A young woman who survived a horrific accident is now speaking out on the dangers of cell phone use while driving. She is not one of our clients.
On January 7 of this year, Kaitlyn V. was driving to see her older sister. She never got there and she does not remember the accident. Investigators believe she was flipping through songs on her smartphone when she rear ended a payloader tractor at highway speed.
She was transported to the hospital, where she underwent brain surgery, “removing most of the right side of her skull to relieve brain swelling.” She was then transferred to a regional trauma center, where the surgeon removed a significant amount of damaged tissue and inserted a drain and monitoring device (to monitor seizures). Another surgery was performed to replace the portion of the skull that had been removed with a computer generated bone plate.
Instead of denying what had happened, Kaitlyn V. has been speaking out about the dangers of cell phone use while driving. We applaud her strength, courage and caring.
There is a GoFundMe account for Kaitlyn V.
Again, Kaitlyn V. is not our client. We want to stand with her to educate people about the dangerous mix of driving and cell phones.
Source: Herzog, Karen. “Crash survivor regrets 2 seconds on her phone.” Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. 24 Nov. 2016. http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/local/wisconsin/2016/11/24/crash-survivor-regrets-2-seconds-her-phone/94283904/
Distracted Driving Resources
The U.S. Department of Transportation has a campaign called “Faces of Distracted Driving,” which is a series of videos. Below are two of them.
The DOT has a website dedicated to distracted driving, distraction.gov.
The National Safety Council has put together a free cell phone policy kit for employers. OSHA also has information about distracted driving.
Pritzker Hageman law firm helps survivors of traffic crashes and families with wrongful death claims, whose loved ones did not survive a crash involving a distracted driver. Attorneys Fred Pritzker, Eric Hageman, and David Coyle have helped their clients win multimillion-dollar settlements and verdicts and helped their clients in their efforts to advocate for safer roads.
