Highway 29, Grand Forks County, ND
Underride Crash | Wrongful Death, Traumatic Brain Injury
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The Law Firm for Truck Safety attorneys, Andy Young, DJ Young, and Amy Papuga secured an $8.5M trial victory for a North Dakota family who tragically lost their children in a broadside crash on Highway 29 near Grand Forks, in the spring of 2018.
While driving down Highway 29, an SUV driver suddenly lost control of her vehicle after hitting an ice patch. She was able to regain control of her vehicle and come to a controlled stop along the highway.
Following the SUV was a Pan-O-Gold bread company truck driver who witnessed this SUV hit this ice patch and come to a complete stop. Despite watching this happen, the Pan-O-Gold bread company driver did not sufficiently slow his tractor-trailer to avoid a collision with the SUV.
The truck broadsided the family’s SUV killing two of the child passengers, and severely injuring another child passenger and the driver.
Despite initial investigation reports that seemed to relieve the Pan-O-Gold driver of liability, a jury determined that Pan-O-Gold and its driver were, in fact, negligent.
The jury found that Pan-O-Gold lacked a sufficient defensive driver training program — training that the truck driver himself conceded would have been beneficial in proactively preventing this crash.
The jury came back with a unanimous verdict finding greater than 70% fault on Pan-O-Gold and their truck driver. Before a jury was asked to place a value on the harms and losses, Pan-O-Gold’s insurance companies and our clients reached a global resolution of $8.5M.
The Law Firm for Truck Safety plaintiff attorneys, Andy Young, D.J. Young, and Amy Papuga, acted as lead trial counsel for this trial victory. They were joined by Nathan Severson (SW&L Attorneys) in representing the children of this crash. After the fact discovery and deposition record were developed by The Law Firm for Truck Safety, attorneys Pete Kestner, Mary Batcheller, and Duane Lillehaug joined the lawsuit to represent the SUV driver’s personal injury claim.
It is believed the settlements for the parties in this crash totaled a record or near-record amount for wrongful death and severe injury broadside truck crash cases in North Dakota.
