Vicky and Denny Moore never dreamed they would someday hear a jury place a dollar amount on the value of their son’s life. It’s not cliché to say that no money in the world would fill the void left by the death of their youngest child, 16-year-old Ryan.
So in 1997, little prepared the Salineville, Ohio, couple for the $10 million award meant to compensate them and punish the railroad for that fatal day in 1995 when a Conrail freight train collided with the car their son was riding in.
It was a devastating event. And, in many respects, the money only added to the pain.
“We did not want to take that money and gain personally,” Vicky Moore says.
Her husband agrees. “We couldn’t have bought a house or a car,” he says. “It’s blood money. It’s nothing you can enjoy.”
So what did the Moores do with their award?
On the suggestion of their lawyer, they turned it over to a foundation to improve railroad safety. The Angels on Track Foundation—with the slogan “Bad crossings kill good drivers”—has since spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to improve more than a dozen railroad crossings and to pay for public service announcements on radio and billboards.What’s peculiar about this case is that the jury got to hear about the Moore family’s spending plans. Sandusky, Ohio, lawyer Tom Murray, who represented the Moores, has dubbed the concept “curative damages.” The idea is that damage awards are used to “cure” a problem rather than provide punitive relief in the traditional sense. It’s an idea that promotes more constructive interaction between a negligent defendant and harmed individuals.
Details here from the ABA Journal.