Jury Awards Parents $810,458 After Driver Admits Fault in 1995 West Fargo Crash That Killed Their Son
After trial: The North Dakota Supreme Court affirmed on August 25, 1999 (1999 ND 171), refusing to deduct the family's pretrial settlement with the driver's father from the jury award. The amended judgment was $825,681.47, but the opinion does not itemize what was added to the jury's $810,457.96, so only the award ranks.
Won by Vogel Law Firm.
The parents of an eight-year-old boy killed in a November 1995 crash in West Fargo, North Dakota, sued the driver, his father and a second driver alleged to have been racing him. The driver admitted liability, and the jury awarded the parents $810,457.96 against him and found the second driver not negligent. The trial court refused to subtract the family's pretrial settlement with the father from the award, and the North Dakota Supreme Court affirmed in 1999.
What happened
On November 12, 1995, an eight-year-old boy died of injuries he suffered in a collision in West Fargo, North Dakota. Scott Johnson was driving his father's pickup truck when it hit the vehicle carrying the boy's family. The child's parents, James and Kathleen Nelson, sued on their own behalf and as his surviving parents.
The lawsuit named three defendants: Scott Johnson, his father William Johnson, and Michel DuFault, who was alleged to have been racing Scott Johnson when the crash happened. The claim against the father rested on North Dakota's family purpose doctrine, under which the owner of a family vehicle answers for the driver's negligence. Before trial, the Nelsons settled with William Johnson for his vicarious liability alone and expressly kept their claims against Scott Johnson and DuFault.
The Supreme Court's opinion lists H. Patrick Weir Jr. of Lee Hagen Law Office, Ltd., in Fargo, as the Nelsons' counsel. That firm is no longer operating, and Weir is now a shareholder at Vogel Law Firm. The court record does not give the date of the trial.
At trial Scott Johnson admitted liability and disputed only the amount of damages. The jury found that his negligence was the sole proximate cause of the collision and that DuFault was not negligent. It awarded the Nelsons $810,457.96 in compensatory damages against Scott Johnson. The court later entered an amended judgment for $825,681.47; the opinion does not say what was added to the jury's figure.
Johnson then asked the trial court to subtract what the Nelsons had received from his father's pretrial settlement, arguing that otherwise the family would recover twice. The trial court refused, reasoning that the money his father paid was the price of settling a separate claim against the father, not a contribution toward the damages award.
Johnson appealed, and on August 25, 1999, the North Dakota Supreme Court affirmed in an opinion reported at 1999 ND 171. The court held that releasing a vicariously liable owner does not release the driver who was actually negligent, and that the state's contribution statute did not call for a deduction here. It also rejected the double recovery argument. The court explained that settlement amounts are not the same as damages, because a settlement reflects the value of avoiding the risk and expense of trial as well as the claim itself. Johnson, the only defendant found at fault, had no claim to a windfall from his father's decision to settle early.
The Nelsons kept the full jury award, and the judgment stood as entered.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
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