Junko Kimura/Bloomberg News
A truck driver who filed a lawsuit against Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations in the U.S. District Court of Wyoming settled with the company out of court earlier this month, right before trial.
Brian Kehler’s lawsuit, filed in August 2015, said a Bridgestone tire “was in a defective, dangerous condition at the time of its sale” and was “unreasonably dangerous” to Kehler, who was injured in a collision on Interstate 80 in Cheyenne, Wyoming, in November 2014.
That crash killed Cheyenne resident James Ednie, his longtime partner, Tanya Gooden, and her adult special-needs son, Cameron Gooden.
Ednie was well-known in Cheyenne for being an active advocate for suicide prevention in Wyoming and the full-time caretaker for Gooden’s son.
He was driving the family’s Dodge Caravan when the FedEx tractor-trailer with pup trailer Kehler was driving struck them nearly head on.
FedEx ranks No. 2 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest U.S. and Canadian for-hire carriers.
Ednie and Tanya Gooden, who both were wearing seat belts, suffered fatal injuries on scene.
Cameron Gooden, who was seated in his wheelchair in the backseat area of the minivan at the time of the collision, was flown to a medical facility in Denver, where he died the next morning.
An investigation revealed that the westbound tractor-trailer’s left front tire failed, sending the vehicle careening through the median near the College Drive exit.
Kehler, who was from Utah at the time of the incident, was employed by CLR Transportation and contracted to drive a FedEx tractor with two trailers, according to his complaint.
“The defective condition caused or was a substantial contributing factor in the plaintiff’s injuries,” his lawsuit said, adding that “Bridgestone’s conduct in marketing, distribution and sale of the tire was negligent.”
| Sarah Zoellick Wyoming Tribune-Eagle
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