January 10, 2011
Re: Jan Chung vs. Tire Corporation of America,
Videotaped Deposition of Charles
Crowder
Date of Deposition:
December 5, 2010
Background
Witness’ full name is Charles David Crowder. He is
6’5” tall and 240 lbs, about the same weight as he was at the time of the
accident. He is a tow truck operator. He has been employed by Dartnell’s Towing
for 13 years. The principals of Dartnell’s Towing are Sara and Don Dartnell,
husband and wife.
He knows Trooper Matthews, Police Officer Tate, and
Deputy McIntyre from other accidents.
Other than what has been produced today, he has no
other notes and did not take any photographs. He would not consider himself a
tire expert but since the accident he studies the tires that they buy and they
put on their wreckers just out of curiosity.
What did he do?
Mr. Crowder recalls this accident which happened on
February 5, 2007 in Loland County. He does not remember the time he arrived at
the scene of the accident but recalls it was a Sunday afternoon. He remembers
this was a tough job to do because the vehicle was lying against a tree away
from the road and he had to back roll it and drag it up through the sand, which
was difficult because the vehicle was torn up. He could not get a good angle on
it to do a good recovery without just completely tearing the vehicle all to
pieces. This is why he had to take the shovel and dig a trench to get
underneath it, to get his chains underneath it, so he could go to the bottom
side of it.
He was able to remove the vehicle from the scene by
going by the driver's side door right behind the front tire. He took a shovel
to dig a trench. He then pushed a chain underneath it to the backside, hooked
it, positioned the rollback somewhere up the road and rolled it where it would
fall on down. It slid sideways in the dirt and then it fell over on all four
wheels to its normal driving position. He was then able to rehook it and bring
it to the road. He had to rehook it a couple of more times because of the
damage.
He was able to get the vehicle off the tree but there
were small metal pieces of the vehicle he had to also pick up. He was able to
get the rubber tires of his tow truck onto the shoulder but got stuck where his
rear wheels were spinning. He did not have a four-wheel drive tow truck so he
had to push himself out with his under-reach wheel lift which is on the back of
the tow truck. There is a tube that comes out and has a bar on it, where you
can tow two cars at a time. You can put this down and push it out, if you release
your brakes, and as you push it out, it will push the wreck. He backed about
two to three feet off the emergency lane, just enough to get out of the road,
and started pulling from there which is when he went to reposition one time. He
then realized, after the wheels spun a little bit, it was stuck, and got out
and pushed himself out. He did not have to use a dolly or a caster. The tire
was dragged through the soft sand but did not roll, because of the section of
interstate they were on. The tires did not roll they just slide through it. He
had to reposition the truck one time because the tire was flat and the way it
was sliding it would not cooperate to get on the truck completely.
It was his intention to get the vehicle off the tree
and pull it onto a flatbed. He tried to make sure the vehicle was secure
because he did not want parts flying off of it as he went down the highway. The
driver's side sliding door was still on securely enough that it was not going
to come off. He had nothing to do with cutting or removing any of the doors on
the vehicle. When he got the truck onto his flatbed, he tie-scrapped the
passenger's side door closed with a ratchet-strap-type device. The furthest
rear window on the passenger's side was still intact but bowed out in the open
position. When he pushed it to close it, the glass shattered in his hand. He
could not go down the highway with a window bowed like it was, so he had to do
something. As he tried to push it to close it, it shattered.
After the incident, he did not do any depth or tread
analysis. He did not speak with any of the Chungs, any of the officers,
firemen, or the coroner.
What did he observe?
It was not raining the day of the accident and the
paved road was dry. The shoulder of the road had a slight slope
away from the paved travel lane. It's very sandy,
sugar sand, which was normal for the region.
When he arrived at the scene there were already a few
police officers, county police officers, state patrol, fire trucks there.
As far as he knows, the sliding door on the
passenger's side was still attached to the vehicle because he did not remove
it. When he arrived at the accident scene, the vehicle was lying on its side
and the condition of the rear driver's side rear door appeared to be folded
back up underneath the vehicle. He does not know whether the fire department
had anything to do with that. The driver's side sliding door was still hanging
on to the vehicle when he removed the car from the tree but it was mangled.
