$4,600,000 Settlement

When you wake up in the morning, you jump into the shower, have some breakfast, and start heading to work. You always believe you’ll be home in the evening to spend time with those you love and those who love you. However, on this particular day, our client, a young newly married man with his first child on the way, was working in New York City earning only a small wage. He worked as a delivery person and on this particular day, he was making a delivery to a construction site. He drove up to the gate of the construction site, parked his van on the street, and exited his vehicle a narrow Brooklyn roadway. At the same time, a tractor trailer was proceeding down the block. Some may say this was a freak accident, when the wind blew a piece of our client’s coat into the air, which got caught on a section of the passing tractor trailer. Our client was pulled underneath and run over by the trailer. He was transported to a nearby hospital, but did not recover from his injuries and tragically died that same day.

Our firm was retained by the decedent’s family. Rather than a freak accident, we believed that the tractor trailer simply drove too close to our client on this busy Brooklyn roadway, and that the construction site failed to have a safe area for delivery personnel to drop off construction supplies. The defense came out strong alleging that our client darted out between two parked cars and accidently walked into the side of the tractor trailer as it proceeded down the road. In fact, the defense claimed that an eyewitness would substantiate its lack of responsibility. At first glance, it would appear that they were correct, since the police investigation concluded that the driver of the tractor trailer did nothing wrong and that the cause of the accident was the inattentiveness of our client. There was a lot of work to do on behalf of our firm to get to the truth and unwind what we believed was a false defense and sloppy police work. After thousands of pages of deposition testimony by numerous municipal representatives, construction company employees, and others, the truth started to emerge. However, the defense would not give in. It took skill and persistence to turn the tide on what otherwise may have resulted in a defense verdict or small settlement. With a trial date looming and our firm ready for jury selection, the Court held several pre-trial settlement conferences and the defense finally acknowledged their exposure. The case settled, providing this young family with financial security after the tragic loss of their loved one.