A former JP Morgan analyst was recently awarded a compensation of $35 million (about Rs 292 crore) after the glass door of a building in New York City suddenly shattered on her leaving her with permanent brain damage. The incident had happened in 2015, the New York Post reported.
A CCTV footage of the incident that is now doing rounds on social media show the 7.5-foot-tall lobby door almost exploding as Meghan Brown, now 36, walked through it after a physical therapy appointment in the building. “I do remember seeing glass, like, everywhere, in the lobby, near me,” she told the Manhattan Supreme Court during the three-week trial in which jurors were shown the surveillance footage.
Brown said she didn’t remember the moment the door shattered on her but could remember “being inside and I was on the floor. At that point there were people helping me” and glass strewn all around her.
The incident caused a traumatic brain injury to Brown who was then a 27-year-old, leading to the end of her promising career in investment banking. She told jurors the injuries cost her her job as a high-level analyst at JP Morgan, made her unable to carry out everyday tasks and even destroyed her love life. It also led her to losing her sense of smell and taste, and completely forgetting how to understand Spanish, a language she was once fluent in.
“One of the biggest problems I have with my brain is that I can’t trust it,” the New York Post quoted her as saying during the trial.
Brown was diagnosed with PTSD, her executive function has slowed and her memory, focus and vocabulary have all suffered, she told the court.
A year after the incident in New York, Brown returned to JP Morgan but her performance wasn't the same and she was ultimately fired in 2021.
“Eventually she was let go permanently and has not worked in that type of investment banking since,” her lawyer Tom Moore told the publication. “She keeps trying but just can’t perform.”
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