The Toronto Star reported today one of the largest personal injury settlements for a motor vehicle accident ever. A seriously brain injured Plaintiff was awarded $17 million dollars in a Jury trial. One of the reasons the Plaintiff was able to collect such a large award was that the accident was with a leased furniture truck company belonging to Ford Motor Credit. The policy that Ford held had almost $20 to $25 million dollars.

Such a verdict does not usually occur since the vast majority of people in Ontario only carry an auto insurance policy with $1 million dollar limits and only some have $2 million dollars.

In this case the verdict was based on a finding of 61 percent liability on the Defendant truck when making the left turn and 39 percent on the Plaintiff for speeding up and attempting to cross the amber light versus stopping.

I suspect given the large sum of money the Defendant might appeal. However, given the fact that the Jury decided on the $17 million dollars it seems the Defendant would have a high hurdle to cross to satisfy even leave to appeal.