Closing Arguments set for Thursday in Drunken Driving Trial

Closing arguments are set to begin 1:30 p.m. Thursday, May 28, in the trial of a drunken driver who killed one person and injured three others in Sioux Falls.

Robert Clifford, a nationally prominent trial attorney from Chicago, said he intends to ask the eight-woman-four-man jury for punitive damages. A jury is allowed to award such damages by way of punishment in cases where wilful and wanton conduct is involved.

Clifford is scheduled to begin closing arguments on behalf of the plaintiff, Don Dickerson, who was left permanently brain damaged after the car in which he was a passenger was struck by a van driven by an employee of Graham Tire Company of Sioux Falls. Dickerson's wife, Diane, was killed in the April 22, 1995 crash.

Jay Gunderson, an employee of Graham Tire Company, was intoxicated at twice the legal limit at the time he collided the company van into the car in which Dickerson was a passenger.

Gunderson left Nutty's Pub in Sioux Falls at about 8:30 p.m. after having consumed up to 12 beers in four hours, according to plaintiff's expert. Gunderson had drunk in the company of several Graham Tire Company corporate officers who did not exercise their duty to take away the keys of Gunderson before he got behind the wheel of the company van.

The company's policy prohibited employees from driving company vehicles before or after work hours under the influence of alcohol.

"The jury will be asked whether it is time to send a message to the community of Sioux Falls that it will no longer tolerate this type of reckless conduct," Clifford said. "Through punitive damages, this jury can let everyone else know that the citizens of Sioux Falls abhor this irresponsible behavior and that it will no longer be tolerated."

Clifford Law Offices represents Don Dickerson and his children as well as the estate of Diane Dickerson. Clifford Law Offices in Chicago is a nationally prominent firm concentrating in transportation, aviation, medical negligence, personal injury and wrongful death litigation.

The trial is being heard before Judge Glen Severson in Room 4B at the Minnehaha County Court House.

Dickerson was a passenger in Larry and Kathleen McMichael's Ford Mustang when it was struck by the Graham's Dodge Caravan at what some experts estimate to have been greatly in excess of the speed limit.