$18 Million Verdict After Driver Struck Mother and Daughter in Calabasas Crosswalk and Staged the Scene

On June 5, 2016, Yijing Chen and her mother, Hongfen Shen, stepped into a marked crosswalk in Calabasas after the pedestrian signal turned green. Nicole Herschel was driving a pickup truck and struck both women in the crosswalk. Yijing suffered a fractured leg. Hongfen Shen died from her injuries.

What followed the collision became central to the civil case. Evidence at trial showed that after the impact, Herschel moved her vehicle, repositioned Hongfen while she lay unconscious, and gave misleading statements to responding CHP officers about how she had come upon the scene. The CHP later recommended criminal charges, and in 2017 Herschel pleaded no contest to vehicular manslaughter and was sentenced to a year in jail.

Yijing Chen filed a civil suit in Los Angeles Superior Court, represented by El Dabe Ritter Trial Lawyers. At trial in Van Nuys, attorneys Jonathan Ritter and the firm proved not only that Herschel caused the collision but that her post-crash conduct constituted malice under California law. The jury found that the scene staging caused additional emotional distress to Yijing, who had watched her mother die and then saw the scene manipulated around her.

In January 2020, the jury returned a verdict of $18,000,000, all in compensatory damages. About $5 million of that award was for Yijing's emotional distress, and the balance reflected the loss of her mother and her own injuries. The jury found that Herschel acted with malice, which supported the emotional-distress claim, though it awarded no separate punitive damages.

Herschel appealed. The California Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District, Case No. B306200, affirmed the judgment on March 2, 2022, finding the jury's verdict and malice finding were supported by substantial evidence. The $18 million judgment stands.