Todd Schafer: $4.1 million verdict for a client injured with MTBI in a semi-truck collision
$4.1 million trucking verdict this week in Porter County
By: Bob Kasarda
NWITimes.com
A Porter County jury awarded $4.1 million to a Valparaiso woman who sustained serious injuries just more than five years ago when her vehicle was struck by a semi-trailer truck whose driver disregarded a red light at a local intersection along U.S. 6, according to her attorney Todd Schafer.
Courtney and Jeffrey Faulhaber were awarded the money after a trial that lasted just more than a week, ending Monday, Schafer said.
The defendant in the case is B&W Cartage Company. No one at the company could be reached early Tuesday afternoon for comment.
The complaint in the case says that on June 20, 2020, Courtney Faulhaber was driving south on Calumet Avenue and had entered the intersection of U.S. 6 on a green light when the driver of a westbound semi-trailer truck disregarded a red light and struck Faulhaber's vehicle.
Faulhaber sustained a traumatic brain injury, left shoulder injury and spinal injuries from the collision, according to the suit.
The truck driver, identified in the suit as Siliman Ibrahim, and his company were accused in the suit of various forms of negligence and carelessness.
"It was a case where the defense agreed they ran the red light and caused the crash, but they refused to pay for the damage they had done," Schafer said.
"Courtney suffered a traumatic brain injury which carries with it lifelong symptoms and an uncertain future," he said. "The defense refused to appropriately value the life and health of a human being."
Schafer pointed out that this company and others carry insurance to cover these types of payments.
"The jury did the right thing and enforced the safety rules — traffic laws — that are there to protect us," Schafer said. "If juries don’t hold corporations accountable for violating the law none of us are safe."
