Family Files Suit in Freeway Death

The family of a Lake View Terrace man killed in a fiery crash when the car he was riding in slid across a dirt median on the Simi Valley Freeway in January has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Caltrans, an attorney said Saturday.

The lawsuit alleges that the state Department of Transportation acted negligently by not installing a center divider on a stretch of road where similar fatal accidents had occurred.

In response to the crashes, a temporary median divider was erected last week on a five-mile stretch of the freeway between Balboa Boulevard and De Soto Avenue where six people died in three accidents this year. On Nov. 3, a Pacoima woman was killed when another car slid across the dirt median and into oncoming traffic.

The suit was filed on behalf of the family of Jose Erasmo Calix, 44, one of three men killed Jan. 31 when their Celica slammed head-on with a Toyota 4-Runner near Tampa Avenue in Chatsworth.

According to the California Highway Patrol, the Celica, which had been traveling westbound, went out of control after it was bumped by a big rig while trying to make a lane change. The Celica veered into the eastbound lanes, where it struck the Toyota, sparking a chain-reaction pileup.

The lawsuit, filed last week in Los Angeles Superior Court, also names the driver of the big rig and the driver’s employer and seeks unspecified general damages and funeral costs, said Gregory Bistline, attorney for the Calix family.

Anthony Ruffolo, deputy chief counsel for Caltrans, said Saturday that the suit was one of three filed against Caltrans stemming from the same accident.

“It’s our position we acted reasonably,” Ruffolo said. “I can’t comment on what kind of defense we plan to present because we’re going to have to wait until we have all the facts.”

The other occupants of the Celica killed in the January crash were Jose Alvarez, 24, of Pacoima, and David Vasquez, 26, of Lake View Terrace. Passenger Maria Alvarez was pulled from the burning car moments before it exploded and suffered second- and third-degree burns on 60% of her body.

The suit filed by Calix’s widow, Miriam Calix Funes, and his four children alleges wrongful death and that Caltrans maintained the freeway in a dangerous condition, Bistline said.

Questions of whether a barrier should be installed in the freeway median had been raised years before the recent spate of accidents by state Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita) and other public officials.

In a Dec. 15, 1989, letter to Caltrans, Davis said he was concerned about “a series of serious, and fatal, traffic accidents on the 118 Freeway from Simi Valley to Interstate 405 (San Diego Freeway).”

Between June, 1986, and June, 1989, Caltrans officials reported 28 cross-median accidents, including four fatalities on an 18.5-mile stretch of the freeway, according to information received by Davis’ office.

Caltrans District Director Jerry Baxter responded to Davis with a Jan. 8, 1990, letter saying that a barrier was among the projects to be funded by the 1989 Proposed State Transportation Program.

But budget constraints delayed the project, which eventually was rescheduled to be installed in the 1993-94 fiscal year, a Caltrans spokeswoman said.

Following the January crash, state transportation officials ordered a temporary barrier installed between De Soto and Balboa by the end of the year. The installation was moved up following the Nov. 3 crash that left a Pacoima woman dead and a West Hills woman injured.

Two other people were killed and two others were injured Sept. 24, when a sedan traveling west on the freeway rear-ended a station wagon and then crossed the median and collided with two cars on the eastbound side of freeway, before bursting into flames near the Tampa Avenue exit, CHP officials.

A permanent barrier is scheduled for construction in 1994 as part of a $39.4-million project to widen the freeway and add car-pool lanes.