In this blog, we’re going to continue our story of a tragic motor vehicle crash involving the death of a young girl and tell you how it ended this past week. As you know from past blogs, we, along with attorney Todd A. Newman of Philadelphia, represent the family of a young girl who tragically died in a horrific motor vehicle accident which occurred on the New Jersey Turnpike about 4 years ago. Our client’s death was caused, in large part, by the negligence of 2 drivers of 2 different trucking companies.
It was late at night. A family was making the trip through New Jersey with their family members. All of a sudden, the family member driving the car, an off-duty NYPD officer, noticed a small car wedged under a truck. The off-duty officer pulled his car over to the side of the road and exited the car to offer assistance. He managed to timely remove the person driving the small car from underneath the giant truck. At this point, as debris and broken-down vehicles are being moved out of the way, the off-duty officer remains at the scene of the accident, directing traffic around the crash site in an effort to prevent another accident. At this time, our client, her mother and her sister are sitting in the car watching the chaos unfold behind them.
Seemingly out of nowhere, an enormous truck approaches the scene seemingly unaware of the crash site. At the last moment, the driver notices the large truck and tries to veer out of the way, striking the large truck and the small car wedged underneath it. That driver lost control after impact and careened into our clients SUV. The crash was hard and the consequences deadly. One of the little girls in the SUV, full of hope and promise, was taken from this Earth.
Given the circumstances, we all would have hoped for a quick release; however, that wasn’t how it played out. The little girl suffered at the accident scene and in the hospital, in exorbitant amounts of pain, for hours and hours before finally passing away, devastating her family and robbing the world of a beautiful, cheerful little girl.
Now, didn’t the approaching truck see the other large truck on the side of the road? No, it didn’t. The driver of the trailer didn’t know he was approaching the scene of an accident because the driver of the large truck didn’t mark his truck for the scene of an accident. Below are the ways in which the large truck driver was potentially negligent:
–He may have failed to put on his emergency lights, the “flashers,” that everyone with a driver’s license should know how and when to operate.
–He failed to put out the reflective triangles behind the trailer, as is required by Federal trucking law when a big truck like the one he was driving is pulled to the side of the road, especially in an accident.
–His truck did not have proper reflective tape on the back of his truck–tape that would have drawn the attention of drivers approaching the scene.
We’re not saying that the driver of the large truck acted in a malicious way. We’re not saying that they’re happy with the death of a wonderful little girl—of course they aren’t. The point is that they acted in a negligent manner, and if they had acted cautiously and followed the rules, the other driver would have possibly noticed the crash and that little girl would possibly still be with us today.
The other driver’s company, previously settled and compensated the little girl’s family for their negligence. The remaining large truck company, the one that started the entire fiasco, refused to accept responsibility until recently.
Recently, the remaining case proceeded to a jury trial in New Jersey. It took 4 years, a huge amount of work and money, and the act of picking a jury to get the remaining defendant to finally come to terms with their negligent actions and resolve the case.
It is our duty, as lawyers, as Americans, and as compassionate people, to make sure that the negligent party does what they have to do to rectify the wrong they did and the harm they caused. We are proud to have assisted attorney Todd Newman and his law firm in bringing justice to this family.
Should you have any questions or comments about this case, please feel free to call us at 561-266-9191 or email us at daronberg@build.simple.biz.
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