A jury has awarded $3 million to a son of a 60-year-old woman run over and killed by multiple drivers in 2020, including a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who initially thought he had hit road debris, but the panel apportioned liability for the death in three ways.
Antwon Land, the offspring of the late Karen Land, brought the wrongful death/negligence suit in Los Angeles Superior Court in September 2021. The case was later transferred to Compton Superior Court, where the jury returned a verdict on July 30, finding liability at 40% for the county and 30% each for Karen Land and unknown other drivers.
Karen Land was crossing Imperial Highway at Slater Street in a wheelchair in a crosswalk at about 6:25 a.m. Dec. 11, 2020, when she collapsed and fell onto Imperial Highway, the suit stated. Three motorists who ran over the woman fled and never returned, trial testimony showed.
Deputy Armando Ibarra, who along with a partner was driving in the right lane at about 44 mph with his headlights on to a call of a man with a gun, did not see Karen Land because she was wearing dark clothing and the sheriff’s vehicle he was driving struck her, according to the county’s court papers.
Believing he had struck road debris, Ibarra returned to the location to clear the hazard and realized he had hit a person, the county’s court papers further stated. The woman was pronounced dead at the scene and the coroner determined her cause of death was blunt force injuries from being struck by multiple vehicles.
Three days before her death, Karen Land left Haven Home, a facility where she received treatment for a drug problem, the suit filed in September 2021 stated.