If historical data can help us forecast the future, a pedestrian will be killed about once every 111 minutes leading to approximately 4,500 total pedestrian deaths this year. Attorneys who handle motor vehicle accidents involving the death of a pedestrian need the experience and the skill to understand the damages to the pedestrian and need knowledge of insurance issues to be able to fully pursue different sources of recovery.
Consider, for example, the reported case in which the driver actually admitted to being at fault for the motor vehicle accident. The driver was making a left hand turn and struck and killed a 62 year-old man crossing the street on a walk signal. So the only issue that remained was the nature of the recovery for the family of the pedestrian victim who was killed in the accident. But as is so often the case in motor vehicle accidents with serious injuries to the victim, the driver's insurance policy had limits of only $15,000 In this case this amount was completely insufficient given the severity of the injuries. There was no dispute that this amount would be paid out.
The law firm that handled this matter on behalf of the victim's family recognized that, even
though the driver had been driving his own car at the time of the accident, the driver was on his way to a store to make a purchase for his employer. They were thus able to establish that the driver was acting within the course and scope of his employment at the time of the accident. This makes the employer liable as well. Given this, the law firm was able to pursue the employer's insurance policy and recovered an additional $1 Million. The law firm thus recovered at total of $1.015 Million on behalf of the victim's adult children.
This case illustrates one of the most important lessons that attorneys representing victims of motor vehicle accidents must learn and apply. Attorneys need to investigate the case in order to identify all potential defendants. In addition to the driver, other potential defendants include (1) employers as well as anyone who (2) owns any of the vehicles involved in the accident, (3) contributed to the accident or who can (4) be vicariously liable. Applying this lesson, even when the potential defendant denies liability, can significantly increase the amount recovered on behalf of the family of a pedestrian killed in a motor vehicle accident.
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