STANFORD, Ky. — The son of a retired fire chief who died after being struck by an ambulance has filed a lawsuit against Stanford EMS and the EMT driving the emergency vehicle.
Walter Manuel, 79, was a retired fire chief of the Lincoln County Fire Department’s Station One in the 1980’s. He died at the scene on January 14, 2014, when his car collided with an ambulance that was transporting a patient in critical condition.
His son Clarence W. Manuel filed the complaint last week in Lincoln Circuit Court. The lawsuit alleges that EMT Joshua T. Ruhe was negligent as the driver of the ambulance that struck Manuel’s car as he was making a turn from Lancaster Street onto U.S. 27, Central Kentucky News reports.
The ambulance had lights and sirens on at the time, and was en route to Fort Logan Hospital, where a helicopter was waiting to airlift a critical patient to a Lexington hospital. Ruhe, the patient and two others in the ambulance were injured in the crash; the patient was eventually airlifted.
The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount of damages for medical expenses, funeral expenses of $9,029, pain and suffering, and the loss of Walter Manuel’s ability to earn money.