Imagine getting a phone call in the middle of the night from the police saying that your son had been in an accident and it was important for you to get to the hospital to identify his body. Imagine finding out that your son had been riding in a car with his best friend, but that friend had been high on drugs, causing the fatal Louisiana car accident.
While this is exactly what happened to a Louisiana woman, she recently asked the judge that sentenced the man who caused her son’s fatal accident for leniency. It is a rare thing to be able to forgive the person who killed your child and many Louisiana parents would more likely file a wrongful death lawsuit against the driver, regardless of whether he had been the child’s friend.
Wrongful death lawsuits are about more than just covering the costs of burying a family member. They help a family to come to terms with its loss and find a sense of justice for the untimely death. A fatal accident also has more of a financial cost than just the burial and funeral. Suing for a wrongful death can also help cover that family member’s lost wages and attempt to compensate for his or her loss of companionship.
In this story, the 32-year-old man had been driving with the 30-year-old victim and another passenger after having taken Lidocaine, Diazepam, Methadone and using marijuana. The Louisiana State Police have said that the driver lost control of his vehicle when he drove off the right side of the street. He tried to turn back onto the road but overcorrected, sending his car into oncoming traffic. While he was not hit by an approaching vehicle, he overcorrected again before his car finally went back off the road and into a tree.
Source: The Times-Picayune, “Mississippi man to serve three years for car crash that killed friend,” Claire Galofaro, May 4, 2012
