Driver Collides with Sixty-Four Year-Old Pedestrian in Fatal Accident
Tennessee imposes many duties on drivers within the state in order to make sure that they are driving in a reasonably safe manner. One such duty is the duty to keep a proper lookout. This duty extends not only to keeping a proper lookout for vehicles and other obstacles in the roadway, but also extends to keeping a lookout for pedestrians as well. Unfortunately many drivers fail to drive in a safe manner in areas where they know or should expect pedestrians to be present. Such places include school zones, college campuses, heavily populated areas, and crosswalks. Failure to keep a proper lookout in these areas can lead to serious injury or even death and is also likely to lead to a personal injury lawsuit in East Tennessee should the driver’s negligent behavior result in injury to the victim.
A memorial service is reportedly being planned for a sixty-four year-old college student at the University of Central Oklahoma who was killed on Tuesday in an automobile-pedestrian accident. The woman apparently took the bus to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays and was stepping out into the street to board the bus on Tuesday morning near her apartment complex when she was struck by a vehicle. Law enforcement officials say it looked like she may have walked into the side of a moving vehicle, and the manager of the apartment complex said she may have gotten her suitcase used to carry her books stuck on something and was trying to get it unstuck as she stepped out into the road. There is no indication in the article of who was at fault for the accident.
The unfortunate truth is that sometimes there is simply nothing a driver can do to avoid accidents, even if he or she is keeping a proper lookout. For this reason, drivers should drive much more slowly and with a much greater degree of caution in areas where they know pedestrians are present just in case something out of the ordinary might happen. Failure to take extra care may result in the driver being liable for the damages should a scenario take place like the one described above.
