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On
the evening of October 10, 1998, Laura McKenna, a beautiful
31-year-old single woman, was a passenger in a car driven by
her best friend, Amy. They were heading home on the 408/East-West
Expressway from the christening of a friend's baby and Amy's
10 year-old son was in the back of the car. Jason Giguere, a
19-year- old young man with a long history of personal problems
, was driving his pickup truck without a valid drivers license,
was legally drunk and high on marijuana, and was fleeing the
scene of an accident he had
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been involved in at the S.R. 436 toll booth. Jason lost control
of his truck, crossed over the 40 foot grassy median separating
the Expressway's lanes, and slammed head on into the car in which
Laura was a passenger. Laura did not die immediately, but lingered
on and died three hours later from multiple blunt traumas to her
head and chest.
Jason
carried only $10,000 in insurance, had no assets, and was serving
a 12 and a half year sentence for DUI manslaughter when we got
Laura's case from an attorney referral. We agreed to take the
case, but cautioned Laura's father that the family's chances of
recovering anything beyond Jason's $10,000 in coverage appeared
bleak. Our investigation, however, revealed that Jason's truck
was co-owned by Jason's father, Robert Giguere, allowing us to
sue both Jason and Robert under Florida's danger- ous instrumentality
doctrine. Robert, though, claimed he carried no insurance on the
vehicle and also claimed his bank had made a mistake and should
have transferred title to the truck solely to Jason once he turned
18. The bank's documents seemed to con- firm Robert's argument,
but we had no standing to sue the bank. Robert's attorney also
claimed in discovery that Jason alone had bought, paid for, and
insured the truck.
Still,
we refused to give up on the case. Eventually, we were able to
develop a bad faith claim against Laura's insurer for their fail-
ure to provide her with uninsured motorist coverage. We also later
discovered that Jason's father carried a commercial auto- mobile
policy and made a claim against that policy. We event- ually won
a motion for summary judgment against Robert's insurer finding
coverage under the policy, and obtained a separate favorable bad
faith settlement from Laura's insurer, allowing the McKenna's
to recover $475,000 for their daughter's tragic death. While no
amount of money can ever compensate the McKenna's, they can now
bring some closure in their lives from the event and the money
they received will help Laura's sisters raise their families.
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