$6,501,684 Jury Verdict – Big Rig Truck Driver Negligently Stops In Freeway

A mother traveling with her 21 year old daughter and grandchildren at night to her home in Brentwood, California on Interstate 5 after visiting Disneyland, swerved to avoid a big rig tractor-trailer stopped on the freeway and went off the road and overturned, causing the death of the mother and traumatic brain injury to the daughter. The accident occurred at the Button Willow exit near Bakersfield, California. When the police arrived, the big rig truck was stopped completely on the shoulder with all of its running lights activated. The investigating police prepared a report that blamed the mother for the accident. We undertook extensive investigation and located eyewitnesses who testified that before the accident the truck had made an emergency stop partially in the slow lane on the freeway and did not have its emergency flashers or running lights on. Prior to the arrival of the police, the truck driver moved the truck to the shoulder and activated its lights. We proved that the truck driver had not been properly trained and was inexperienced. He had hooked up the air brakes incorrectly which caused him to have to make the emergency stop on the freeway. A Stockton jury awarded the traumatically brain injured daughter $4,651,684 and $1,850,000 was obtained for the death of the mother.