CHATTANOOGA — Texas attorney Mo Aziz of Abraham, Watkins, Nichols, Sorrels, Agosto & Aziz is representing the parents of 10-year old Zyanna Harris who was killed on November 21, 2016, when her school bus crashed in Chattanooga. Troy Pradia and Jonathan Cox of the Cox Pradia Law Firm and Luke Neder of Dale Buchanan & Associates are also part of the family’s legal team.

On November 21, 2016, Zyanna Harris was a passenger in a school bus when it rolled over and collided with a tree. Zyanna died from blunt force trauma.

Johnthony Walker, who had received his commercial driver’s license in April of 2016, had been in another accident while driving for Durham School Services, L.P. and National Express, LLC in September. In the past 24 months, Durham School Services has been involved in 346 crashes.

The attorneys have also filed suit against Thomas Built Buses, Inc., a subsidiary of Daimler Trucks North America, LLC, for the defective design of the bus. The bus in question was defectively designed because it did not include seat belts. Additionally, the bus contained a window system that failed to prevent contact between the window glass and the roadway and failed to minimize the possibility of occupant ejection in foreseeable overturn/slide events.

“The negligence case against Mr. Walker and Durham School Services is clear. We also know that the bus manufacturer could have delivered a safer product into the stream of commerce by equipping this bus with seat-belts and glazed shatter-resistant windows. The real question is whether those features would have lessened the harm to these innocent school children in this crash? That’s what I have been hired to determine,” said Aziz.

Aziz served on the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in the In Re: Hurricane Rita Evacuation Bus Fire, where he played a lead role in the $88 million settlement of the Hurricane Rita evacuation bus fire disaster, in which 23 elderly citizens perished. He has also served on the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in the Victoria Bus Litigation, where he represented 37 claimants from a single bus rollover accident near Victoria, Texas and resulted in a global settlement of $10.8 million.

The petition can be viewed here.