendent.
Attorneys for the victims’ families had urged the court to maintain the June 1 start date, and following the ruling, victims’ lawyers expressed approval of the decision to keep the civil case moving forward. The civil trial will address multiple claims against the ship manager and owner, including negligence and wrongful death allegations. The collapse of the Key Bridge disrupted a major East Coast shipping route and threw Baltimore’s port into chaos for months. The criminal charges against the companies and Nair are proceeding separately.