$10.6M Verdict to Woman After Losing Her Arm in a Car Crash

By Dean I. Weitzman, Esq. on October 15th, 2018

A woman whose arm was amputated after the vehicle she was riding in crashed and overturned on a New Jersey Interstate highway in 2015 has been awarded $10.6 million in compensatory damages by a Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas jury.

The victim, Shanika Brown, was in the front passenger seat of a minivan being driven by another woman on Interstate 295 in Gloucester County, N.J., in July of 2015 when the minivan driver swerved to avoid a 14-foot-long, two-foot-wide piece of a blown cement truck tire that was laying in the roadway, according to an Oct. 11 story in The Legal Intelligencer. The minivan overturned and Brown and her five-month-old daughter were partially ejected, severing Brown’s arm and her daughter’s leg in the crash. The family settled for an undisclosed amount for the baby’s injuries, the report continues.

“According to the plaintiffs, the tire had been left in the roadway for nearly 30 minutes before the accident,” the story reported.

The tire had blown earlier on a truck owned by Silvi Concrete Products, but the driver of the company’s cement truck had not called 9-1-1 to report the debris in the road, the victim’s attorneys argued. Attorneys for the victim argued that an internal document from the cement company “outlining that their policy instructed drivers not to accept responsibility for accidents.”

Brown sued Silvi Concrete Products, Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations, which made the tire that exploded, and McCarthy Tire Service Co., which serviced the tire, alleging products liability and negligence for allegedly failing to properly inspect the tire or supervise their employees, according to the story.

Brown’s arm was re-attached after the crash, but eventually had to be amputated above her elbow in two surgeries, the story reported. She faces another surgery and will be fitted with a prosthetic arm.

Attorneys for the victim were able to discover dispatch audio from the cement company which provided evidence bolstering the victim’s claims. The cement company was found to be 85 percent responsible for Brown’s injuries.

Legal cases like this one occur around the nation every day and are examples of similar kinds of cases that MyPhillyLawyer attorneys regularly work on tirelessly for our own clients. Often, we are not able to discuss the cases we are actively working on due to confidentiality requirements, so we discuss other relevant cases in the news such as this one to illustrate the legal situations people find themselves in every day.

We here at MyPhillyLawyer stand ready to assist you with your legal case if you or a loved one is ever seriously injured in any kind of fall, workplace injury or vehicle incident anywhere in the United States. We pledge to make sure that you and your family get the compassionate, dogged and experienced legal representation that you deserve and expect from a professional legal team which works hard to uncover every fact to bolster your case and maximize your damage award.

We represent the families of victims who die in such tragedies as well, to ensure that their families receive every penny of damages that they are eligible to receive.

Call MyPhillyLawyer at 215-914-5471 or toll-free at 1-(866) 352-4572 anytime and our experienced, compassionate, aggressive team of attorneys and support staff will be there for you and your family every step of the way as we manage your case through the legal system.

When Winning Matters Most, Call MyPhillyLawyer.

 

Listen to Court Radio every Sunday at 7 a.m. with me, attorney Dean Weitzman of MyPhillyLawyer, on Philadelphia’s Old School 100.3 WRNB, Boom 103.9 or on Praise 107.9 WPPZ FM. Listen to Court Radio online or on the radio every week for the latest on legal topics and to get answers to your legal questions. In addition to addressing the topical issues of the day, we’ll answer caller questions on a wide range of legal issues.