Making Highways Safer
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Michigan must adopt an aggressive program to widen two-lane highways
throughout areas to make high-speed travel safer for all. Law enforcement officials
must regularly our highways to enforce speed limits rather than tolerating drivers traveling
80 m.p.h. or higher.
Cochran, Foley & Associates has gone on record as a truck accident
lawyer in Michigan and an advocate for actions such as these to reduce the number of
car-truck collisions after representing the family of a 5-year-old boy was killed when
a semi-tractor truck struck from behind a vehicle being driven by his mother.
Paving construction to widen our two-lane highways or at lest provide
for more left-turn flare lanes, increased speed enforcement on two-lane highways, and
stricter enforcement of truck driver's driving time limits can prevent deaths. Human
life is so valuable that we must make these efforts.
A settlement was reached for $1,300,000 in a wrongful death civil
lawsuit. Earlier the truck driver had been found criminally negligent and was imprisoned
for 18 months in his home on an electronic tether.
"As counsel for the plaintiff, I cannot be at ease with the finding
of criminal neglect or with the wrongful death civil settlement," says Terry Cochran,
attorney and senior partner of Cochran, Foley & Associates, PC, in Livonia, MI.
"I cannot rest at peace because I know with certainty that before
the year ends someone else will needlessly die somewhere on a highway. I am certain
of this because federal officials, state and county governments, and law enforcement
won't take any actions beyond the civil and criminal judgments recorded. None of us
should be at peace until certain actions are taken."
If truck driver makes a mistake, adds Cochran, it is very
hard to correct because of the mass and size of a truck. "Most truck drivers are good
drivers who drive defensively and are qualified and trained to be good drivers," says
Cochran. "But only a single driver error in a lifetime of driving can have tragic results.
If you are involved in a truck accident it will be serious. If you are driving and see
a truck behaving erratically, call the state police who will come out and check driver's
log."
