Bruce L. Lampert

Bruce Lampert is a partner at Katzman, Lampert & Stoll, where his practice is devoted to plaintiff-side aviation accident litigation. He has served as counsel in approximately 190 federal aviation cases over more than three decades, including commercial airline disaster litigation, general aviation and corporate aircraft crash cases, helicopter and rotorcraft matters, military and government contractor aviation claims, and aircraft product liability proceedings.

Bruce brings a personal dimension to aviation disaster litigation that few attorneys share. On February 24, 1989, he was a passenger aboard United Airlines Flight 811, a Boeing 747 that suffered explosive decompression over the Pacific Ocean after a cargo door failure, killing nine passengers. He survived the incident and subsequently pursued claims arising from the accident. His experience as both a survivor and a practicing aviation litigator informs the perspective he brings to representing families after aviation disasters.

Bruce holds a Private Pilot certificate issued by the FAA (1982), with single-engine and multi-engine airplane and instrument airplane ratings. (Source: FAA Airman Certification registry.) He pilots the firm’s 58P Baron to travel to Courts and clients nationwide. His aviation background also includes attendance at Naval Flight School in Pensacola, Florida, and service as an intelligence officer with a Navy F-4 Phantom squadron aboard the U.S.S. Coral Sea (CVA-43).

Bruce earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Denver College of Law in 1979, where he received the American Jurisprudence Prize in Contracts and the American Law Book Prize and served as a writer for the Denver Law Journal. After graduation he clerked for the Honorable Hatfield O. Chilson, U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado. He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado in 1970. He is licensed to practice in Colorado and Michigan.

Bruce’s commercial airline disaster litigation includes service as counsel for passenger and crew families in matters arising from several of the firm’s representative aviation matters, including Continental Airlines Flight 1713 (Denver, 1987), United Airlines Flight 232 (Sioux City, 1989), United Airlines Flight 585 (Colorado Springs, 1991), TWA Flight 800 (Long Island, 1996), Korean Air Flight 801 (Guam, 1997), and Continental Airlines Flight 1404 (Denver, 2008). In the Continental 1404 matter, he represented the flight crew in litigation that included claims against the Federal Aviation Administration arising from air traffic control during hazardous crosswind conditions; the matter resolved in settlements. (Continental 1404 reported by CBS Colorado and the Associated Press, 2013.) The firm also pursued litigation on behalf of the families in the Korean Air 801 matter across the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, the Central District of California, and the District of Guam.

His aviation product liability work has included proceedings against airframe manufacturers including Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, Cessna, Piper, Beechcraft, Aerospatiale, and Cub Crafters, as well as engine and component manufacturers including Rolls-Royce, Textron Lycoming, Garmin, Matco, Tamarack Aerospace, and Precision Airmotive. He has also handled claims against military and government aviation contractors including DynCorp International, helicopter operators and tour companies, aviation insurers, and airport operators. In 2007, the firm pursued litigation directly against the National Transportation Safety Board concerning investigative access — a step few plaintiff-side aviation firms have taken. (Schaden, Katzman, Lampert & McClune v. National Transportation Safety Board, D. Colo., No. 1:07-cv-02079.)

Bruce’s litigation record spans the firm’s successive iterations. With Schaden, Lampert & Lampert, he was counsel of record for the plaintiffs-appellants in Sewell v. Public Service Co. of Colorado, a wrongful death action arising from a private aircraft’s collision with power transmission lines, in which the Colorado Court of Appeals reversed summary judgment that had been entered against his clients. With Schaden, Katzman, Lampert & McClune, he was on the briefs for the decedents’ families in Old Republic Insurance Co. v. Durango Air Service, Inc., litigation arising from a fatal aircraft crash, in which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed insurance-coverage rulings in the families’ favor. With Katzman, Lampert & McClune, he was counsel of record for the plaintiff in Sikkelee v. Precision Airmotive Corp., aviation product liability litigation that produced a significant Third Circuit ruling on federal field preemption. (Public record — Sewell v. Public Service Co. of Colorado, 832 P.2d 994 (Colo. App. 1991); Old Republic Ins. Co. v. Durango Air Service, Inc., 292 F.3d 1216 (10th Cir. 2002); Sikkelee v. Precision Airmotive Corp., 822 F.3d 680 (3d Cir. 2016).)

Bruce is a member of the American Association for Justice and has served on the governing board of the Colorado Trial Lawyers Association. He lectures and has written on aviation law, mass-disaster litigation, and complex product liability.

He represents families in plane crash wrongful death cases nationwide. For educational analysis of aviation accident investigations, see the firm’s Aviation Insights section.

You may email Mr. Lampert at blampert@klm-law.com or use our contact form.

Aviation Litigation Focus

Bruce’s experience in aviation accident litigation includes major air disaster cases, commercial aircraft accidents, product liability claims, and complex multi-party litigation involving aircraft operations and aviation safety issues.

• Representation of victims in major commercial aviation disasters
• Litigation arising from high-profile aircraft accidents worldwide
• Aircraft product liability and structural failure cases
• Commercial airline accident litigation
• Mass-disaster and multi-party aviation litigation
• Aviation safety and accident investigation-related cases
• Trial advocacy in complex aviation cases
• Lecturing and writing on aviation law and litigation

Related Aviation Insights

For readers seeking more background on aviation accident litigation, the following resources explain key legal, investigative, and technical issues that frequently arise in aircraft accident cases.

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To discuss an aviation accident case, contact the firm for a confidential consultation.

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