Meadow Walker, the late Paul Walker’s teenage daughter, has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Porsche–the company that made the car in which her father was a passenger when he died.
Paul Walker was in the passenger seat of his 2005 Porsche Carrera GT. His friend Roger Rodas was driving, and lost control of the car–crashing it into a tree. Both Rodas and Walker died in the crash. Paul Walker was 40. Roger Rodas was 38.
Paul Walker's daughter files lawsuit against Porsche: http://t.co/dh2RsNkWhs
— KING 5 News (@KING5Seattle) September 29, 2015
Meadow Walker accuses Porsche of “strict liability and negligence” in the lawsuit. She is seeking an undetermined amount of money in damages. The amount will be determined in a jury trial.
“It is with great reluctance that Meadow Walker has authorized the filing of this lawsuit on her own behalf and as heir to Paul Walker’s estate,” Meadow Walker’s attorney, Jeff Milam, said in a statement. “She’s a teenage girl who is still dealing with the tragic loss of her father.”
The lawsuit alleges that the Porsche in which Paul Walker died “lacked safety features that are found on well-designed racing cars or even Porsche’s least expensive road cars–features that could have prevented the accident or, at a minimum, allowed Paul Walker to survive the crash.” One missing item was the electronic stability control system, “which is specifically designed to protect against the swerving actions inherent in hyper-sensitive vehicles of this type,” the lawsuit reads.
“The bottom line is that the Porsche Carrera GT is a dangerous car,” Meadow Walker’s lawyer added in a statement. “It doesn’t belong on the street. And we shouldn’t be without Paul Walker or his friend, Roger Rodas.”
Meadow Walker isn’t the only one to file a wrongful death lawsuit in this tragedy. Paul Rodas’s widow, Kristine Rodas, filed one in May of 2014.
Porsche has replied to Meadow Walker’s suit, saying, “As we have said before, we are saddened whenever anyone is hurt in a Porsche vehicle, but we believe the authorities’ reports in this case clearly established that this tragic crash resulted from reckless driving and excessive speed.”
This didn't take long RT #Porsche responds to #MeadowWalker's wrongful death lawsuit http://t.co/RuGEqzXEzY pic.twitter.com/xeks0ARVAo
— Perez Hilton (@PerezHilton) September 29, 2015
The company released the statement to People magazine.
Do you think Meadow Walker or Paul Rodas’s widow stand a chance of getting anything from Porsche in their lawsuits?