Family settles after woman dies following wreck

The sister of a woman who died in the days after a car accident settled a wrongful-death claim for $750,000.

“We had a medical causation problem,” said Zane Cagle of Cagle Law Firm. “She went into the hospital after the crash, had some other unrelated health issues and then ended up passing.”

Cagle said Carol Chreist died five days after the October 2017 accident while in the hospital for monitoring due to preexisting heart troubles. She’d been taken to the medical facility directly from the crash scene.

“The morning that she passed, she reported that she was OK, feeling good,” he said, noting that she was due to be released the day she died.

According to the filed petition, the midday accident occurred when motorist Charles Woods struck the rear of Chreist’s vehicle, which pushed it into the vehicle ahead, which in turn struck another car.

The decedent’s death certificate indicated cardiac arrest as the cause of death, but Cagle said medical records from the treating doctors showed trauma from the accident played a role in her demise.

“Our argument was that it may not have been the sole cause, but it contributed to cause,” he said.

Cagle said the defendant’s two insurance policies left a gap in coverage between $250,000 and $500,000, but a settlement was ultimately worked out.

“They were two separate insurance companies, so that made things a little bit tough,” he said.

Robert Rowland of the Law Offices of Rouse & Cary was listed as representing the defense. He did not respond to a request for comment.