Jury Awards Trucker $13 Million
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By Joy C. Shaw A truck driver and his wife won a jury verdict of $13 million for a 1999 forklift accident that left him partially paralyzed for life. Plaintiffs' attorneys called the verdict, returned Tuesday at the Alhambra courthouse, one of the largest personal-injury awards ever out of the San Gabriel Valley. "This is a very fair verdict and will help for the necessary cost of trying to care for him for the rest of his life," said attorney John Taylor of Taylor & Ring in Los Angeles. Taylor represents the truck driver, Jacob Munoz. Munoz v. Power Lift Corp., GC020481 (LA Super. Ct., filed Oct. 17, 1999). The jury cleared Rol-Lift, the Arkansas-based manufacturer of the forklift, of any liability. But the company had settled mid-trial for $650,000. "We think the jury reached an appropriate verdict, and that Rol-Lift is zero percent at fault in the accident," said Rol-Lift lawyer John Bower of Bragg, Short, Serota & Kuluva in Los Angeles. Power Lift attorney Daniel Friedenthal of Pasadena-based Friedenthal, Cox Herskovitz said he plans to appeal the verdict and request a new trial. "We thought [the verdict] was high," Friedenthal said. Jacob Munoz was delivering antifreeze to Sierra Autocars dealership in Monrovia in 1999, when a forklift owned by the company unexpectedly tipped over, crushing him, his suit claimed. Munoz, who was 42 at the time of the accident and the father of four children, lost all sensation from the chest down and could not bathe, walk, go to the bathroom or even sit in a wheelchair for hours, despite two spinal surgeries and extensive rehabilitation, his suit said. The defendants at trial were Rol-Lift and Power Lift. The jury, however, apportioned responsibility among all the parties, including Munoz, who was found 15 percent at fault; Power Lift 54 percent; Sierra Autocars, the Monrovia dealership, 30 percent; and Munoz's employer at the time, A.P. Fisher, 1 percent at fault. Sierra Autocars settled before trial for $5.6 million. |
