Winnebago County Jury Awards $52 Million to Family in Fatal Panera Bread Truck Crash

On the morning of May 20, 2018, two vehicles were traveling in opposite directions on U.S. Route 20 near Stockton, Illinois. Bob Krischon was driving east with his 88-year-old father, Fred, beside him. Headed west were Mary Norman and her passenger, 71-year-old Ruthie Fairchild. Ahead of the Krischons was a Freightliner tractor-trailer owned by Panera Bread and driven by Eluid Valencia.

As the truck rounded a curve, its trailer off-tracked, meaning the rear wheels followed a tighter path than the cab and swung wide into the lane beside it. The trailer struck Norman's westbound vehicle and pushed it across the center line into the eastbound lane. Norman's car hit the Krischons head-on, and the Krischon vehicle caught fire.

Fred Krischon and Ruthie Fairchild were both killed. Bob Krischon, then 56, survived with multiple fractures, a collapsed lung, and chronic pain that has not left him. In the days before the crash, his family had been planning Fred's 89th birthday party. Patrick Salvi II later called the case "tragic on so many levels."

The families' claims went to trial in Winnebago County Circuit Court in September 2025. Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard P.C. attorneys Patrick A. Salvi II, Heidi L. Wickstrom, John A. Mennie, and Kristen M. Stoicescu represented the Krischon family. They argued that Valencia should have known a trailer that size could off-track on a curve and that he failed to keep it within his lane. They also showed the jury that Valencia had been in four collisions during his 11 years driving for Panera, and that the company never gave him the retraining that record called for.

The case against Panera rested on the company's own conduct, not only the driver's. A carrier that kept a driver behind the wheel after repeated crashes, the attorneys said, owned a share of what happened on Route 20.

On September 30, 2025, the jury returned a total verdict of $67 million. Of that, the Krischon family was awarded $52 million: $37 million to Bob Krischon for his injuries and $15 million to the estate of his father. The estate of Ruthie Fairchild, represented by separate counsel, received the remaining $15 million. The jury assigned 90 percent of the fault to Panera Bread and Valencia and the remaining 10 percent to Norman.