Location: Fredericksburg, VA
Settlement: $200,000
In February of 2022, our client was struck in a T-bone collision that was hotly contested by the defendant. She testified that she was stopped at a red light and that when the light turned green, she looked to her left and saw the defendant’s vehicle approaching. She added that the defendant’s vehicle was a car’s length away from the intersection and already moving when she first saw it. Before she entered the intersection, there was no sign that the defendant was slowing down or preparing to stop.
These details were disputed by the defendant. In his deposition, he testified that his light turned from green to yellow as he entered the intersection. The resulting collision occurred in the middle of the intersection, when the defendant crashed into our client’s left front quarter panel. There were no independent eyewitnesses to the crash. During negotiations, the defense counsel advanced arguments on primary and contributory negligence, arguing that a green light is not a command to go.
Our client was taken by ambulance from the scene to the emergency room, where she experienced pain in multiple places. Complaints about her back were first recorded a month after the accident. The back injury ended up being the main issue, resulting in the need for a lumbar decompression and fusion surgery at L4-L5, fourteen months after the collision.
The defense hired a Richmond orthopedic surgeon, who opined that the surgery was not related to the collision but rather was necessitated by degenerative changes aggravated by the plaintiff’s work activities. Our client was 49 years old at the time of the collision.
After party depositions were taken, the defense offered $50,000 and proposed mediation. Our legal team declined both the offer and the invitation to mediate. With four weeks left until trial, the matter settled for $200,000 via negotiation.
