It is sometimes hard to believe that thousands of people are killed in pedestrian accidents every year across this country. And the sad fact is that many of these deaths, at least those that were the result of another person’s negligence, could likely have been prevented. As Maryland personal injury attorneys, I and my staff provide representation for the victims of automobile accidents and their families.
Pedestrian injury cases can arise when the driver of a motor vehicle hurts or fatally injures an individual on foot who may be traversing a roadway in a marked crosswalk, walking through a parking lot or occupying an area where cars and people share a common space.
Although individuals walking, running or jogging on sidewalks, park paths or marked pedestrian crosswalks must take proper precautions to insure their own safety, people can and are hit by commercial trucks and passenger cars at an alarming rate, especially in densely populated areas, such as Gaithersburg, Frederick and Washington, D.C.
While some people are killed outright in pedestrian-related traffic accidents, the majority of incidents result in a variety of injuries. These can range from “simple” cuts and bruises to more serious bodily injuries, such as broken arms, cracked ribs and compound fractures of the leg. In very severe cases, a victim of a car- or truck-pedestrian accident may suffer closed-head trauma or spinal damage, which may require months or years of rehabilitation at great cost.
A tragic pedestrian accident occurred in Baltimore not long ago, which sent two teenage girls to the hospital where they both subsequently died from their injuries. These sad deaths were precipitated by a hit-and-run driver who struck the two girls as they attempted to cross four of the southbound lanes of Baltimore’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. late on a Monday night. According to police reports, the girls were in a marked crosswalk a little before midnight when the two were hit by a passing motorist.
Based on new reports, the two teens and long-time friends were on their way to meet another friend just before 12am when a southbound vehicle hit the 16 and 17 year olds in the crosswalk at W. Pratt St. Police stated that the car then left the scene without stopping.
Emergency responders took the two to the Maryland Shock Trauma Center for treatment, however their injuries were apparently too extensive for doctors to save the young girls. According to reports, they died within minutes of each other just before 12:30am early Tuesday morning.
Not long after the fatal traffic accident, Maryland Transportation Authority officers stopped the suspect vehicle for an unrelated traffic offense near Baltimore Washington International. According to news articles, the patrolman who made the stop noticed damage to the vehicle and placed the car’s occupants into custody pending an investigation.
Although the accident occurred in the late evening, a spokesperson for the city’s transportation department said the intersection where the two teens were fatally struck was not considered to be an especially dangerous one. The spokesperson added that the city had already placed more visible street signs and increased the signal time for pedestrians crossing that section of street.
According to news reports at the time, Baltimore police accident investigators interviewed the suspects and were in communication with Baltimore’s state attorney’s office prior to filing any charges. Police were also reviewing footage from that intersection’s red light cameras to better understand the events leading to the tragic deaths of those two teens.
Two teenage girls fatally struck by vehicle in city, BaltimoreSun.com, June 14, 2011