It is no surprise that devastating injuries can result when tons of metal collide at high speeds. Unfortunately, it is not easy to understand the legal maze of your own auto insurance policy and your rights for a fair recovery. The attorneys of Raynes McCarty can guide you through that maze and represent you, as we have hundreds of others.
Car accidents frequently involve just two parties: our clients and those who injured them because of unsafe driving. A Raynes McCarty attorney not only helped write Pennsylvania auto law for these types of accidents, he also wrote the book explaining the law to other attorneys.
To achieve positive results for our clients, we work with design engineers, trucking safety experts, and leading industry specialists. When it's time to explain an accident, we develop advanced computer animations that make the truth very clear to juries.
Some examples of our cases involving auto accidents include:
- $15,000,000 Verdict for Car Passenger In an older section of Philadelphia, a set of decades old trolley tracks ran down the center of the street in a right-of-way reserved for public transit. Because the various governmental units involved could not agree who had the legal responsibility for maintaining the tracks, the condition of the tracks and surrounding road severely deteriorated. The dangerous condition of the roadway caused the driver of a car to lose control; tragically, the passenger suffered serious orthopedic injuries. Investigation of the accident revealed the interagency bickering. The agencies again would not fulfill their responsibilities by compensating the passenger for her injuries, thereby forcing her to trial. With Gerald A. McHugh, Jr. as co-counsel at trial, the jury returned a $15,000,000 verdict. The case was reported by the American Bar Association Journal as one of that year's top 10 jury verdicts.
- $10,250,000.00 confidential settlement for fatal trucking accident Tim was a talented young man who had distinguished himself in public service, and was just starting to build a new career when he was killed in a fiery accident. His car was stopped in traffic because of highway construction when a truck rear-ended it, causing it to burst into flames. The trucker had only limited insurance, so a team led by Raynes partners Jerry McHugh and Regina Foley investigated the precautions taken by the road builders and government officials to alert approaching motorists of the construction and the need to slow down. Exhaustive discovery involving more than 40 depositions proved that responsibility for the accident rested on several parties, resulting in fair compensation for Tim's widow and son.
- $6,000,000 for Young Father Killed in Fiery Crash Roy DeCaro led the Raynes McCarty team called upon to represent in federal court the family of a young husband and father who was burned to death when his car was struck by a tractor trailer in Delaware County.
- $5,700,000 Verdict in Fatal Car Crash Florence was killed in a car crash when a van driven by a Choice Courier employee skidded into her. Roy DeCaro convinced a federal court jury to award $1.8 million in compensatory damages for this homemaker, even though she had never worked outside of her home. The jury also awarded $3.7 million in punitive damages because the company's vans had bald tires, which they had neither inspected not corrected. Click here to read more about the case. .
- $5,000,000.00 Settlement for Death of Teenager Unlawfully Served Alcohol An 18-year-old attended a sporting event, where he was illegally served multiple beers by vendors who did not check his identification and who failed to follow the arena's limits on the volume of alcohol that could be sold to a patron. As he drove home, the young man could not navigate a turn and was killed in a one-car crash. The team of Jerry McHugh, Steve Raynes, and Tina McLaughlin successfully refuted a defense that the young man was to blame for his own death and established that the responsibility rested with the vendor. A videotape settlement brochure – assembled by Marty Brigham – allowed the family to express their painful loss without the need for their formal testimony. The Raynes McCarty team secured for the family a $5 million dollar pre-trial settlement from the vendors' parent company.
- $4,250,000.00 settlement for trucking fatality Paul was a successful business executive with a happy family when he died in a collision with a truck, whose driver claimed that he did nothing wrong and a sudden cardiac emergency was the reason he lost control. To overcome this defense, Raynes partner Jerry McHugh did exhaustive research into the driver's actions immediately after the accident, and his medical history. He then retained qualified medical experts who established that the real explanation for the driver's actions was sleepiness, not a heart attack. Even though the case was pending in a venue known for modest jury verdicts, Jerry was able to achieve a settlement that reflected the family's losses.
- Confidential Seven-Figure Settlement for Train Engineer's Widow A train collided with a gasoline tanker at a grade crossing, resulting in a massive fire and the death of the train's engineer. The accident was caused in part by the failure of the railroad-crossing signal, and in part by the driver of the oil company tank truck, as he failed to look before entering the crossing. The investigative report of the National Transportation Safety Board suggested that the truck driver had no responsibility for the accident. Acting on behalf of the engineer's widow, we performed an independent reconstruction of the accident and disproved the conclusions of the NTSB. One of our attorneys obtained a confidential seven-Figure settlement for the engineer's widow.