Attorney Dax Bello has filed a case on behalf of two parents who were killed by a semi-truck on I-95. Mulin and Junia Andrieux Celestin had been in separate cars when they were involved in a collision with a third car with a family inside. The collision disabled all their vehicles; after checking on one another, Mulin and Junia went to help the occupants of the other vehicle.
While helping to extricate the children in the other car, a truck owned by Horizon Freight System and operated by Armando Alvarez Padina crashed into all three disabled vehicles at 66 mph. Mulin, Junia, and two occupants of the other vehicle were killed. Another child who was still inside the other car suffered serious injuries. The trucker never hit the brakes or made an attempt to evade the people on the road. Brake lights from other vehicles who saw the disabled cars and maneuvered around them into the open right lane of the highway. The semi-truck driver was not paying attention despite operating a vehicle comparable in weight to a train car.
"This is a horrendous tragedy that could have been avoided with the exercise of minimal attention while operating a lethal weapon on the Interstate,” Dax said to the Daily Business Review. “A brother and a sister have lost both of their parents and are now orphaned. Three other children have lost their mother, and their father lost his wife and his seven-year-old son. The magnitude of the damages suffered by all the victims in this case cannot be overstated.”
Despite sharing the highway with sedans, minivans, and all kinds of commuter vehicles, semi-trucks are in a different class altogether. Fully loaded, they can weigh as much as 80,000 pounds—more than ten times the weight of a large pickup. That’s why the operation of these vehicles is tightly regulated, from how long a driver is allowed to remain behind the wheel for a single workday to the regularity of inspection the semi-truck is subjected to.
Dax, along with co-counsel attorney Marc Brumer, represents the Celestin estate, and their investigation of this case will seek to ensure the orphaned children are taken care of. Our firm will put every necessary resource toward ensuring this family can recover as much as they can from this tragic situation.