In a major victory for federal contractors, a Louisiana appeals court affirmed a trial court’s determination that the Sewerage and Water Board (S&WB) is solely liable for damages to several homeowners stemming from the Uptown drainage work performed by three contractors under the auspices of the U.S. Corps of Engineers.  Notably, the court found that there was “no evidence that any of the contractors breached their contracts, negligently or otherwise.”

It is black-letter law that architects owe a professional duty of care to third parties, but recovery for design errors is limited in the absence of a contract.   In a recent federal decision, the court reaffirmed that an architect can be liable to a subsequent owner of property for damage caused by defective design but not for the defective design itself.