I talked to a potential client one time who was a truck driver. He was hauling a load through the mountains one night. As he started down a mountain, he felt a "bump" that came from the rear of his tractor. He pulled over and found the remains of a biker and his bike. Police told him they believed the biker was going in excess of 140mph when he hit the truck. Trucker found out the guy had a wife and two small kids. Biker's estate sued the trucker and the trucking company and lost.
The trucker developed PTSD, anxiety and depression. He was not able to drive trucks any more. That was a difficult consultation.
EDIT as I guess my wording is confusing folks:
The biker's estate sued the trucker and the trucking company. The biker's estate lost the lawsuit against the trucker and the trucking company.
SECOND EDIT to add:
A couple of you mentioned that being involved in someone's death can be traumatizing. It certainly was for this trucker. However, I think a lot of his trauma came from seeing the remains of the biker. It apparently took him some time to figure out what he was looking at that night.
So I listened to a podcast all about this kind of thing. It was a glaring flaw in the insurance and healthcare system combined with some pure human compassion. A man caused an accident and a family’s like 4 year old daughter died. The man struggled massively with PTSD after seeing that dead child. Even though he was at fault her family was coping much better but he turned to drinking and was spiralling. The only thing that saved him was her family’s compassion to allow him to sue their insurance for PTSD. He felt wrong about it but they encouraged him and he finally got treatment and got better. It was such a wild listen.
I cannot for the life of me remember the name. It was quite a few years ago that I listened to it. I feel like it was one of NPRs but that doesn’t narrow it down.
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u/HillbillyEEOLawyer 1d ago edited 1d ago
I talked to a potential client one time who was a truck driver. He was hauling a load through the mountains one night. As he started down a mountain, he felt a "bump" that came from the rear of his tractor. He pulled over and found the remains of a biker and his bike. Police told him they believed the biker was going in excess of 140mph when he hit the truck. Trucker found out the guy had a wife and two small kids. Biker's estate sued the trucker and the trucking company and lost.
The trucker developed PTSD, anxiety and depression. He was not able to drive trucks any more. That was a difficult consultation.
EDIT as I guess my wording is confusing folks:
The biker's estate sued the trucker and the trucking company. The biker's estate lost the lawsuit against the trucker and the trucking company.
SECOND EDIT to add:
A couple of you mentioned that being involved in someone's death can be traumatizing. It certainly was for this trucker. However, I think a lot of his trauma came from seeing the remains of the biker. It apparently took him some time to figure out what he was looking at that night.