Articles Posted in Auto Accidents

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Gabriel Pablo was riding his bicycle westbound on 26th Street and traveling in the designated bike lane near St. Louis Avenue when a city of Chicago employee, Harry Sanders, opened the door of his parked car into the bike lane. Pablo and his bike collided with the opened door. This incident took place on July 24, 2013.

Pablo, 38, was transported by ambulance to Mount Sinai Hospital in Chicago with injuries to his head, back, left arm and left shoulder. He was diagnosed with partial tears of the labrum and rotator cuff in his shoulder, eventually requiring arthroscopic repair surgery, which left four surgical scars. Pablo argued that he still suffers ongoing pain and limitations in his left shoulder and back.

He produced $112,287 in medical expenses. Sanders was ticketed and pled guilty to failure to yield. The court records indicate that Sanders was dismissed from the case shortly before the start of this jury trial.

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Cornell Smith, 38, was driving on a highway when he stopped for the traffic ahead. Traffic was backed up from an off-ramp exit. While he was sitting in his stopped SUV, he was rear-ended by Ross Keys, who was driving a cargo van for Tri-Cal Distributors LLC.  On impact, Smith was wearing a seatbelt, but he was thrown upward in his seat and struck his head on the roof of his SUV. He felt immediate head and neck pain. Smith was transported to the nearest hospital. He was diagnosed there with a concussion and cervical sprain.

In the months following the crash, Smith developed chronic headaches, neck and mid-back pain and numbness and tingling in his fingers. The radiology imaging revealed cervical disk and facet damage, including an indentation of the ventral cord at C5-7.

He underwent conservative treatment and medication, but the pain interfered with his ability to perform his job as a police officer.

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On March 9, 2013, the defendant Roy H. Verdin was driving eastbound on 159th Street in Orland Park, Ill.  His vehicle rear-ended Christina L. Barron’s car at 94th Avenue and pushed it into two other vehicles ahead of her.

Barron, 46, maintained that she suffered a torn rotator cuff injury along with soft tissue sprains. She lost one week of work as a retail sales clerk. Her medical expenses were $40,000.

The defendant argued that the crash was only a “fender bender.”  It was maintained that no airbags deployed and that the plaintiff’s rotator cuff tear was not related to this occurrence.

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On May 23, 2008, the plaintiff in this case, Carla C. Hudson, 43, was stopped at a red light on northbound Walnut Lane at Golf Road in Schaumburg, Ill.  The pickup truck driven by the defendant Barry McDonald, a Schaumburg Park District employee, was stopped directly in front of Hudson’s vehicle.

The pickup truck was hauling a rowboat, which stuck out several feet behind the truck’s tailgate, blocking McDonald’s view.

Hudson contended the truck suddenly reversed without warning and backed into her car causing her injuries. She sustained ruptured tendons and 4th and 5th fingers of her right hand, which required surgery.  She also claimed an unoperated knee surgery and cervical/lumbar spinal injuries. Hudson brought a lost time from work claim of $9,540 as a Navy reservist. Her medical bills were $81,627.

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On July 21, 2007, Terri Whitehead was involved in a two-car crash in Wisconsin. The driver of the other car did not have insurance. Section 143.1 of the Illinois Insurance Code saved Whitehead’s uninsured motorist claim from being barred by a two-year deadline for initiating arbitration.

Although Whitehead did not demand arbitration on her uninsured motorist (UM) claim against Country Preferred Insurance Co. within two years of when she was injured by the uninsured motorist, and she failed to select an arbitrator when she eventually demanded arbitration, she did notify Country Preferred a few hours after the crash, plus she promptly filled out and returned its “notice of claim” form.

The notice of claim form was sufficient to trigger Section 143.1 which provides:

“Whenever any policy or contract for insurance * * * contains a provision limiting the period within which the insured may bring suit, the running of such period is tolled from the date proof of loss is filed, in whatever form is required by the policy, until the date the claim is denied in whole or in part.”

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Gilbert Gail Gerth was riding his lawnmower down a street when he was rear-ended by a pickup truck. The incident killed Gerth. At the time of the collision, the defendant pickup owner and driver, Gary Sachau, was insured under an automobile insurance policy with a $30,000 liability limit.

