WIXLIB

SERVING BUSINESS LAWYERS IN TEXASCommercial Vehicle Crashes Cause LitigationBoom for Texas LawyersBy Natalie Posgate – (September 22, 2014)– Last year, a Dimmit County jury awarded 281 million to the family of a deceased man whowas the victim of a commercial truck crash inSouth Texas near the Eagle Ford Shale.Plaintiffs and commercial defense lawyersaround the state say they expect truckingindustry lawsuits to continue to increase as longas business in the Eagle Ford and Permian Basinshale plays continues to boom.This past April, an El Paso jury awarded 4.6 million against three trucking companiesfor a 2010 accident that left two men dead.That same month, a Dallas jury awarded aTrucking litigation has become so hot thateven the Texas Hammer is broadcastingadvertisements seeking victims.“Our firm has signed twice as many 18-wheelerand large commercial truck cases in the last yearor two than in the same period before that,”said Houston attorney Vuk Stevan Vujasinovicof the personal injury firm, VB Attorneys.“We’re going to continue to see more and moreover time.”Vujasinovic and others have pointed to the oiland gas boom as a frontrunner for the increase intrucking litigation.The remnants of a crew truck that collided head-firstinto an oil rig trailer on Sept. 20, 2012 on RR-2119due to the 18-wheeler’s negligent driving.Mississippi woman 4.1 million for severeinjuries she suffered in a 2011 accident withan 18-wheeler while traveling through Texason I-20.The number of serious or deadly crashesinvolving commercial trucks hauling materials inthe oil and gas boom has skyrocketed during thepast three years.The jump in commercial trucking crashescombined with a series of six, seven, eightand even nine-digit jury verdicts has led to asignificant spike in litigation in Texas. 2014 The Texas Lawbook1And numbers indicate thatthe boom is only goingto continue. Accordingto a study released thissummer by the Universityof Texas at San AntonioInstitute for EconomicDevelopment, the oil andgas play in the West TexasVuk Stevan Vujasinovic region alone will produce 20.5 billion in economic output in 2022.With that boom comes higher demand forcommercial trucks, which experts say causesthe overwhelmed trucking companies to putmore 18-wheelers on the state’s roads – many ofwhich lack the infrastructure to accommodatethe influx.Naturally, this leads to more accidents.

SERVING BUSINESS LAWYERS IN TEXASRecent Texas Department of Transportationstatistics obtained by The Texas Lawbookreveal that fatal crashes in the Eagle Ford Shalearea alone, which stretches across 26 counties,increased by 19 percent from 2009 to 2013.Thirty percent of those crashes involved acommercial vehicle last year – a 191 percentincrease from 2009, when commercial vehiclesonly accounted for 12 percent of the fatal crashes.As a result, litigation is on the rise.Mike Davis“You’re seeing lawyerswho might handle anoccasional truck wreckingcase who are now seeinga much higher volume,”said Austin attorney MikeDavis of the prominentTexas personal injury lawfirm, Slack & Davis.“I think everyone perceivesthat there’s been a major uptick in the numberof truck wrecks,” he added. “If fatalities areup that in the natural is going to lead tomore litigation.”The great increase in accidents that causedfatalities or serious injuries around the stateis disturbing enough, but 18-wheelers andcommercial trucks’ growing involvement in thoseaccidents is perhaps the biggest shock. 2014 The Texas Lawbook2In West Texas’ Permian Basin region, for example,there were 317 fatal crashes in 2013, a 40 percentincrease from 2009. Commercial vehicles wereinvolved in 77 of those fatal crashes, which is 208percent more than their accountability in 2009,which was 25 fatal accidents.The outcome is similar for crashes that resulted inserious injuries. Commercial trucks’ involvementin those kinds of crashes increased by 98 percentfrom 2009 to 2013 in the Permian Basin region,which saw 4,080 of these crashes last year.Why it’s HappeningDavis and other attorneys who handle truckinglitigation point to many factors in the surge oftrucking accidents, but they say an obvious oneis the amount of fatigue drivers face while tryingto meet the fast-paced demands of their oil andgas clients.Under federal law, truck drivers must take off34 consecutive hours after a 60 or 70-hourworkweek. But an exception to the rule, theOilfield Exemption, allows commercial vehicleoperators who exclusively serve the oil and gasindustry to reset their workweek after 24 hoursoff instead – something Davis said is puttingmore fatigued drivers on roads.Davis said the exemption is only supposedto apply to a very small category of driverswho transport special equipment. But some

