San Diego

A disabled 16-year-old girl from Fargo, N.D., will receive monthly payments and a lump sum every five years from a settlement approved by the San Diego City Council. Diane Sansted was paralyzed from the neck down after she was struck by a car on a city street on June 22, 1978. A condition of the settlement between attorneys for the city and the girl was that the amount awarded not be revealed. However, city officials said that San Diego paid $776,211 for the city’s share of the settlement. The rest of the settlement was paid by insurance companies, but those amounts are not known. The young woman was 10 at the time of the accident. City attorneys agreed that the driver of the car was not entirely to blame, and that poor street lighting and vegetation that restricted the driver’s view contributed to the accident.