The widow of a motorcyclist who was killed in a wreck with a dump truck has filed suit against the trucker and his company.

The Lima OH woman filed the wrongful death lawsuit against RD Jones Excavating based in Harrod OH, as well as Randy Jones, the owner, and Rolland Rhodes, the driver of the truck.

The crash occurred on May 27, 2015, when Rhodes was working on a dump site along OH Route 197. He was driving a dump truck that was owned by the company, and was dumping a load of gravel. After he dumped it, Rhodes left the site and tried to turn left and turned into the path of the motorcyclist, who died at the scene. The lawsuit claims that the truck driver did not use his turn signal.

The suit further states that Rhodes was negligent in driving the dump truck and should be held accountable, along with the company.

Our trucking accident law firm in Virginia and North Carolina wants to offer our condolences to the widow in this terrible tragedy. Commercial truck drivers must be held to a higher standard when they are operating their rigs, and we think that the driver and his company should be held liable in this wrongful death case.

Wrongful death lawsuits involving tractor trailers can be complex, as we have learned in our years of personal injury experience. We once represented a client whose car was rear ended on I-64 in Norfolk VA. The car caught on fire and our client died.

The trucker admitted in deposition that he did not see the car until right before he rear ended it. The defense tried to argue that the crash was caused by our client driving too slowly on the highway.

However, we found that the truck driver had violated many Virginia CDL Manual rules. Our research also revealed that the truck driver had diabetes that he did not control, which played a role in the wreck. This complicated truck accident case was settled for $3.5 million