‘He watched her progress, recede, and then die.’ $3.75M settlement reached in crash

A $3.75 million settlement has been reached in a Lexington crash with a concrete truck that killed a 57-year-old woman, but her husband’s attorney said the money will never make up for the family’s loss.

On the morning of Feb. 28, 2017, the driver of a Harrod Concrete & Stone Co. mixer truck was trying to turn left from Versailles Road into a temporary Blue Grass Airport construction entrance when the truck struck Dale Leonard’s car, according to a police report. It was raining, the road was wet, and the driver of the cement truck said he’d been waved on by drivers using three inbound lanes of Versailles Road.

But the truck driver, Bruce Grimes, did not see Leonard’s car, which was traveling in the lane furthest from him, the right turn lane toward Man o’ War Boulevard, according to court records. The truck hit the left side of Leonard’s car.

Dale Leonard’s husband, Bill, stayed at a Lexington hospital with her until her death 18 days later, said his attorney, Don Pisacano. They were married for 32 years.

In May of 2017, Bill Leonard filed a lawsuit against Harrod Concrete and Stone Co., Grimes, Harrod Transport Co. and Jimmy Bryant, another Harrod employee. His attorneys accused the company of acting negligently and causing the wrongful death of Dale Leonard.

This month, Bill Leonard and the defendants reached a $3.75 million settlement in the case. The settlement has been finalized and funded, Pisacano said.

“Our deepest condolences go out to the Leonard family,” the Harrod companies said in a statement Thursday. “Out of respect to all of the families who were affected by this accident, we do not feel comfortable discussing any of the details of the lawsuit. We are glad that this matter has been amicably resolved among the parties.”

The lawsuit accused the company and drivers of failing to comply with a traffic plan put in place by the airport’s board for the construction of a runway expansion.

The temporary construction entrance to the airport was near the intersection of Versailles Road and Man o’ War. After the crash, workers were instructed to turn left at the light instead of using the entrance, according to court records.

The temporary entrance was meant to be for right turns only, but Grimes said in a deposition that he hadn’t been told of the restriction prior to the crash.

During the deposition, Grimes said that on the morning of the crash, he’d been in the median of Versailles Road waiting to turn with his lights flashing. He was waved to go ahead. He said that he couldn’t have been traveling more than 2 mph when the crash happened.

“I was sitting there and they stopped and motioned me across,” Grimes said, according to a transcript in court records. “And I was just barely cruising along, just barely moving, and just out of nowhere that car was there. I didn’t see her. I couldn’t see her for the — for the traffic, and I don’t — I don’t — I don’t think she saw me.”

One of the drivers that Grimes said waved him on was Bryant. Bryant was driving a Harrod Transport Co. dump truck, according to court records.

The police report filed in the crash states that investigators believed Dale Leonard had the right of way, and that she was not traveling at excessive speed when the crash occurred.

Grimes said in his deposition that he didn’t feel he was at fault because he’d thought he was being let through by the other drivers. He also said that he felt the crash would not have happened if workers hadn’t been told to use the temporary entrance.

David Harrod, the owner of Harrod Concrete and Stone, said during a deposition that his drivers had been using the temporary entrance at a time of day that was prohibited, according to a transcript of the questioning. But Harrod also said that the company and drivers did not know that the use of entrance at that time of day was prohibited until after the crash.

Harrod said during the deposition that the company found that Grimes had been driving cautiously at the time of the crash, and that he was not reprimanded for what happened.

In the days after the crash, Dale Leonard had begun to recover from “devastating injuries to her head and body,” Pisacano wrote in a letter to the defendants calling for a settlement. She had started to communicate with her husband and had been able to sit up in a chair at one point. But her injuries from the crash eventually caused her bodily systems to fail, leading to her death.

Pisacano also wrote that Bill and Dale Leonard worked together at a karate school and were inseparable. Despite serious head and facial injuries, Dale Leonard had used her leg and hand to communicate with her husband in the days leading up to her death, according to the letter.

“He watched her progress, recede, and then die,” Pisacano wrote in the letter. “He had to make difficult decisions, but always said ‘please do whatever you can to save her.’ Bill is now 70, and at his age, is left to die alone, with only memories of Dale.”

Dale Leonard’s obituary said she was “the heart” of Sin Thé Karate School. She left behind a son, three step-children and five grandchildren.

Harrod Concrete and Stone is based in Frankfort, with a ready mix concrete plant on Forbes Road in Lexington.

This story was originally published September 27, 2019 at 9:31 AM.