Blog Post

Civil Lawsuits Filed in Los Angeles County Train Accident Case


April 29, 2008
Topic: Train Accidents

61 victims of the train accident that occurred in downtown Glendale, California, in which Juan Manuel Alvarez parked his Jeep Grand Cherokee on the tracks in an unsuccessful bid to commit suicide, have filed a civil lawsuit against the Metrolink and the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

The arguments in the lawsuits include the fact that better safety measures would have prevented Alvarez from accessing the tracks. They also mention that the controversial push-pull system, which has many rails safety experts upset and calling for its elimination, played a huge role in the train accident.

On January 6, 2005, Alvarez, who had been estranged from his wife, parked his Cherokee on the railroad tracks. His intention, he later told police, was to kill himself when the train crashed into his vehicle. Things went the way he planned, at the beginning. He parked his Cherokee, and the train came barreling toward him. When the train accident occurred, there were 11 people dead and more than 180 passengers injured. Alvarez, however, was still alive. Apparently he had aborted his suicide attempt at the last minute, but did not or was not able to move his Jeep.

In the weeks that followed, investigators mulled over whether the man intended to kill anybody else or not, and what his real intentions were. A criminal case was filed against him, and a trial is set to begin.

Meanwhile, a civil trial that seeks compensation for victims of the train accident puts much of the blame squarely on the Metrolink and the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority. While the media has made a splash about Alvarez' role in this tragedy, attention has been focused away from one of the deciding factors in this crash - the push-pull system, which was operating at the time of the train accident.

The push-pull system has been found by rail safety experts to be very dangerous, with great potential to cause deaths and injuries in a train accident when the engine is at the rear end. So great is the danger, that the passenger cars that are leading the train are often called "coffin cars" to denote the slim possibility of surviving a crash. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Tradesmen have been lobbying for an end to a system they say puts passengers at unnecessary risk of fatality in a train accident. In experiments conduced, it was seen that in crashes where the engine was pulling, the damage to passenger cars was minimal, and very few of them toppled over. When the engine was pushing on the other hand, passenger cars were thrown about and suffered major damage.

The reason why the system is still in place is because the other alternative is too expensive. This is just another instance of agencies putting profits before safety of the passengers. When tax payers ride a train they don't expect to be hurt in a train accident because the agency hasn't seen fit to use those tax dollars and train fares to design and implement a safer system. Regardless of Alvarez's lunacy and whether he meant to cause the crash or not, the LACMTA has a lot to answer for. We hope this lawsuit will be the beginning of long over due changes in the rail systems.

If you have been injured in a train accident, you need the help of an experienced California personal injury attorney. Contact a lawyer at The Reeves Law Group for a free consultation.


The California personal injury attorneys at The Reeves Law Group represent victims of accidents, injuries and wrongful death throughout California from our offices in Los Angeles County, Orange County, San Diego County, Riverside County, San Bernardino County, Ventura County, Fresno County, Kern County, Sacramento County, San Fernando Valley, Long Beach, Antelope Valley, Torrance, Glendale, Bakersfield, Santa Ana, San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland, Ontario, and Victorville.