HOUSTON – A local jury recently determined that Werner Enterprises, Inc. was responsible for a late 2014 two-vehicle accident in West Texas which claimed the life of a 7-year-old, according to Harris County District Court records.
The jury reached a $90 million verdict in favor of Jennifer Blake and her children, Brianna and Nathan, on May 18, essentially closing the plaintiffs’ 3-year-old lawsuit against Werner and one of its employees, Shiraz A. Ali.
Following a six-week trial, the jury ultimately concluded that Werner was negligent in its training in supervision of Ali while it found the driver “(failed) to do that which a commercial truck driver of ordinary prudence would have done under the same or similar circumstances or doing that which a commercial truck driver of ordinary prudence would not have done under the same or similar circumstances.”
Eric Trayce Penn of The Penn Law Firm PC in Jacksonville filed the suit on behalf of the Blakes on May 25, 2015.
According to the case, Ali operated a truck for Werner along I-20 in Ector County on Dec. 30, 2014 amidst icy road conditions, lost control of the vehicle, and slammed into 2003 Ford F350 carrying the plaintiffs and decedent Zachery Blake.
“The defendants made the reckless decision to operate the Werner truck on Interstate 20 in icy road conditions that were far too dangerous to safely operate the Werner truck,” the complaint says. “Ali further chose to operate the Werner truck in those icy and dangerous conditions at speeds that were far too great to safely control his commercial motor vehicle given the conditions.”
The elder Blake asserted the wreck caused her and her minor children to suffer “life-altering, serious, permanent injuries and death.”
Werner, in turn, countered the accident was no fault of its own Ali's, arguing it was not its driver who lost control.
An Omaha World-Herald article dated May 22 reports that the defendant intends to appeal the amount, which Creighton University law professor Patrick Borchers surmises will rank among the 25 highest jury awards this year among the thousands nationally.
“The big guy-little guy thing does play into it,” Borchers told the World-Herald. “When you see a monster verdict like this, that is often the setup.”
The litigation was heard in the Harris County 127th District Court.
Harris County 127th District Court Case No. 2015-36666