NOTE: This article is part of our ongoing series highlighting recent cases.
In a case involving an intrastate carrier, a truck that operates only within the State of Georgia, our attorneys were successful in reaching a recovery worth several hundred thousand dollars for a client who had suffered a head injury after she was struck by a custom-built electrical contractor company's truck early one evening in traffic. Our client sustained a moderate head injury that required several months of treatment and physical therapy and she recovered very nicely. Regardless, she was out a lot of money for her medical expenses and was unable to work for several weeks following her injury and needed to recover for those lost wages as well.
The accident involved a total of five vehicles. During the course of the initial liability investigation the driver of the truck claimed he did not make contact with our client's vehicle, but had swerved to miss her and struck the retaining wall. The driver claimed that our client had unexpectedly slowed her vehicle down while on the highway and he wound up running up close to her and attempted to avoid her by swerving. He also maintained the damage to her vehicle came as she attempted to avoid his vehicle by maneuvering into the lane of travel on her right-hand side and wound up being involved in an accident with two other vehicles.
We immediately demanded that the electrical carrier preserve the truck in its current, post-accident state, without making any repairs. Our attorneys then went, personally, and conducted an inspection of the truck involved in the vehicle, as well as our client's vehicle before any repairs were made. We were able to, utilizing photographs, demonstrate that the damage and paint transfers were consistent with our client's version of events that her vehicle had been struck in the rear driver side by the electrical contractor's truck and that action had pushed her vehicle into the right-hand lane of travel causing the contact with the other vehicles. Once we were able to prove this chain of events, which was done without an expert, we were able to settle our client's case for an appropriate value given the nature of her injuries for an amount that was more than fair given the nature of her injuries and the conduct of the driver in calling into question or client's correct version of events.