Hillsborough Jury Awards Motorcyclist $3.83 Million After Left-Turn Crash on US 301
After trial: We found no post-trial motion or appeal in the sources reviewed, but we could not confirm entry of final judgment or payment from the docket.
Won by Swope Rodante PA.
Anthony Ellis, 21, was hit by a left-turning driver while riding his motorcycle on US 301 in Riverview, Florida, in January 2016. He needed knee reconstruction and had broken bones in his foot. A Hillsborough County jury awarded about $3.83 million in May 2019 after a four-day trial in which the defense disputed fault.
What happened
On January 29, 2016, Anthony Ellis, then 21, was riding his motorcycle north on U.S. Highway 301 in Riverview, Florida, when a driver turned left across his path. The car hit him broadside. The impact threw Ellis and his motorcycle into a drainage ditch beside the road.
Ellis needed surgery to reconstruct his left knee. The bones of his left foot were dislocated and broken, and surgeons had to pick gravel out of his right knee. He also broke a toe and a finger on his right side. The injuries ended his plan to enlist: he had a pending application to join the Air Force and had to abandon it.
The driver was insured by GEICO. According to the plaintiff's lawyers, Ellis made offers to settle the claim within the driver's coverage limits, and for more than a year the insurer did not accept them. Ellis then filed suit in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit Court in Hillsborough County.
Fault was the central fight. The defense argued that Ellis had been riding with his headlight off, which would have made him harder for the turning driver to see. Ellis's side maintained that the driver simply turned in front of an oncoming motorcycle. The case ran about two years before it reached a jury, and the defense contested it throughout.
Trial before Judge Cheryl K. Thomas lasted four days. Jurors deliberated for about two hours before returning a verdict on May 16, 2019, for roughly $3.83 million. About $3.5 million of that was non-economic damages, covering pain, suffering and the loss of ordinary life that followed the crash, with the remainder going to economic losses.
Law360 reported that Swope Rodante represented the motorcyclist. Swope Rodante attorneys Stephanie Miles, Brandon Cathey and Casey Gartland tried the case, and Vernis & Bowling of the Gulf Coast defended it, according to the firm's announcement of the result. Because the verdict followed an insurer's refusal to settle within the policy limits, the case also set up the question of whether GEICO would answer for the judgment beyond what its insured's policy covered. We found no post-trial ruling or appeal in the sources reviewed.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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