Houston, TX — A post office box truck in Houston allegedly ran a red light on Wednesday morning (March 4, 2015) and crashed into a car, seriously injuring a woman inside the car. The woman, who wasn’t named, was taken to a hospital along with her child, who was less seriously injured.
This accident happened at about 7:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning, at the intersection of the Gulf Freeway (I-45) access road and Park Place Boulevard. According to the news reports, the woman was driving a silver sedan along the southbound access road when a post office box truck ran the red light at the intersection with Park Place.
The passenger side of the woman’s car was impact, which left her with serious injuries while her child suffered only minor harm. Paramedics took both to a hospital, however. The driver of the USPS box truck wasn’t harmed.
As of Thursday, it’s not clear if that driver will face any charges and it’s not clear why he ran the red light, if the news reports were accurate.
Map of the Accident
View from the Road
Commentary:
Running a red light is a serious thing, but running it in a semi-truck? That seems downright foolish, especially considering how big and heavy those trucks are. If this driver was trying to stretch a yellow light, then I’d say there needs to be some tough questions directed their way. If this were an ordinary semi-truck, simply owned by a business, things would be pretty straightforward and the victims here would likely have a claim against the at-fault driver (and potentially the company he worked for).
However, since this truck was owned by the United States Postal Service, which is part of our government, that means that they play by special rules. Specifically, the U.S. Government gets to dictate how and when (and sometimes if!) their entities and employees can be sued in a negligence-based claim. If this driver ran a red light, their negligent driving caused the accident, for example. But, some of the “special rules” I mentioned include things like: how long you have to file a claim, how much money can be paid out, which types of damages are suable, and other restrictions of that nature. In some cities, you have only days to file a claim instead of the usual 2 years — it just depends on what kind of restrictions that city or county has in place.
My main point here is that even though it seems obvious the postal truck driver is at fault, don’t assume that filing a claim against the driver will be any simple matter. As some people are very familiar with, the government isn’t in the habit of spelling things out for people who might not know what they’re doing. Go to any DMV and wait in line with the wrong papers; you’ll likely get sent to the next line with little instruction on what you did wrong. Filing a claim is no different, and if you accidentally miss a deadline you didn’t know existed, your claim might disappear just like that.
— Grossman Law Offices
