Roadside Pedestrian Struck by Nissan Delivery Driver Wins $46 Million Verdict

On September 10, 2013, Faustino Torres Solorio was riding in a truck driven by a coworker, Franco Javier Perez, on a road in San Bernardino County when the truck ran out of gas. Perez pulled it legally onto the shoulder, and Solorio got out to retrieve a gas can from the truck bed. While he stood at the tailgate, a car driven by Gunnar Ayala struck him as Ayala turned onto the street. Ayala was cited for an unsafe turning movement and his license was suspended, and the officer who investigated concluded that Solorio did not cause or contribute to the collision in any way.

The impact left Solorio with multiple broken bones, deep lacerations and a lacerated spleen. His left leg was damaged so severely that surgeons amputated it above the knee. The jury's later award for future medical care reflected the ongoing treatment that injury and the rest of his injuries would require.

Ayala worked as a parts delivery driver for Nissan of Fontana, Inc., which operated dealerships known as Nissan of San Bernardino and Metro Nissan of Redlands, and he moved parts between the stores in his father's personal vehicle. His father, Louie Ayala Jr., had set up L.A.G.D.J. Courier Services to handle those deliveries. On the day of the crash Ayala had worked his shift and left the San Bernardino dealership to fill up for the next day. Solorio sued the dealerships along with both Ayalas. The dealerships answered that Ayala was an independent contractor, or at least outside the course and scope of his job when he hit Solorio. Solorio argued that the vehicle use exception to the going and coming rule applied, because the job required Ayala to supply the car he used on his route, so the dealerships answered for his negligence.

The case, captioned Faustino Torres Solorio v. Nissan of Fontana, Inc., went to trial before Judge Wilfred J. Schneider Jr. in San Bernardino County Superior Court. On August 9, 2016, the jury found that Ayala was an agent or employee of the Nissan defendants and was acting within the scope of that relationship when he harmed Solorio, and it awarded Solorio $46 million: $2 million for future medical expenses, $6 million for past pain, suffering, physical impairment and loss of enjoyment of life, and $38 million for the same categories going forward. Of the total, $44 million was noneconomic damages, with the remaining $2 million set aside for future medical care.

Robinson Calcagnie represented Solorio at trial. No appeal of the verdict has surfaced in the years since it was returned, and no public record shows what the dealerships or their insurers ultimately paid.