Two people were killed in separate motor vehicle accidents on Friday, Dec. 25 and Saturday, Dec. 26 in New Orleans. The first fatal accident involved a pedestrian. The second incident was a single-vehicle crash.
According to the New Orleans Police Department, the first auto accident happened at about 10:00 p.m. near the intersection of General De Gaulle Drive and Garden Oaks Drive in Algiers. A 26-year-old man, headed east in a 2011 Nissan Maxima, struck a 45-year-old male pedestrian as the man crossed Garden Oaks Drive, killing him. The second accident happened at around 6:15 a.m. the next morning, on the 22000 block of Chef Menteur Highway, when a 46-year-old woman driving a white Nissan Maxima with no passengers lost control of her car, running off the road and striking a tree. She was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident.
In the first case, the driver was deemed to be driving while intoxicated and was arrested and charged with vehicular homicide. The charge is applied even if there is no intent to kill when an impaired person causes an accident that results in a victim’s death. Police are awaiting the results of blood and alcohol tests in the second case.
In a case where a person is killed in an accident that was the result of an impaired or otherwise negligent motorist, the surviving family members of the victim might want to meet with a personal injury attorney to discuss whether or not a wrongful death lawsuit should be filed against the at-fault driver. Damages that are often sought in these types of actions included funeral and burial expenses and, if applicable, the loss of the financial contribution that the decedent had been making to the household.
Source: The Times Picayune, “Suspected drunk driver hit pedestrian in fatal Christmas night crash, NOPD says,” Emily Lane, Dec. 26, 2015
