Corner Iron Off Lion Raisins Truck Pierces Schoolteacher's Brain: $11.8 Million Fresno Verdict

On September 17, 2010, Susan Reyes was driving on State Route 99 near Bakersfield when the vehicle ahead of her, a Lion Raisins semi-trailer driven by Richard Oh, shed a corner iron that had been used to secure stacked boxes on the flatbed. The iron flew from the trailer, punched through Reyes' windshield, and lodged in her skull. Paramedics found her with a Glasgow Coma Scale score of 3, the lowest reading consistent with survival.

Reyes was a Teacher on Special Assignment with the Fresno Unified School District. The brain injury ended her career. She was left unable to drive safely and prone to seizures. Her husband Adrian pursued a separate claim for loss of consortium. The family retained Richard Watters of Miles, Sears and Eanni, the Fresno firm founded in 1956.

The plaintiffs sued the driver, Oh, for negligence, and named Lion Raisins under respondeat superior: Oh was on company business when the load shifted and shed the iron. The central dispute at trial was the extent of Reyes' functional limitations. Defense counsel retained surveillance footage showing her driving a car to a supermarket and argued that the video proved her cognition was adequate.

Watters turned the footage against the defense. He argued that Reyes' decision to drive at all, despite a known seizure disorder and a physician's instruction not to, was itself proof of impaired judgment. Far from showing recovery, he told the jury, the video demonstrated exactly why she required full-time supervision and could not be left to manage her own affairs.

The jury in Fresno County Superior Court returned a verdict on March 25, 2012, in the amount of $11,876,655.82, covering Susan's damages and Adrian's consortium claim. The case number is 10 CECG 03649 MWS. No post-trial reduction has been reported in the verdict record.