Stock image.
Lawrenceville, GA— Parties last week settled a Georgia wrongful death, crash case against a medical waste company and one of its drivers, as jurors deliberated, and after the plaintiff’s attorney requested more than $150 million during the trial's closings. Skinner, et al. v. Curtis Bay Medical Waste Services Georgia, LLC, et al. 21-C-06893-S2
The settlement, with terms that were not disclosed, was reached as a Gwinnett County State Court jury deliberated at trial over the 2021 crash that killed Elina Lo, then 31. Lo had been stopped at a traffic light on Highway 316 in Gwinnett County, Georgia when her vehicle was struck from behind by a Ford T350 van driven at highway speed by Cameron Smith, working for Curtis Bay Medical Waste Services of Georgia.
With Curtis Bay Georgia and Smith admitting fault in the case, the three-day trial focused on damages, including value of lost life, pain and suffering, and punitives.
During closings, Morgan & Morgan’s Keith Mitnik, representing the administrator of Lo’s Estate, reminded jurors of evidence he said showed Lo was strongly devoted to her friends and family and that the fatal crash cost her a half-century of her life.
“Let’s say she lost a leg, lost her eyesight, ended up in a wheelchair. We would be taking about tens of millions of dollars for that,” Mitnik said. “But every bit of [her life] was taken,” Mitnik added, before asking for between $150 million and $250 million for the loss of her life. “While that’s a lot of money in a vacuum, no question, I suggest to you, it is dead reasonable under these circumstances.”
But Curtis Bay Georgia's attorney, Matthew Moffett, of Gray, Rust, St. Amand, Moffett, Brieske, told jurors evidence showed Lo suffered from health conditions that may have reduced her life expectancy. And he walked jurors through evidence, including testimony from an expert, who concluded economic loss from Lo’s death totaled $1.945 million.
Moffett told jurors that non-economic factors could play a part in a damages calculation, but argued the economic loss should be the foundation in calculating a damage award.
“That foundation is the earnings calculation,” Moffett said. The farther away that it moves, the less objective it becomes, the more speculative it becomes, the less reasonable it may become, the more corrupted it becomes.”
Jones Walker’s Allyson Byrd, representing Smith, suggested a $5.84 million award would both incorporate that economic measurement and compensate for the parts of Lo’s life that could not be measured in the same way.
“Now, $5.84 million will not bring Ms. Lo back to her loved ones,” Byrd said. “But it is a fair, and it is a just way to award damages in this case.”
CVN has reached out to the attorneys on the case and will update this article with any comments.
Email Arlin Crisco at acrisco@cvn.com.
Related information
Not a subscriber?
