FILE – In this April 9, 2014 file photo, actor Tracy Morgan attends the FX Networks Upfront premiere screening of ‘Fargo’ at the SVA Theater in New York. (Photo: Greg Allen/Invision/AP)
In a court filing Monday, Walmart said actor-comedian Tracy Morgan and other passengers are at least partly to blame for their injuries because they weren’t wearing seat belts.
Morgan’s limousine was hit from behind by a Walmart truck on a highway back in June, an accident in which his friend James McNair was killed as the group traveled back from a show in Delaware. Morgan spent several weeks in rehab with rib and leg injuries.
Walmart Stores Inc., based in Bentonville, Arkansas, submitted the brief in response to a lawsuit Morgan filed in July over the accident, and argues that the passengers’ injuries were caused “in whole or in part” by their “failure to properly wear an appropriate available seatbelt restraint device.” The claim argued this constitutes unreasonable conduct.
An attorney representing Morgan and the other plaintiffs called Walmart’s court filing “surprising and appalling.”
“It’s disingenuous,” attorney Benedict Morelli said. “It’s not what they said they were going to do initially, which was take full responsibility. I’m very upset, not for myself but for the families I represent.”
The lawsuit seeks a jury trial, punitive and compensatory damages. The plaintiffs contend the retail giant should have known that its truck driver had been awake for more than 24 hours before the crash and that his commute of 700 miles from his home in Georgia to work in Delaware was “unreasonable.”
They also allege the driver fell asleep at the wheel.
Walmart spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said in an email that the company “continues to stand willing to work with Mr. Morgan and the other plaintiffs to resolve this matter.”
The plaintiffs in the case include Ardley Fuqua, Jeffrey Millea and Millea’s wife, Krista Millea, though Krista Millea was not actually in the limousine when the crash occurred took place. She claims she has a related loss-of-services lawsuit stemming from the crash.
Truck driver Kevin Roper, of Jonesboro, Georgia, pleaded not guilty to death by auto and assault by auto charges in state court. A criminal complaint also accuses him of not sleeping for more than 24 hours before the crash, a violation of New Jersey law.
A report by federal transportation safety investigators said Roper was driving 65 mph in the minute before he slammed into the limo van. Though often higher in most stretches, the speed limit on that particular stretch of the New Jersey Turnpike is 55 mph, but was lowered to 45 mph on the night of the accident due to construction.
Roper had been on the job about 13 1/2 hours at the time of the crash, the report concluded. Federal rules permit truck drivers to work up to 14 hours a day, with a maximum of 11 hours behind the wheel.
