After settling a multi-million dollar personal injury lawsuit with a Bennetsville couple, a North Carolina trucking company has banned its drivers from hands-free mobile phone use while driving. The suit may inspire a string of similar bans by other trucking companies.
A Unifi Inc.-owned truck had rear-ended the couple’s vehicle that was turning into the driveway of their home with its lights on. The truck driver had been talking on his mobile phone for seven hours of his eight-and-a-half-hour driving shift when the crash happened.
The driver initially claimed he hadn’t been talking on his phone at the time of the rear-end crash, however, this was subsequently disproved by phone records, Post and Courier reports.
Unifi drivers had been subject to a company policy that restricted them to only two minutes of hands-free phone use at a time.
The couple’s lawyer Douglas Jennings stated the company did not enforce the rule: “All they did each year was have their drivers sign a piece of paper saying they wouldn’t use their phones for more than two minutes. They never did a spot-check of their driver’s phone logs. What good is a rule if it isn’t being enforced?”
The trucking company settled the lawsuit for $3.75 million and also agreed to ban all active duty cell phone use for their drivers.
Jennings stated other trucking companies should follow suit and similarly ban active duty cell phone use while driving: “This company has 60 trucks using the roads in South Carolina every day, and until last week their drivers were engaged in dangerous behavior by talking on their cellphones for hours and making three-way calls. Now that has changed, and hopefully more trucking companies will recognize the danger and get on board.”