WASHINGTON-The lawyer for a Mississippi car dealer accused in a $15 million suit alleging cell-phone use contributed to a fatal driving accident in March said his client is innocent, and any punitive damages awarded would be unconstitutional.
“Damages and injuries, if any, to plaintiffs, were proximately caused by or proximately contributorily caused by the negligence of parties other than defendants herein,” said Bill Patterson, a lawyer for Michael Cannon, in a filing with the Circuit Court of Leflore County.
In her June 4 suit against Cannon and his automobile dealerships, Jill Warner said her husband was killed after being hit by Cannon’s car. The suit claims Cannon was talking on his cell phone and ran a red light before striking 43-year-old Gregory Warner. Warner, who had two children, was taken to University of Mississippi Medical Center, where he died of injuries.
The suit seeks $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages. In support of the latter damages, the lawsuit cites a 1997 study by The New England Journal of Medicine that found talking on wireless handsets while driving increases the risk of a collision fourfold. But Patterson argues the defendants are not liable for punitive damages.
“An award of punitive damages against defendants in this civil action would amount to a deprivation of property without due process of law in violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States,” Patterson said in the filing. “No legislation has been enacted authorizing punitive damages in a civil action such as this, and no legislation has been enacted placing any limit on the amount of punitive damages.”
Driver distraction suits are increasingly putting individuals and their employers in the line of fire. Mobile-phone manufacturers, for their part, have been shielded from liability in litigation to date.
Driver distraction has become a major safety issue for the driving public and a significant public-relations challenge for the mobile-phone industry.
Mobile-phone operators are not fully unified on how to reduce distracted driving, a problem not unique to cell phones but one that nonetheless is typically associated with the cellular industry.
Various studies conclude talking on cell phones while behind the wheel increases the chance of accidents. States have reacted by enacting and pursuing legislation to forbid drivers from talking on handheld phones but allowing them to use hands-free devices. But the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and some studies have found hands-free cell-phone conversations by drivers are not risk free. Others disagree.
Bush administration transportation safety officials have focused driver-safety efforts on teens, the same strategy being advocated by Cingular Wireless L.L.C.
After investigating a 2002 crash in which five adults were killed after a young driver on a cell phone lost control of her Jeep Grand Cherokee, the National Transportation Safety Board recommended a new, federally funded media campaign aimed at novice drivers. NHTSA later hired Ogilvy Public Relations to develop an ad campaign on driver safety aimed at teenagers. The program is expected to be rolled out sometime this year.
NHTSA, meantime, is preparing to release new driver-distraction findings later this year based on computer simulation models and on-road studies.
