30 Million Settlement
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IMAGE SOURCE: Los Angeles Times Web site/ Metrolink derailment, Glendale, 2005
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The Los Angeles regional rail system, Metrolink, Wednesday agreed to pay $30 million to settle most of the remaining lawsuits that resulted from a 2005 Glendale crash that killed 11 and injured more than 180.
The derailment happened January 26, 2005.
A man allegedly attempting suicide drove his Jeep onto the tracks, but as the Metrolink approached he abandoned his car and his suicide attempt, the OC Register reports.
When the Metrolink struck the car, the train jackknifed and struck two other trains on either side of it. The man who left his vehicle, Juan Manuel Alvarez, is in prison serving 11 life sentences.
Because the train was pushing cars on this leg of the trip, as opposed to pulling them, the train was easier to derail and passengers in the front cars were especially in danger, argued the victims’ attorneys.
But last year an appellate court struck down the push-pull theory saying it is allowed under federal regulation.
The settlement covers about 90 percent of the cases with the remaining ten percent heading for a January 2010 trial.
This was the second deadliest crash in Metrolink’s history, reports the Los Angeles Times, following the crash a year ago in Chatsworth.
IB member Paul Kiesel, of Kiesel, Boucher, Larson LLP filed the first lawsuit against Metrolink on behalf of the parents of Aida Magdaleno, who was among 25 killed in that crash. The California State University, Northridge 19-year-old sophomore was going to school to become a social worker.
Attorneys say they saw a change in attitude from Metrolink after Chatsworth. Most of the cases involving serious injuries and fatalities were settled in mediations over the last six months.
Metrolink had no comment to the media Wednesday. #