Teen Runs Red Light on a Bike and is Crushed by a Bus- Mother Sues the Bus Company

Can we have a "loser pays" tort system now? It's tragic that this woman lost her son, but now she and this ambulance chaser are trying to profit from his death shaking down the bus company with this silly law suit. Fucking scum.

What makes me even madder is that I know the company will settle for a few hundred thousand.

Mother of teen bicyclist killed in Beaverton sues TriMet

The teen, a student at Beaverton's Arts & Communication Magnet Academy, was riding home after school. The accident happened about 4:45 p.m. Feb. 11, not far from his house.

"Had Miller stopped, this crash would not have occurred," states a report prepared by the Washington County Crash Analysis Reconstruction Team.

The report, released in late April after weeks of investigation and interviews, found no reason to arrest the bus driver.

At the time, Stephanie Miller said she and Austin's father disagreed with the report's conclusions and had hired an attorney to review the case.

"We both think that the bus driver could and should have avoided hitting our son," she said in a prepared statement.

TriMet said that immediately after the crash it reminded its 1,200 bus drivers to be watchful of bicyclists. TriMet operating procedures call for buses to yield to bicyclists before pulling into or out of bus stops, turning or changing lanes.

The Murray-Farmington intersection has long been considered hazardous by some bicyclists because of congestion and mixed uses. Because there isn't room for a bike lane on the west side of Murray between Tualatin Valley Highway and Farmington, cyclists are directed to ride on the sidewalk next to Valley Catholic School.

Cyclists can pick up the bike lane after turning onto Farmington.

Some witnesses said Miller, who was wearing an iPod portable music player at the time of the crash, "swooped" into the street without stopping.

Accident Report(PDF).