Jury Finds Highway Contractor Partly Liable for Fatal I-75 Rear-End Crash

Just after 9 p.m. on October 17, 2009, a dump truck pulled out of the median of Interstate 75 in Warren County, Ohio, and into the highway's fast lane. Nine miles of I-75 were being widened under a contract John R. Jurgensen Co. had won from the Ohio Department of Transportation, and the truck, driven by Timothy Smith, one of the dump truck drivers Jurgensen had hired to haul dirt on the job, had traveled about 574 feet and 24 seconds into the lane when a Nissan Maxima struck its rear end at close to 79 mph in a 65 mph zone. Nicholas Poe was driving; his wife, Amanda, sat in the front passenger seat. Neither was wearing a seatbelt, and both died on impact.

At trial, Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers testified that dirt and dried mud covered the truck's rear lights, its license plate area, and its reflective conspicuity tape, and the lead investigator testified he could not see the reflective tape from 1,000 feet away. Jurgensen had not let its drivers stop and wipe the trucks down once a shift began. The company had also skipped the flashing amber high-intensity lights that the Ohio Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices requires for equipment working outside the shoulder, relying instead on ordinary hazard flashers. Warning signs marked the nine-mile work zone, but the last sign on the left side of the road sat about two miles back from the crash site, and there was no sign at all 1,000 feet ahead of the spot where the trucks actually crossed into traffic. An ODOT transportation engineer testified that a warning sign belonged roughly 1,300 feet before an entry point, and on whichever side of the road the trucks were using. Jurgensen's digital warning sign was on the right shoulder, the side farthest from the lane the trucks entered.

The mothers of Nicholas and Amanda sued as administrators of their children's estates. After other defendants were dismissed, the case went to a six-day jury trial against the truck driver and Jurgensen. The jury cleared the driver of liability but split fault for the crash between Nicholas Poe (51 percent), Jurgensen (25 percent), and ODOT (24 percent), even though the estate had not sought recovery from ODOT. Because Ohio law bars a plaintiff who is more than half at fault from recovering, and treats a defendant found less than half at fault as severally, not jointly, liable, only Amanda's estate, since she was a passenger and not the driver, could collect, and only from Jurgensen's own share. The jury set Amanda's estate's damages at $16 million, and the judgment entered against Jurgensen for its 25 percent share came to $4 million.

Jurgensen appealed to the Twelfth District Court of Appeals, arguing the trial court should have directed a verdict in its favor because Nicholas Poe's speed was the sole cause of the crash, and that the $16 million damages figure was excessive. In a January 12, 2015 opinion, the court disagreed on both points. It held that the jury had ample evidence, including testimony that the crash would have happened even at the posted 65 mph limit, that the truck's fouled lighting and inadequate signage were independent contributing causes, and that nothing in the record showed the damages award reflected passion or prejudice rather than the jury's weighing of the loss. The court affirmed the $4 million judgment against Jurgensen in full.

The Twelfth District's opinion lists Michael J. Leizerman and Rena M. Leizerman of E.J. Leizerman & Associates, LLC as counsel of record for the plaintiffs-appellees. No further appeal to the Ohio Supreme Court could be found.