Articles Posted in Truck Accidents

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Glen Bellamy, age 50, was driving through an intersection on a green light when his car collided with a tractor-trailer driven by Thomas Godbold. Godbold was employed by Red Classic Transit LLC. It was alleged that Godbold ran a red light, causing this crash with Bellamy’s vehicle and severely injuring him.

Bellamy suffered a traumatic brain injury. He now has difficulty with executive functions such as decision-making, and he has a short-term memory deficit. His past medical expenses paid totaled $1,300,000, and his future medical expenses and life-care costs are estimated at $4.2 million.

Bellamy was a truck driver at the time of the incident and was permanently disabled by this collision. His lost earnings, past and future are estimated to be $776,800.

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Jimmy Hill was 66 years old and was unloading a truckload of chicks at a farm when an employee of the transportation company J.B. Hunt drove a forklift over Hill’s ankle. Hill underwent surgery to repair the broken ankle and later died of post-operative sepsis. He is survived by his adult son.

Hill’s son sued J.B. Hunt claiming its employee, the forklift driver, chose not to follow the company’s safety policies and safety training. The lawsuit did not include a claim for lost income. The jury’s verdict of $3.4 million found the defendant J.B. Hunt 98% responsible and a non-party 2% liable for Hill’s injuries and untimely death.

The attorneys representing the Hill family were John P. Zelbst and David Butler. For trial the plaintiff engaged the expert services of an internal medicine physician and engineering expert, both of whom testified at the trial.

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Tracy Morgan, the actor/comedian, has settled his lawsuit against Walmart. In June 2014, Morgan and three others were involved in a truck crash on the New Jersey Turnpike when their limousine was struck by a Walmart truck. Morgan’s close friend and mentor, James “Jimmy Mack” McNair was killed. Morgan suffered serious injuries, which included head trauma, a broken leg and broken ribs. He is still recovering from his injuries. McNair grew up with Morgan in New York City; his two children survive him.

The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Newark, N.J. Details of the settlement were not disclosed as the case was settled on the basis of the confidential agreement.

The truck driver for Walmart, Kevin Ropert of Jonesboro, Ga., faces criminal charges. He has pleaded not guilty.

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Daniel DiNardi was a State Department of Transportation supervisor who was pulling his orange Department of Transportation pickup truck onto the right shoulder of a highway to remove debris. Before getting out of his truck, he activated the emergency lights and yellow strobe lights on his truck. After he placed the debris into the pickup truck bed and was walking to get back into his truck, Gina Davis, driving a tractor-trailer for PTX Services LLC, drifted off the road and struck DiNardi. He suffered multiple blunt-force trauma injuries and died shortly thereafter. DiNardi was survived by his parents and two minor children.

Davis pleaded guilty of misconduct with a motor vehicle and was sentenced to five years in prison, which was suspended after two years.

DiNardi’s family sued Davis and PTX Services claiming that Davis was negligent in choosing not to pay proper attention to her driving, keep a proper lookout and remain in her lane of traffic. The family also made a claim that Davis was fatigued from driving and had falsified her truck’s log book. The family presented evidence, including Davis’s own admission, that she had falsified her logs for the two days leading up to the collision. Davis also admitted at deposition and at trial that she drove onto the shoulder.

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On July 14, 2009, the plaintiff Evaristo Hernandez, a 39-year-old truck driver, was driving a 63-foot semi-tractor-trailer during his employment for Transforce Trucking. After Hernandez finished his deliveries that day, he began driving back to his truck yard and was traveling eastbound on 31st Street in Chicago when he stopped for a red light at Western Avenue. That intersection is a T-intersection. Hernandez put on his right turn signal to show that he was about to make a right turn.

At this intersection, 31st Street has only one lane for eastbound traffic plus an adjacent bicycle lane to the right in which cars are not permitted to drive.

The defendant, Gina Valenzio, was eastbound in her SUV and approached Hernandez’s truck from behind. Instead of stopping behind Hernandez, Valenzio drove her SUV into the bike lane along the right side of the Hernandez truck in order to make her right turn.

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In a case involving injury to James and Theresa Denton, who were injured by an 18-wheeler truck in Indiana, the trial court allowed the application of Illinois law, but the Illinois Appellate Court reversed finding that Indiana law applied.

