Rear-end crash, injuries lead to $100,000 settlement

A Ballwin woman reached a $100,000 settlement with the insurer for a driver who rear-ended her vehicle, according to her attorney.

Deborah L. Doak of Brown & Crouppen said her client was an active, healthy and physically fit 78-year-old who worked part-time in food service at a local high school.

According to Doak, on Jan. 26, 2017, a Wildwood resident driving a 1998 Lexus LS400 slammed into the rear of the plaintiff’s 1995 Ford Windstar. The two women were driving on westbound Manchester Road, just past New Ballwin Road, when the collision occurred.

The defendant driver told police an unknown vehicle had been rapidly accelerating toward her, so she sped up because she thought that vehicle was going to hit her. While the driver was accelerating, she continued to look in her rearview mirror and struck the rear of the plaintiff’s vehicle, pushing it into the back of another car.

Doak said the plaintiff was thrown violently in the double-impact collision, injuring her head, neck, shoulder, back and knee. She also experienced heart issues as a result of the collision. When she threw up blood, her doctor suspected a chordae tendineae rupture from her impact against the steering wheel.

Following a hospital stay, and due to injuries she suffered in the collision and changes in her mental outlook and lifestyle, she developed atrial fibrillation that required treatment and life-long medication. She also sustained a complete tear of the right lateral meniscus body and anterior horn and underwent a right total knee replacement. She had conservative treatment of neck and back sprains and strains as well.

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