Notice of being sued

First; stop posting about this anywhere on the internet. It can be used against you.

Second; you will need to contact you former employers safety and insurance provider.
They are most likely named as well.
The former company and insurance company should provide legal representation. It would be a good idea to get a second opinion from a qualified attorney.

Third; get copies of any and all repotting made on the incident for your use.

My guess is the other driver tried to make an insurance claim for damages. The claim was denied or less than what they wanted. Texas has some odd laws around this. Basically they can’t bring a court case against the insurance company, but they can drag the company and you into court for a settlement.
And that’s what they want.

Lastly this is going to take a long time. The idea is to drag it out, looking for a deal.

 

You are being included in the suit so that they can drag you in for depositions. They will try to show that your logs were not legal, or that you did not do a proper pre-trip. If they can show either of those things then the case will be decided on a strict liability basis, meaning your company will pay for her damage even though she was at fault in the accident. It's how the system works. Any infraction of any kind means that fault for the accident will no longer be considered. Only damages will matter. That's why there are so many billboards advertising lawyers who want to sue trucking companies.

 

With all the truck wreck lawyers who flood the TV and print ads in Texas, she is looking for a bigger payday than she was offered by the company. The ads like to present that they can get hundreds of thousands of dollars "in your pocket".

 

Notify your insurance company that you had at that time immediately. Send them everything you have on the situation and let them take the lead. They will try and make it go away quickly but if that’s not possible then they will hire a lawyer to defend you. How much are they sueing for?

I had an incident where a lady jumped off the back of my trailer and broke her leg. 2 years minus 1 day later she sued for 1 million. I freaked the F out thinking the world is ending. Long story short the insurance company got a lawyer to negotiate everything and it took about a full year but finally they settled for $10,000. The whole thing was a freakin joke. And btw I had moved on from the insurance company by the time I was sued, so the old insurance company had to take it on even though I wasn’t a client any longer. The limitation was 2 yrs.

Hopefully that calms your nerves a bit and gives some insight.

Edit: They also named my driver in the suit as well. He had to come in for a deposition and the insurance company had the same attorney rep him as wel.

 

Without some kind of police report it's hard to have ducks in a row.

 

I was thinking about this today. If I understand correctly she initially stopped, but then ran away when you called the police? Or did she simply run away before you could exchange information?

If it's the latter, then by filing the lawsuit she's basically saying she's guilty of hit and run. If that fact is presented to her attorney it might give them pause to think about what they are doing.

 

Ive been doing some thinking before I write here. I have been sued twice related to trucking in two particular accidents.

The first was really simple, backing into the docks at Shedd's in SW Baltimore in a designated truck only area protected by two gaurds at the entrance. No one else is to enter while I am docking. The truck failed to keep moving back sight side and a examination of the problem revealed a employee had driven his car into my rear right drives punching his door in a little bit.

Long story short, that employee was late to work for the third time against policy, he rolled his car into my area past the guards against policy. And so on. When the papers served he wanted 66500 for his house mortgage off our back, me and the company I ran for. In the deposition our position was made clear as ice to the lawyers of the other side. There was nothing in our positon to have a leg to stand on so to speak.

Because this was a deposition as a first step prior to trial to decide if there is merit for a trial on both sides, my lawyer who specializes in maritime, railroad and trucking accidents in the Baltimore area dug up pharmacy fills of many narcotic medicines on what is supposed to be just a sprain shoulder. There was no cell, no internet and way before the just say no policy against drugs in those days. He was essentially doctor shopping, raking in piles of narcotics to be high and wasted on at the doses given by a number of doctors and filled fast at a small number of pharmacies. At the end we just laughed him out of having a trial. The State would be very interested in asking HIM the plaintiff why he piled up a mountain of pain pills. And for that he stood to be prosecuted etc for fraud to start off.

We did not have to do anything more. It was dropped. Between the drugs and breaking of company policy and getting his car into my "Turf" to ensure that I will hit him etc was all against him. And so that was that.

The second suit was where I took out a granny and her car in the Esses near the Nat'l Cathedral on the 495 loop during rush hour. My ticket by the state police was failure to stay in lane and my tractor had a few new mirriors bolted on after the hit. At the end I believe the insurance company settled out with her getting a new car and that pretty much was all she was asking for. So in all everyone was happy. Obviously changing lanes with a cab over was for me a particularly dangerous adventure. Many years into my life on the road I would take out another vehicle and damaged a high value cargo inside his vehicle. The situation that night was a no win for all of us. Since I hit him then the company wrote a check to him on the spot to allow this man to take care of the damage and enjoy a little extra. The company tested me and did a top inspection on everything. I had a beer load from Busch St Louis that night. So it was a pretty complete inspection. I was found to be ok and allowed to proceed. And that was the end of that.

It would not be the only suits in my lifetime. These two stories reflect my suit experiences with trucking specifically. I had one accident where the rear of the trailer damaged about 15000 dollars worth of store inventory due to a very specific failure of the store manager to assign a number of his staff to my unloading at his nursery corner against so many cars coming and going. We returned the next day to finish it and this time had a army of store employees for a hour unloading and getting us out of there safely.

They did not fire me in those days either. We just brushed everything off and loaded for another run. These days drivers are easily fired over the smallest thing. But if you were really stupid then yes they will come after you with a suit for the damages.

 

Wow...that's at another level of weird.