A CYCLIST has sued a driver of a vehicle that struck the bicycle he was riding last year at a traffic light intersection near the Chalan Kanoa post office.
Carlos T. Aguilar, through attorney Stephen Nutting, filed a lawsuit in Superior Court against Josepha T. Camacho for negligence, and asked for an award of $100,000 in economic and non-economic damages, pain, suffering, emotional distress, medical care and expenses and bodily injury.
According to the lawsuit, Camacho is the owner and operator of a 2015 Toyota sedan that struck the plaintiff’s bicycle on the early morning of July 24, 2022.
On July 24, 2022, the lawsuit said, the plaintiff began a normal cycle ride early in the morning at 5 a.m. going north on Beach Road.
The plaintiff said he was wearing a protective cycle-specific helmet on his head, and during his ride, he remained safely on the right-hand side of the highway on the outermost right lane.
The plaintiff said he had operational safety lights on both the front and the rear of his bike. “For additional safety, [the] plaintiff also had, on that day, a backpack worn with an operational blinking bright-white light which blinked to draw the attention of vehicles approaching him from behind on the roadway.”
On that same morning, the lawsuit said the defendant was driving a light blue Toyota sedan north of Beach Road near the traffic light intersection on Tun Segundo near the Chalan Kanoa Post Office.
At approximately between 5 a.m. and 5:10 a.m. while driving on the outermost right lane of Beach Road near the traffic light, the defendant’s car struck the back of the bicycle that the plaintiff was riding.
The lawsuit accused the driver of failing to maintain a safe distance from the cyclist.
The traffic crash report indicated that the defendant was distracted as “she was…looking at the garbage truck on her left [and] wondering what trash company works on a Sunday,” the lawsuit stated.
It added that the traffic crash report concluded that “Josepha Camacho [was] the cause of the crash for failure to exercise due care.”
“With reckless indifference to the law and for the safety of [the] plaintiff, [the] defendant failed to exercise due care and failed to look straight on the road and instead look at the garbage truck on her left,” the lawsuit stated. “As a result, [the] defendant’s car struck [the] plaintiff’s bicycle with tremendous force, throwing him from his bicycle approximately eight meters, and causing personal injuries and damage,” the lawsuit added.
As a result of the collision, the plaintiff said he suffered significant physical injuries, such as significant abrasions on the left side of his nose, left elbow, right side of his elbow, and on his right wrist; bruises and lump on the right side of his forehead and above his right eyebrow; and contusions on his forehead and chest wall with complaint of pain.
Additionally, the plaintiff said he suffered painful injuries to his back and shoulder which still persist.
The plaintiff’s personal property, a Cannondale mountain bike, was also damaged because of the collision, the lawsuit stated.
