Council OKs $900,000 for trash truck victim’s kin

A $900,000 settlement for the family of an elderly woman struck and killed by a Honolulu garbage truck in 2013 was approved Wednesday by the Honolulu City Council.

Pauline Ando, 83, was hit by the truck as it was reversing in an Aiea cul-de-sac on Feb. 1, 2013. Lunue Bethea, a Department of Environmental Services driver with 23 years of experience, told police he chose to reverse out of the cul-de-sac instead of turning around in it because it was easier to do, a Honolulu Police Department report showed.

The lawsuit filed by Ando’s estate and her sons, Russell and Marshall, said she sustained multiple blunt force injuries, including to her head, ribs, sternum, pelvis, right femur, left fibula and left ankle.

Bethea, then 52, said he checked the truck’s rearview mirrors and its video monitor before backing up but did not see Ando, the HPD report said.

The driver’s conduct operating the 66,000-pound truck was “grossly negligent, consciously indifferent, willful and wanton,” the lawsuit said.

An HPD investigation concluded the driver committed second-degree negligent homicide, but prosecutors declined to pursue the case because of a lack of sufficient evidence of gross negligence, an HPD report said.

A 2014 Honolulu Star-Advertiser story reported that there were nearly 400 accidents involving City and County of Honolulu garbage trucks between 2009 and 2013. The city, in its own investigations, concluded that while many of the incidents were minor and did not involve pedestrians or other motorists, 7 out of every 10 were avoidable because drivers failed to take all reasonable precautions to prevent the incidents.

Leavitt, Yamane and Soldner, which filed the lawsuit on the Andos’ behalf, cited the same reports.

The city “has demonstrated a pattern and practice of failing to properly hire, train, retain and/or supervise its refuse drivers,” the lawsuit said. “Clearly, there are longstanding systemic problems in the way (the city) carries out this basic government function.”

The city has failed to correct its deficiencies, the lawsuit said. The lawsuit also said the city has incentives in place that “encourage drivers to complete their routes in the quickest manner possible, often at the expense of public safety.”

The city, in a court document, said it was Pauline Ando and her sons who “acted with poor judgment and lack of due care at the time of the incident.”

Corporation Counsel Donna Leong could not be reached for comment Friday afternoon.