Published Sunday 12 July 2026 · By the JustEng team
A busy week for the forensic and disputes community: a formal Department of Investigation inquiry has opened into the buckling Manhattan high-rise, the Technology and Construction Court has stretched the reach of building liability orders to a foreign parent by default, and one of the largest US contractors has been hit with a further eight-figure judgment. Here is what is moving in the market and what it means for hiring.
NYC opens formal inquiry into buckling Manhattan high-rise
New York City’s Department of Investigation has opened a formal inquiry into the near-collapse of 235 East 42nd Street — the former Pfizer headquarters being converted to residential — after two columns on the 21st floor buckled on 7 July, sagging floors by as much as four inches. According to CNN, the Department of Buildings has ordered the owner to appoint a third-party forensic engineer alongside its own probe, which will review construction documents, interview witnesses and inspect the entire site. The developer has attributed the failure to columns carrying additional load from an 18,000 sq ft vertical expansion.
Hiring angle: Investigations of this profile pull in senior forensic structural engineers, code specialists and heavy-load analysts — and typically anchor rate expectations upward for the next 12 months, as reflected in our forensic engineering salary guide.
Mulalley v Sto: first Building Liability Order by default judgment
The Technology and Construction Court has granted the first Building Liability Order (BLO) by default judgment, holding the German parent of the failed UK cladding supplier Sto Limited jointly and severally liable for its subsidiary’s defective system. Osborne Clarke reports the court assessed a “just and equitable” contribution of 87.5% against the supplier — above the range typically applied to architects — after the parent failed to engage at any stage of the proceedings.
Hiring angle: The decision confirms that international product manufacturers with UK subsidiaries fall inside the BLO regime, which is already producing steady demand for forensic engineers with cladding, product-conformity and specification-review experience.
Tutor Perini hit with further $42.4m judgment on Philadelphia W hotel
Philadelphia Common Pleas Judge James Crumlish III has ordered Tutor Perini Building Corp. to pay a further $42.4m to subcontractor Ventana DBS LLC in the long-running dispute over the W and Element hotels, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. The award, reported on 7 July, includes $7.1m in attorney, expert-witness and litigation costs, and sits on top of a $174.7m judgment issued earlier this year over construction delays to the 51-storey scheme.
Hiring angle: Judgments of this scale reinforce a familiar pattern — contractor and subcontractor legal teams are staffing up on delay analysts, quantum experts and programming specialists, and the winning side’s expert-witness pool tends to see repeat instructions across the region for years afterwards.
Grenfell: Met to submit files to CPS by end of September
The Government’s July community update confirms demolition of the tower continues at roughly one floor per month, with 24 floors to remove. In parallel, the Metropolitan Police have said they will submit criminal investigation files to the CPS by 30 September 2026, with 57 individuals and 20 organisations identified as suspects for charges likely to include corporate and gross negligence manslaughter, fraud and breaches of the Health and Safety at Work Act. Charging decisions are targeted before the tenth anniversary of the fire; court cases are unlikely to start much before 2029.
Hiring angle: A criminal case of this scale will lock in senior fire, cladding and materials-testing experts for years — the market for chartered fire engineers and forensic materials specialists remains one of the tightest we track.
Baltimore Key Bridge: chief engineer of Dali admits reporting failure
US federal prosecutors have brought further charges over the March 2024 collapse of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, alleging that the chief engineer of the container ship Dali knowingly failed to notify the Coast Guard of hazardous conditions before the vessel struck the bridge, according to WYPR. Total economic damage from the incident has been estimated at more than $5bn.
Hiring angle: Cross-border marine and bridge failure work — combining ship impact analysis, structural forensics and hydrodynamic modelling — is one of the fastest-growing niches inside forensic engineering, and clients are increasingly instructing UK-based experts to work alongside US counsel.
Building or expanding a forensic, expert-witness or disputes team? Register a vacancy and we’ll shortlist chartered engineers with cladding, structural, fire or marine forensic experience. Candidates can submit a CV to be benchmarked against our live UK and international disputes briefs — typical ranges are set out in our forensic engineering salary guide.