An Ohio pregnant woman suffered disabling injuries in a car accident involving a drunken driver a mere mile from her home in Huber Heights. She and the father of her child were driving home when a drunken driver swerved her car over three lanes of the highway, crashing into their vehicle and pushing it into the side of a retaining wall.
The accident caused her to break almost every bone in her face as well as suffering a broken right arm and a broken neck. Rushed to a medical facility, her treatment that day was just the beginning of a nightmare that rang up $866,000 in doctor and hospital bills and required her, so far, to endure no less than 11 difficult and painful surgeries.
It turned out that the drunken driver was coming home from her job at a strip club where the dancers were encouraged to drink on the job with customers to encourage their spending. Under these circumstances, it could be argued, the employer had ample reason to know that employees were likely to be driving home in an intoxicated condition and that a dangerous or even deadly accident could easily occur.
While the driver was later jailed for six months for drunk driving and vehicular assault, a jury in a civil lawsuit on behalf of the injured woman awarded $2.85 million dollars in damages against both the intoxicated dancer and the company that owns the strip club.
While the 24-year-old woman remains pregnant with her first child, she faces a future filled with chronic pain and disability. She currently must take approximately $4400 worth of pain killer medication a month to endure the agony. While no amount of money can ever adequately compensate a person for this kind of injury, it is only right that those responsible for the accident bear the burden of the economic cost. After any serious accident, injured parties should consult with an experienced personal injury attorney at the earliest possible time.
Source: Norwalk Reflector, "Drunk strip club dancer changes woman's life" Mary McCarty, Jul. 14, 2013