Case Info
The Windsor Wildcats Bus Accident
On January 29, 2005, the Windsor Wildcats, an under-21 female hockey team from Windsor, Ontario, chartered a bus trip with Coach Canada to travel from Windsor to Rochester, New York, for a hockey tournament, followed by a skiing excursion at Swain Ski Hill. Coach Canada assigned the trip to Ryan Comfort, a 24-year-old driver who had only started with the company one month earlier.
After driving through the night and watching the hockey game instead of resting, Comfort boarded the bus at 4 pm to drive the team to Swain Ski Hill. Less than 45 minutes later, Comfort veered off the road and struck an illegally parked tractor-trailer on the shoulder of the interstate. The heavy impact split the bus in half, killing four and severely injuring 19 others. Among the tragic fatalities were the Wildcats’ coach Rick Edwards, his 13-year-old son Brian, and Cathy Roach, the mother of one of the team’s players.
Discovery uncovered substantial evidence that Coach Canada had engaged in a pattern of careless hiring, training, and supervision practices, sending drivers out on charter trips that exceeded legally permissible driving hours. The company’s failures in this case were particularly egregious given Comfort’s lack of driving experience.
Windsor Wildcats Litigation
Seeger Weiss filed suit on behalf of eleven victims and their families against Coach Canada and its related entities, as well as J&J Hauling, the owner of the illegally parked tractor-trailer. The litigation began shortly after the 2005 accident and extended for more than four years of complex discovery and legal proceedings.
The discovery process included reviewing thousands of pages of documents and conducting more than twenty depositions. The liability phase of the trial began on June 15, 2009, before the Honorable Justice Thomas Van Strydonck of the Supreme Court, Livingston County. Following jury selection, Chris Seeger delivered an opening statement in which he criticized Coach Canada for its negligent approach to driver hiring, training, and supervision, as well as a pattern of violating federal driving hour limitations.
Seeger Weiss presented compelling evidence during the liability phase, including testimony from Trooper Robert Frost, the lead Accident Reconstructionist for the New York State Police, who detailed his observations from the accident scene and findings from his reconstruction report. Plaintiffs testified regarding the impact of the crash.
Before Ryan Comfort testified, the defendants reached an agreement on liability allocation. Coach Canada and its related entities accepted 90 percent of the liability for the accident, while J&J Hauling agreed to accept the remaining 10 percent. This agreement resolved liability allocation.
Following the liability determination, the case proceeded to damages trials for individual plaintiffs. In the first damages trial, Seeger Weiss partners Moshe Horn and Marc Albert represented three victims: former players Carly Labadie and Tory Gault, and assistant coach Jason Mailloux. After a six-day trial and four hours of jury deliberation, the six-person Livingston County jury awarded $2.25 million in damages: $1 million to Labadie, $500,000 to Gault, and $750,000 to Mailloux. All three had sustained orthopedic injuries and were diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder following the crash.