After a delivery truck driver doored a 27 year old bicyclist on North Milwaukee Avenue in August, 2012 the driver's company sent her a bill for the damage she caused to the heavy door, over two hundred dollar's worth. Now, thanks to a resolution reached Friday, the delivery company will be paying the bicyclist a hefty sum for the injuries she sustained from the driver's carelessness.
The incident occurred just after 11 p.m. in front of a 7-Eleven store at 2403 North Milwaukee Avenue. The woman was riding her vintage Schwinn home after a night working on her bike at West Town bike's Women and Trans' Night. She was riding in the shared bike lane and wore a helmet. Her bicycle was properly equipped with a light and reflectors. As she passed the left side of the truck the driver suddenly threw his door open smacking the cyclist in the face. The hard impact throw her into the street, and broke the door's metal hinges.
The cyclist was rushed via ambulance to Resurrection St. Mary's Medical Center. She would later hire my law firm to represent her against the driver and the delivery company that employed him. She would undergo months of physical rehabilitation for her injured wrists and thigh, and endure an extended period of painful swelling and bruising to the right side of her face. The delivery company asserted that its driver had looked before opening his door and that it had remained opened for several minutes when the bicyclist just rode into it for some reason. After a diligent search we located another cyclist who was riding behind our client that night and who could corroborate that the door was thrown open suddenly just as she rode by. With that witness's statement the company felt compelled to resolve the case in the cyclist's favor.
Does it matter that the truck is illegally parked in a bus loading zone? I pass by the same truck often as the driver/workers load goods into the 7-11 there.
ReplyDeleteI doubt there are many cases of people willingly running into open doors...
Certainly it matters. . . The truck driver was completely in the wrong. I would have loved to show the bill for the door to a jury, but in the end settlement made sense.
ReplyDeleteCan I ask what the causes of action were, or rather, would have been, had you filed the complaint?
ReplyDeleteWe cold do with you here in London. Last year a driver doored a cyclist and knocked him under the wheels of a passing bus, which crushed him to death. The court was told that the windows of his car were so heavily tinted that transparency was reduced by 83%. Yet he was found not guilty of causing death by dangerous driving because the jury accepted that his explanation that he "just didn't see" the cyclist.
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