Judge Awards Parents $11 Million in Compensation After Teens Die in Car Crash

Richard Szabo
By Richard Szabo
April 12, 2019US News
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Judge Awards Parents $11 Million in Compensation After Teens Die in Car Crash
Undated photos of Britney Poindexter, 17, (L) and Santia Feketa, 18, from Fort Pierce, Fla. (Courtesy of Everipedia and Haisley Funeral and Cremation Service)

A U.S. District Court has awarded $10 million in damages to the parents of two teenagers who died in a head-on car crash in Florida back in February 2018.

The federal jury found Michigan trucking executive and developer Walter Roney, 99, guilty of driving a recreational vehicle (RV) the wrong way on a divided highway and crashing into a pickup truck driven by Britney Poindexter, 17, and Santia Feketa, 18, in Fort Pierce, 120 miles southeast of Orlando.

The teens, who were best friends, had just left Poindexter’s home to go roller skating when the accident happened. The girls died on impact and Roney died three days later.

Each parent, including Yvonne and Todd Poindexter and both Stewart Feketa and Stacy West, received $2.5 million in compensation from Roney’s estate.

The parents had separately reached a $1 million settlement with Roney’s girlfriend, Carolyn Burns, 75, because she had been acting as Roney’s caregiver and could have saved the teens too.

Attorney Karen Terry, who represented the Poindexter’s grieving parents, said Florida Highway Patrol troopers who investigated the head-on collision discovered the headlights did not work on Roney’s 40-foot-long RV as it was traveling to the Sunshine State’s west coast for repairs.

When the accident first happened, media reports questioned how Roney could have possibly had his driver’s license renewed at his age.

Terry and Attorney Roger Messer, who represented Feketa’s parents, discussed that Roney’s neuropsychologist had already banned him from driving in 2017 until he had a medical check which gave him the all clear to take Michigan’s driving test.

One month before the accident, Roney passed the driving test, according to Defense Attorney Carlos Garcia who represented the estate.

“The Michigan Department of State … determined Mr. Roney had ‘an acceptable medical condition,’ scored ‘passing results’ on a knowledge exam, vision test, and road test and was ‘eligible to continue driving with full privileges,’” he said in legal documents, according to the Palm Beach Post.

Garcia had initially agreed that Roney was at fault in the accident. However, the dispute was more about the community spirit the teens showed in doing charity work, teaching disabled children how to ride a horse, and also how their lives had been tragically cut short, devastating family and friends.

Poindexter had been in her junior years at Fort Pierce Central High School, while Feketa had graduated from the same school in 2017 and was already studying to be a kindergarten teacher at Indian River State College, according to legal documents.

Terry said hundreds of people showed their sympathy at a memorial on the one-year anniversary of the crash.

Even though the parents received a substantial payout, they did not find much relief for the loss of their daughters.

“They were happy to be able to tell their story and to have people listen,” Terry said. “They just have a huge hole in their hearts that can never be filled.”

“These girls were just great kids,” she added. “They touched so many lives.”

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