PORT ANGELES — A Clallam County Superior Court jury has found the state mostly responsible in the deaths of a Joyce woman and her three children in a car crash on state Highway 112 in early 2000.
On Friday afternoon, after four days of deliberation, the 12-person jury delivered a $1.3 million verdict in a lawsuit for wrongful death filed by Jeff Smith, whose wife, Sara, and three young children were killed Jan. 13, 2000, when their vehicle slid on ice and hit a log truck west of Port Angeles.
The jury’s decision attributes 73 percent of the blame to the state and 27 percent of the blame to Sara Smith.
“I feel that we have exonerated Sara and her actions on that day,” Jeff Smith, 38, said Saturday.
“I still feel that the road is not safe.”
“I’m disappointed, given the percentage of fault that was attributed to the state,” said John Kirschner, assistant attorney general for the state, after the verdict was delivered.
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The rest of the story appears in the Sunday Peninsula Daily News.
