Family Sues Police Officer Who Saved Woman

Last November, a young waitress named Margaret Parkinson was run down by a drunk driver as she helped a friend unload a bicycle from a car on a fog-shrouded street in Torrance.

Parkinson, 24, lost her lower right leg and nearly bled to death before two Torrance police officers saved her life by applying a makeshift tourniquet they fashioned from a rope and a buck knife.

Since the accident on Redondo Beach Boulevard, Parkinson has emerged from a coma and is slowly recuperating at a rehabilitation center in San Diego County.

The Torrance police officers have been lauded for their efforts: Parkinson’s father wrote a letter saying he was “terribly grateful” to Officer Devin Chase for saving his daughter’s life. And the South Bay Police and Fire Medal of Valor Committee presented Chase and fellow officer Jerry Wallace with the Distinguished Service Award for their “courage and self-control” in rescuing Parkinson.

$6-Million Suit

But lawyers for Parkinson, who was left partially paralyzed and brain-damaged by the accident, delivered a strikingly different message this month: a $6-million negligence claim that blames Chase and the city for the accident.

“It’s a tragic irony,” conceded Parkinson’s mother, Nancy.

Chase said he was floored when he learned of the claim.

“You save someone’s life,” said Chase, 27, “and you are trying to do the job the best you can. . . . Down the road all these people come up, and unfortunately they are mostly attorneys, and they say how you are supposed to have done things differently.”

The claim centers on Chase’s actions before the accident, not afterward, said Parkinson’s father, Lucius (Jim) Parkinson. It alleges that Chase drove past Maggie Parkinson before the collision but failed to warn her not to stand behind her double-parked car on the fog-blanketed thoroughfare.

“If my daughter is going to be crippled for the rest of her life and I can find compensation, I’m going to look for it,” Parkinson said.

Just Finished Work

On Nov. 5, 1988, Maggie Parkinson and Ella Schwartz had just finished working their Friday night shifts as waitresses at the Cheesecake Factory in Redondo Beach.

It was past 2 a.m. on Saturday morning when Parkinson, who had moved from her hometown of Carlsbad to Torrance two months before, stopped to drop Schwartz off at her apartment at 3920 W. Redondo Beach Blvd.

The women double-parked on the four-lane boulevard to unload the bicycle Schwartz had ridden to work, Nancy Parkinson said.

Meanwhile, Chase was driving west. A California Highway Patrol report on the incident says Chase recognized the danger of the two women standing, shrouded in fog, in the roadway.

Chase stopped to make a U-turn to warn them but, before he could turn, a car driven by Eduardo Banda Hernandez passed in the opposite direction, said CHP spokesman Richard Richards. Just seconds later, Hernandez’s swerving car missed Schwartz but slammed into Parkinson, Richards said.

Parkinson’s leg was nearly severed and she stopped breathing. Chase could not find a pulse. But with the assistance of Wallace, Chase stopped the bleeding and kept Parkinson alive with CPR until paramedics took her to county Hrbor-UCLA Medical Center.

Jim Parkinson wrote to Torrance Police Chief Donald Nash in March to say, “Maggie’s life was unquestionably saved by (Officer) Devin Chase’s competence after the accident and for that we are most terribly grateful.”

But attorney Robert Kennedy, hired by Jim Parkinson, said he questions what happened before the accident.

Indications From Report

CHP reports seem to indicate that Chase could have turned more quickly, and perhaps turned on his warning lights to alert the two women, Kennedy said.

Chase denied that, saying passing cars prevented him from turning. “They basically say, ‘You didn’t have a crystal ball, so you screwed up,’ ” he said.

The claim against the city also says trees lining the boulevard had not been trimmed, blocking a street light that would have illuminated the road.

Jim Parkinson, a retired petroleum geologist, said he had “some sense of misgiving” about filing the claim. “But my primary interest is my daughter’s well-being, and she is never going to function like she did before,” he said.

Nearly $300,000 of a $1-million health insurance policy for his daughter has been used up, he said.

Hernandez pleaded no contest to a drunk-driving charge in February. He faced up to three years in prison, but he failed to appear at his sentencing in March, and authorities said they believe he has fled to Mexico.

Jim Parkinson said Hernandez had no insurance and that the family does not think it will be able to collect damages from him. He wonders how he will pay his daughter’s bills when the $1-million coverage runs out.

Nancy Parkinson said she has left her job as an art teacher at Carlsbad High School to tend to her daughter, who lives at an Escondido rehabilitation center.