SERVING BUSINESS LAWYERS IN TEXAScompanies are interpreting the provision morebroadly by applying it to equipment “neverintended” to apply to the rule, he said.He added that drivers often spend a substantialamount of time on-site waiting for equipment tobe ready to load, which is time that is consideredoff-duty. Ideally, drivers are resting duringThe crew truck McCallum’s client was apassenger in collided with the oilrig trailerportion of an 18-wheeler that was blockingboth the northbound and southbound sides ofRR-2119 due to gettingstuck during an heeler driver “didnothing to provide warningof the trailer’s precariousposition to oncoming trafficin either direction.”Ron McCallumThe accident killed thedriver of the crew truck (the family of whomMcCallum also represented) and injuredMcCallum’s surviving client so badly that it“broke every bone inside of his body” and causeda severe brain injury.This crash occurred after an 18-wheeler got stuck in anattempted U-turn and blocked both sides of RR-2119in Reeves County.“He was the most hurt person who did notdie [from a trucking accident] that I’ve everrepresented,” McCallum said.their waiting time. Realistically, the drivers areassigned to help out with other duties – whichmakes drivers’ shifts longer than they should be,he said.“The reality of those job sites is, it’s organizedchaos out there,” Davis said.Mesquite personal injury attorney RonMcCallum agreed, adding that some drivers areeven working two driving jobs to make endsmeet, since transportation services to and fromthe fracking sites are needed 24 hours a day.“They’re all overworked,” McCallum said.“When you’re overworked and fatigued, that’swhen things happen. I don’t care if your truck isbrand new.”Recently, McCallum won a favorable settlementfor a client who was severely injured in a 2012wreck that occurred late at night on RR-2119 inReeves County. 2014 The Texas Lawbook3The September 2012 accident on RR-2119 killed thesmaller truck’s driver and severely injured another passenger,who was “the most hurt person who did not die” from atrucking accident that Ron McCallum has ever represented.Companies’ failure to properly maintain theirlarge trucks is another accident-causer, legalexperts say.

SERVING BUSINESS LAWYERS IN TEXASA report published last year by the TexasDepartment of Transportation revealed that in2012, 58 percent of the 215 randomly inspectedcommercial trucks in Dimmit County – thesame county the deceased Aguilar’s accidenttook place in that resulted in a 281 millionaward to Aguilar’s family – were taken out ofservice for not meeting Texas Department ofPublic Safety standards. In the same inspections,23 drivers were found unqualified to operate thecommercial vehicles.Dimmit County’s numbers for out-of-servicevehicles exceeded the statewide statistics by morethan double the amount, which said 25 percentout of the 8,000 inspected commercial vehiclesdid not meet DPS standards.In the Aguilar case, a drive shaft broke off a truckemployed by the oil patch trucking company,Heckmann Water Resources, and bulldozedthrough the windshield of the vehicle Aguilarwas a passenger in. Both vehicles were travelingon FM 133 in Carrizo Springs. The May 2012accident killed Aguilar, who was a militaryveteran in his thirties. Family members of Aguilarclaimed in their lawsuit that the drive shaft brokebecause Heckmann did not properly maintainthe tractor-trailer.Last December, a Dimmit County jury foundHeckmann and its parent company, NuverraEnvironmental Solutions, Inc. responsibleand awarded the family 281 million. The caseofficially settled in July, but the awarded damagesgot slashed to about 105 million, according to alawyer close to the case.Attorneys on both the plaintiffs and defense endsalso pointed out that the fast-pace environmentof the oil patch trucking industry often causescompanies to hire less skilled drivers and tobe more lax on the screening portion of thehiring process.Zach Mayer, a partner at Kane Russell Coleman &Logan in Dallas, emphasized that there are plentyof trucking companies that put safety first, but, 2014 The Texas Lawbook4like any industry, there are the outliers who areout “to make a quick dollar,” which leads them touse a less thorough screening and hiring process.He pointed out that thecompanies that cut cornersare often the small momand pop shops, becausethey often do not have theresources to be picky whenhiring drivers.“Hiring quality drivers canbe time consuming andexpensive,” said Mayer,who has defended large companies such as FedExin trucking litigation. “[Sometimes the] driver’s aguy who was working two weeks ago in fast food.”Zach MayerDallas attorney Eddy Davis of Hartline DacusBarger Dreyer agreed.“I do see companies struggling to keep gooddrivers,” he said. “When that happens, theyend up putting a not-so-good driver (behindthe wheel), whether it beaccident, criminal historyor past drug or alcoholissues, and give them thebenefit of the doubt.”Davis used to specializein defending companiesin products liability andindustrialaccidents.Eddy DavisBut over the past severalyears, his practice has shifted to primarilydefending trucking companies and commercialvehicle operators after accidents.Davis and others acknowledged that anotherbig factor in the shift of his practice’s focusderives from the obstacle the state’s tort reformhas created for plaintiffs lawyers to recoversignificant damages in a majority of personalinjury litigation. Many found that truckinglitigation is one of the few areas that remainedlucrative after the laws took effect.