James Denton was injured in Indiana when his car was hit by the truck operated by Lee Johnson, a resident of South Carolina, who was hauling a load in his truck, which originated from Illinois to South Carolina. He was working for Michigan and Delaware companies.

The defendants included Universal Am-Can Ltd., Universal Truckload Services Inc., Louis Broadwell LLC and the truck driver, David Lee Johnson. The defendants argued that Indiana law applied because Denton was injured in the final stage of a chain reaction of intermediate collisions that started when a now-deceased Indiana resident, George Kallis, drove northbound in the southbound lane of Interstate 65 in Jasper County, Ind.

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Scott Rankin, 37, was riding his bicycle on a two-lane rural, nonresidential road when he collided with the back of a United Parcel Service truck parked partially on the road. Rankin suffered serious injuries, the worst of which resulted in incomplete quadriplegia. He had been a band director earning about $60,000 a year, but now is unable to work.

Rankin filed suit against UPS claiming negligence per se for its driver’s violation of the Texas Transportation Code. The statute prohibits trucks such as a UPS vehicle in nonresidential districts from leaving their vehicles on the main part of the highway unless it is impractical to do so.

Rankin alleged that UPS endangered others on the road by choosing not to train its drivers on applicable parking laws in an effort to promote driver efficiency and safety.

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Sara Hendricks, 32, was driving her passenger vehicle through an intersection when Matthew Mullin, who was driving a farm truck hauling grain for his employer, pulled out from a stop sign into Hendricks’s path. Her car hit the side of the farm truck driven by Mullin.

Hendricks suffered fractures to her right ankle and femur near her knee. She underwent multiple ankle surgeries, including a fusion, and surgery to repair the femur fracture.

Hendricks’s past medical expenses totaled $276,000. She was a special education teacher and lost $69,000 in earnings because of her injuries. Because of the injuries and surgeries, Hendricks has a fused ankle, which has made it difficult for her to participate in activities requiring her to stand or walk for an extended period of time.

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Amarjit Khunkhun was a 43-year-old truck driver when he was found burned to death in the cab of his truck owned by his employer, GMG Trucking of Fresno, Calif. Khunkhun was survived by his wife and three children. The state fire investigators found that the fire started inside the cab and concluded that Khunkhun’s use of a portable stove might have caused the fire. No stove or propane tanks were found in the cab during the investigation.

Khunkhun’s family, with the assistance of attorneys Bill Robins, Hector Longoria, Mohinder S. Mann and Gruinder S. Mann, filed a lawsuit against GMG Trucking and its owners. The family’s attorneys also hired a fire cause-and-origin expert. That investigation showed the fire started beneath the truck, not by a stove or propane tanks. A truck mechanic expert determined that transmission fluid had leaked from the truck’s transmission, where it was ignited by the cab’s exhaust system and other hot components. Because of the fire underneath the cab, carbon monoxide vapors leaked into the cab where Khunkhun was left unconscious, and then the truck cab burst into flames resulting in Khunkhun’s death.

The lawsuit brought against GMG Trucks and its owners alleged negligent maintenance and inspection of the trucks. The family alleged that the owners were aware of the transmission leak in the tractor, but chose not to repair it in violation of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations.

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Sandra Gibbs hired the defendant Blu-Sky Industries to do work on a septic tank on her property at 30658 S. Ashland Ave. in Beecher, Ill. The Village of Beecher is located in Chicago-area suburbs in Will County, Ill. On Dec. 8, 2009, Gibbs, 31 years old at the time, stood in her driveway supervising the work as the defendant Blu-Sky Industries’ workers completed the project. She was walking back toward her house when a Blu-Sky employee, Jacob Courtney, began backing up his truck, which was attached to a trailer.

Courtney did not see Gibbs and hit her twice, causing her to fall onto the trailer with a direct blow to her outstretched right arm. The truck continued in reverse with Gibbs halfway on the trailer and halfway on the ground for 10 additional feet before the truck finally stopped.

Gibbs suffered a right shoulder impingement with a partial thickness tear of the supraspinatus tendon in the rotator cuff, requiring injections and eventually surgery that consisted of arthroscopic distal clavicle excision and subacromial decompression. A subacromial decompression of the shoulder is a surgery designed to increase the size of the subacromial, which is designed to reduce the pressure on the muscle. In order to make room, the surgery involves cutting the ligament and shaving away the bone spur on the subacromial bone. This permits the muscle in that space to heal.

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