When he began working on the vehicle there was still a
device from the firefighters in the vehicle. It was wood cribbing or blocks
used to stabilize the vehicle so it did not teeter or roll either way. It
appears in photos that the wood is driven between the door and the van. Once he
got ready to remove the vehicle he does not remember if they left the cribbing
there or they picked it up after he moved the vehicle. He did not touch it
because it was their equipment.
He does not recall if the other glass on any of the
windows of the vehicle was broken. He has no recollection of what glass was
still intact and what glass had been shattered when he arrived at the scene. He
just knows of the one that broke on his head.
As far as tire shreds, he recalls seeing some on the
side of the interstate just because of the nature of driving but did not pay
any particular attention to any of them. He has no recollection of seeing a
piece of tire treat identified by Trooper Mathews in Exhibit 7. In the process
of towing the vehicle up onto the flatbed, he noticed that the driver's side
rear tire was deflated and there was nothing obstructing it from turning.
Preservation of evidence
In connection with the accident, the only paperwork
Mr. Crowder completed was a tow ticket but he no longer has it.
Exhibit 16 is the vehicle information sheet from his
office prepared by the secretary.
He did not inspect the tires of the van at the scene
or at the yard. Once the vehicle was back at the yard they had a couple of
different companies call wanting the manufacture dates off of the tires, and he
had to go out there and get them. He never attempted at any time to determine
whether the tires were inflated or how many pounds per square inch they had. He
did not inspect the tires of the van at the scene or at the yard. Once it was
back at the yard, they had a couple of different companies call wanting the
manufacture dates off of the tires, and he had to go out there and get them. He
never attempted at any time to determine whether the tires were inflated or how
many pounds per square inch they had. He does not have any specific information
regarding the detread of the left passenger's side tire.
Exhibit 17 is one of his standard county tow-in sheets
for an accident. On the sheet you describe what is in the vehicle. It is more
of a cover-your-behind-type document for liability purposes. Most of the time
on wrecks they are very vague, because cars are torn up. Sometimes they have to
put "vehicle tore all to pieces" and usually it has the customer's
name, what kind of vehicle and the tag number. He does not do his own inventory
of the contents of the vehicle and does not recall any of the contents of this
vehicle. He does not recall finding any personal belongings or effects in the
area of the accident scene.
At the yard, someone told him to go out and get the
DOT numbers off of three tires that were on the van. He did not do the rear
tire on the driver's side. He does not know if someone removed the driver's
side rear tire while it was at Dartnell’s. The vehicle was in the fenced in
yard at Dartnell’s for close to a year, uncovered by a tarp and exposed. No one
took steps to protect rain from getting inside the vehicle.
To his knowledge, no lawyers, adjusters or
investigators came out and looked at the vehicle. Mr. and Mrs. Dartnell never
made him aware that a request had been made to preserve the subject van. He is
not sure if there came a point in time where the driver's side rear tire was
taken off of the van but he believes he heard them talking about it being removed.
He was never asked to remove it. He was never asked to go out and collect any
detached tread or tread pieces from the vehicle. Other than mowing the lawn
around the vehicle, he had no involvement with this vehicle after he dropped it
off at the yard on the day of the accident, other than writing down the three
DOT numbers.
He was not involved in transporting the vehicle from
Dartnell’s Towing to its next location.
TIRE
MISMATCH
According to Exhibit 18, somebody called the yard and
spoke with Sandy, one of the dispatchers in the office. Mr. Crowder was then
asked to go out and get the DOT numbers from the three tires which he found on
the side walls.
He knows the tires on this van were mismatched in that
the front tires were constructed in 2005 and the rear tire was constructed in
2003. He does not know about size, just the dates. The tires on the front were
newer than the tires on the back, according to the last four digits of the DOT
numbers. From the last four digits you are able to determine the week and the
year that the tire was built. He called a friend at a tire store and asked him
how the tires were dated. He was told the first number represents the month
that the tire was constructed; the second number is either the day or week
depending on the manufacturer; and the 0-5, or the last two numbers, is the
year.
He does not know anything about the manufacturer or
the brand of the tires. He does not know anything about the driver's side rear
tire and whether it matched the passenger's side rear tire.
KNOWLEDGE
OF NEGLIGENCE
Mr. Crowder has no knowledge of negligence on the part
of the tire store and does not have an opinion as to whether the fact that the
tires were mismatched contributed to the accident. Prior to calling his friend
who worked at the tire store, he had no independent knowledge of tires or DOTs.
What he characterized as a mismatch is based on information that somebody else
gave him.