The family of a man killed in a car accident involving a speeding Gwinnett County police officer is seeking $5 million in damages from the county in a civil trial set to begin Monday.
Officer James Stoudenmire’s patrol car slammed into a vehicle driven by 52-year-old Willie Allen Sargent Jr. on Dec. 15, 2006. Sargent was trying to turn left into Uncle Woody’s Party Place on U.S. 78 in Snellville when the collision occurred.
At the time, the officer was responding as backup to a suspicious person call in Snellville, traveling between 78 and 80 mph with no emergency flashing lights or sirens, according to the lawsuit.
Sargent died at the scene.
A spokesman for the Gwinnett County Police Department initially said the officer, then 25 and a two-year employee of the department, was obeying the speed limit and that Sargent was at fault for failure to yield while turning left. But a few days later, the department announced that the initial conclusion was wrong and that the crash investigation had revealed the officer was speeding.
Stoudenmire was reprimanded and suspended. Then in 2009, Stoudenmire was arrested on a drunken driving charge while he was off-duty. The Police Department allowed him to resign in lieu of termination.
Sargent’s widow, Faustina Sargent, 61, said Friday that she expects the trial to take an emotional toll.
“It’s just like an old wound that’s going to open back up,” she said when reached by phone.
Willie Sargent had no children, but his widow said he quickly embraced her two sons.
The last time she saw her husband, she was preparing to go out with her girlfriends for the evening, and he was getting ready to visit a buddy. Faustina Sargent said he told her that he was the happiest he’d ever been, and he assured her they were going to be together a very long time.
“He said some of the nicest things to me before he died that Friday evening,” she said. “That’s what has kept me strong and going still.”
The attorney representing Gwinnett County, Michael O’Quinn, declined to comment about the case. He said the trial is expected to last three to four days.
The county filed an answer to the lawsuit that says Willie Sargent was guilty of negligence because he had consumed alcohol, thereby assuming risk. It also said Sargent was found to be at fault for failure to yield while turning left.
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