$690,000.00 RECOVERY FOR ONE VEHICLE ROLLOVER ACCIDENT ON GARDEN STATE PARKWAY ON NEW YEARS EVE
RE: James Farmer v. Redland Insurance
Docket #: MON-L-3272-11
Mediation Date: 2/29/12
Mediator Retired Judge: Bette Uhrmacher
On New Years Eve, December 31, 2009, at approximately 7:00 a.m., Jim Farmer, a 41 year old Regional Sales Manager and father of 3, was on his way to work on the Garden State Parkway. It had been snowing that morning and was snowing at the time of the accident. As the plaintiff was proceeding northbound on the Parkway near mile marker 97.8 in Wall Township he alleges he was cutoff by an unknown vehicle which entered his lane causing the plaintiff’s 2008 Toyota Tacoma Pickup Truck to go into a 360 degree spin striking the guardrail and flipping over several times on its roof. There was no contact between plaintiff’s vehicle and the unknown vehicle and that vehicle never stopped nor was it ever identified. There was also no witnesses to the accident. The plaintiff pursued an uninsured claim against the insurance carrier insuring his employer’s pickup truck that he was in at the time of the accident. The insurance carrier defended on the basis that the accident did not and could not happen the way the plaintiff says that it happened and that his own negligence in traveling too fast and not controlling his vehicle on a snowy and icy road is what caused the accident.
In the rollover accident the plaintiff sustained a serious foot and ankle injury including left open ankle fracture, left calcaneus fracture, along with a severe laceration to the dorsum of the foot and the structures of the foot. He required multiple procedures from an orthopaedic surgeon, vascular surgeon and plastic surgeon to repair the damage to his foot.
The plaintiff did make a substantial recovery from the initial injury but is left with permanent drop foot, loss of sensation and loss of muscle power in his left foot and ankle along with substantial scarring.
The case proceeded to Mediation before Judge Bette Uhrmacher on February 29, 2012. The case settled after the Mediation proceeding for $690,000.00.