Auto Accident Injury Case

K.M. v. MP & T, LLC

This case involved a 53 year-old landscaper, K.M., who was traveling on U.S. Highway 19 to a job site. K.M. had his employee and laborer traveling with him in his vehicle.

K.M. stopped at a traffic light during morning rush hour traffic. Unbeknownst to K.M., a commercial dump truck was traveling behind him, carrying a load of gravel, that had failing brakes. Not surprisingly, the dump truck rear-ended K.M.’s vehicle while it was completely stopped at the stop light.

K.M., while being dazed by the accident from the force of being hit by a loaded commercial dump truck, initially thought he would be fine and did not travel to the hospital. However, in the days following the accident, his neck began to become more painful and at that point K.M. decided to seek medical attention approximately a week after the accident. He initially pursued conservative care for his neck including therapy, massage, medication. However, his neck pain and headaches continued. Ultimately an MRI was performed which revealed a herniated disc at C6-C7. K.M., after consultation with his surgeon, decided to proceed forward with the discectomy with total disc replacement in an effort to resolve his debilitating cervically generated headaches.

The owner of the commercial dump truck had $500,000.00 in liability insurance available for the accident but made no monetary offers to K.M. prior to filing suit, presumably because of a pre-existing neck condition.

A lawsuit was filed by Emerson Straw against the owner and driver of the dump truck for negligence related not only to the operation of the dump truck on the date of the accident, including inadequate maintenance of the dump truck’s brakes.

Within 4 months of filing the lawsuit, the defendants’ insurance carrier proposed a global mediation with K.M. and K.M.’s employee passenger, who was also injured in the accident, to the extent of also requiring spinal surgery.

At the global mediation involving K.M. and the attorney for K.M.’s passenger, Emerson Straw was able to recover over 80% of the available insurance coverage for K.M. despite the passenger having similar spinal injuries and undergoing spinal surgery himself.

K.M. continues to suffer from TMJ injuries from the motor vehicle accident and will be consulting, in the future, with a TMJ specialist in and effort to resolve his continuing jaw pain and complaints. Emerson Straw continues to represent K.M. in connection with his pursuit of underinsured motorist benefits available for the accident in question.

This case illustrates why it is necessary for motor vehicle accident victims to immediately consult with Emerson Straw. The insurance carrier for the at-fault commercial dump truck would not and did not make any monetary offers to K.M. prior to the lawsuit being filed. The case was additionally complicated by the fact that there was an additional plaintiff, who had back surgery and was represented by a separate law firm.

Emerson Straw was able to recover for K.M. the vast majority of insurance coverage benefits available within 1 year of the date of the accident, despite the presence of a competing plaintiff, who also had spinal surgery performed.