$32.4 Million Arbitration Award After KCFD Engine Killed Three at Westport Intersection
Won by Dollar, Burns, Becker & Hershewe.
An arbitrator awarded $32.4 million to the families of three people killed when a Kansas City Fire Department engine ran a red light at 50 mph through the Westport entertainment district in December 2021; Tim Dollar of Dollar, Burns, Becker and Hershewe represented the family of Michael Elwood.
What happened
On December 15, 2021, KCFD Pumper 19 driver Dominic Biscari drove a 45,000-pound fire engine through a red light at Westport Road and Broadway Boulevard in Kansas City at approximately 50 mph, well above the posted 35 mph limit. Dispatch had instructed the truck to stand down roughly one minute before the crash. Biscari did not brake.
The engine struck a Honda CRV, killing driver Jennifer San Nicolas, 41, and passenger Michael Elwood, 25. The force of the collision drove both vehicles into the former Riot Room building. Tami Knight, 41, who was standing on the sidewalk, was killed when the building partially collapsed onto her. A fourth person walking nearby, Alexander Llera, was injured.
The crash prompted immediate civil actions. Internal KCFD records that surfaced during litigation showed that a department employee had sent an email titled 'Horrendous Driving' roughly ten weeks before the collision, describing Biscari operating a truck at 70 mph in the same area and causing a critically ill patient to go airborne inside an ambulance. The arbitrator later found that Biscari had also made 'blatantly false statements to police' in the hours after the crash.
Tim Dollar of Dollar, Burns, Becker and Hershewe represented the parents of Michael Elwood. In binding arbitration, the arbitrator found Biscari negligent and awarded $32.4 million across all claimants: $9 million to Elwood's parents, $11 million to Knight's family, $9 million to San Nicolas's family, $2 million to Llera, and $1.4 million to Broadway-Westport Property Inc., the owner of the damaged building. Jackson County Circuit Judge Jennifer Phillips confirmed the award on November 3, 2022.
Because Biscari could not satisfy a judgment of that size personally, Kansas City assumed responsibility for the arbitration award. In January 2023, the city paid $1.4 million to the families as part of its portion of the resolution. The city council had also approved separate payments totaling approximately $1.8 million to settle related vicarious-liability lawsuits brought directly against the city. Biscari pleaded guilty in February 2023 to three counts of second-degree involuntary manslaughter and received three years of supervised probation.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.KCUR (NPR Kansas City): 'KCFD firetruck driver ordered to pay $32 million after killing three people in Westport crash' (Oct. 24, 2022)·Archived copy
- 2.KCTV5: 'Arbitrator awards $32.4 million for victims killed in crash involving KCFD firetruck' (Oct. 21, 2022)·Archived copy
- 3.KSHB 41: 'Kansas City inches closer to settlement in 2 civil lawsuits tied to deadly KCFD crash in Westport'·Archived copy
- 4.KCUR (NPR Kansas City): 'KCFD firetruck driver pleads guilty to manslaughter for killing 3 people in Westport crash' (Feb. 21, 2023)·Archived copy
- 5.Missouri Lawyers Media: Tim Dollar profile, confirming $32.4 million arbitration award (June 13, 2024)·Archived copy
More proven verdicts from Dollar, Burns, Becker & Hershewe
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A Platte County jury returned a record $70 million verdict after an eight-year-old boy died and his six-year-old sister was seriously injured when a distracted driver rear-ended their grandparents' car in a highway construction zone.
A Jackson County jury awarded $40 million on Nov. 1, 2023, to the family of Charles Mabie, a 52-year-old man killed when a driver on PCP, traveling over 100 mph, struck his car from behind at a red light in Independence, Missouri. The defendant had admitted liability before trial, so the jury decided only damages. The award rested on the loss of Mabie's relationship with his wife and two children.
A jury awarded nearly $39 million after a New Prime tractor-trailer jackknifed on icy Interstate 40 and triggered a multi-vehicle pileup that killed four people, including two members of a Texas family.
Related wrongful death verdicts
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