Man Receives Settlement from Head-On Collision

Arles “Rick” Freeman, a 58-year-old Raymore man, was injured in an April 2012 in a head-on collision when Joey Ray Croft Jr.,  18 at the time, the centerline on a rural Cass County road shortly after 7 a.m. while driving a 1992 Jeep Wrangler.

Croft said he ran off the right side of the road after he reached for an object that fell in his truck. He crossed the center line after over correcting his Jeep and struck Freeman’s vehicle, a 2009 Chevy HHR provided by Infinite Energy Construction of Grandview.

Freeman sued the Cincinnati Insurance Co. in Cass County Circuit Court in 2013 after receiving $50,000 in policy limits from Progressive Insurance Co. on behalf of Croft. Freeman then settled a lawsuit against his employer’s insurer over its uninsured motorist coverage for $275,000.

Plaintiff’s attorney Kathryn A. Lewis of Kuckelman Torline Kirkland & Lewis in Overland Park, Kansas, said her client suffered injuries to his chest, back, knee, arm and shoulder and required three surgeries, including a procedure to repair a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his knee. No criminal charges were filed against the other driver, she said.