$3.6 Million Verdict After Georgia Power Truck Rear-Ends Couple on Hamilton Mill Road
Won by Fried Goldberg LLC.
A Gwinnett County jury awarded $3.6 million to a couple who each underwent spinal fusion surgery after a Georgia Power utility truck struck their stopped Nissan Maxima from behind.
What happened
On August 16, 2010, Sandra Elizabeth Flores Juarez was driving a Nissan Maxima on Hamilton Mill Road in Gwinnett County when she signaled a left turn and stopped to wait for oncoming traffic to clear. A Georgia Power utility truck driven by company employee Cassandra Jeyeun Kim was traveling behind her at roughly 40 mph and never slowed. Kim's truck struck the rear of the Maxima at speed.
Police responded and cited Kim for following too closely. Both Juarez and her passenger, William Pineda Villacorta, were transported with serious injuries. In the months that followed, Juarez underwent spinal fusion surgery and had a separate arthroscopic procedure on her shoulder. Her medical bills exceeded $300,000. Villacorta suffered neck injuries that also required spinal fusion, accumulating more than $200,000 in medical expenses.
The case went to trial in Gwinnett County State Court in January 2015. Georgia Power disputed both the plaintiffs' account of the collision and the severity of the injuries they sustained. Attorneys for the defense, led by Scott Farrow of Troutman Sanders, contested the link between the impact and the surgeries each plaintiff underwent.
Joseph Fried of Fried Rogers Goldberg (now Fried Goldberg LLC) represented Juarez, while Orlando Ojeda of Walker Ojeda represented Villacorta. Together they presented the medical evidence, the police citation, and testimony about the force of the rear-end impact to counter the defense's arguments.
The jury sided with the plaintiffs. Juarez received $1.5 million in compensatory damages; Villacorta received $2.1 million, bringing the total verdict to $3.6 million. No post-trial reduction has been reported in available coverage.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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