Gerth had an automobile insurance policy as well with an underinsured-motorist liability limit of $100,000 per person.  In addition, Gerth had an umbrella insurance policy with Grinnell Select Insurance Co. with an underinsured-motorist liability limit of $1 million per accident.

Dawn Goldstein, the executor of the estate for Gilbert Gerth, settled the claim against Sachau for $30,000, and her underinsured claim against Hartford for $100,000 minus $30,000 recovered from the settlement with Sachau.

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Kerry Hogland was 36 years old when driving her sedan on a highway near Fredericktown, Mo. An employee of Town & Country Grocers of Fredericktown drove onto the highway from an on-ramp. The driver of the Town & Country Grocers vehicle did not heed a stop sign at the end of the ramp and crashed broadside into Hogland’s sedan on the passenger side.

Hogland’s vehicle spun out of control and landed in a field next to the highway.

She suffered an intracranial hemorrhage, an epidural hematoma that necessitated a craniotomy and a skull fracture that left her deaf in her right ear. A craniotomy is a surgical procedure where a bone flap is removed from the skull to allow access to the brain. The surgery removes a part of the bone from the skull to expose the brain. The bone flap is temporarily removed and then replaced after the brain surgery is completed.  Obviously, this is a very serious and dangerous surgery.

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On April 12, 2012, Jennifer Hawkins was stopped at a red light on westbound 127th Street in Lemont, Ill.  The defendant, 18-year-old Nicole Barrett, rear-ended the car right behind Hawkins, which pushed that car into Hawkins’s car. The force of the impact totaled the middle vehicle (a Chevy Suburban) and caused nearly $5,000 in property damage to Hawkins’s Toyota Matrix. The crash also resulted in $4,727 in property damage to Barrett’s minivan.

Hawkins, 35, filed this lawsuit against Barrett maintaining that the crash caused her to have neck and lower back sprains, a protruding disc at C5-6, cervical and lumbar facet syndrome, cervical and lumbar radiculopathy and aggravation of her scoliosis, or curvature of the spine. Hawkins underwent multiple facet joint injections, several nerve blocks and cervical and lumbar radiofrequency ablation treatment. She introduced evidence of $227,563 of past medical expenses and $6,589 in lost wages where she worked as a cashier.

Her treating physician testified that she was a candidate for a future spinal cord stimulator implant, lumbar fusion and continued interventional pain management treatment.

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On Oct. 12, 2010, the plaintiff Christina Marshall was driving southbound on Route 71 in Ottawa, Ill.  When stopped behind a line of backed up traffic waiting for a school bus to drop off children, the driver traveling behind Marshall slammed on his brakes and swerved his van onto the northbound lane to avoid striking the plaintiff’s vehicle. The driver behind the van, the defendant, Callie K. Steith, 27, also braked but was unable to stop in time and rear-ended the Marshall vehicle.

Marshall, 25, contended that the impact caused a herniated C5-6 disc, which led to an anterior cervical discectomy and fusion.

The defendant argued that Marshall made an unnecessary sudden stop, the view of Steith of the roadway in traffic was obscured because it was downhill, the crash was low speed with minimal impact and Marshall suffered only a neck strain.

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On Oct. 18, 2011, Shama Khan was a passenger in her husband’s car, which was stopped at a red light on eastbound Grand Avenue (Route 132) near Stonebrook Drive in Gurnee, Ill.  The defendant Shawn Tabin, 72, was driving his car eastbound and then rear-ended the car behind the Khan vehicle, which was pushed into the back of Khan’s car.

The plaintiff Shama Khan, 48, maintained in the lawsuit that was filed that the impact of the collision caused her to suffer a protruding cervical disc, which was unoperated, cervical radiculopathy, lumbar radiculopathy, post-concussion syndrome, short-term memory deficits and depression. Her medical expenses were alleged to be $38,375.

The defendant Shawn Tabin claimed that the middle driver, third-party defendant Gregory L. Burton, ran into the plaintiff’s car before Tabin’s car rear-ended Burton and caused him to hit her a second time, which was supported by Khan’s claim that she felt two separate impacts to the back of her husband’s vehicle.

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