(L-R) Michael Rafi and Christopher Stokes, with the Rafi Law Firm. Photo by John Disney/ALM

A pedestrian who suffered severe head injuries after being hit by an SUV backing out of a driveway reached a $1.6 million presuit settlement last month. 

The victim, a builder and freelance jazz columnist who is now 69, was left with myriad physical and neurological effects from the accident, including partial hearing loss in one ear.

“We think there's going to be long-term hearing impact, but we're hopeful he'll recover some of it,” said lawyer Michael Rafi. “Jazz is his passion.”

Rafi is less confident that his client, Ralph Miriello, will ever return to the building profession. 

“I'd be very surprised if he were ever able to do contracting work again,” said Rafi, who handled the case with Rafi Law Firm colleague Chris Stokes. 

Miriello, he said, “spends most of his time jumping from doctor to doctor in the Emory network. They've really provided incredible care; they saved his life.”

The settlement includes $1.5 million from the defendant driver's insurance carrier, Farmers, and $100,000 from Miriello's uninsured/underinsured motorist policy. 

According to Rafi and a demand letter he sent earlier this year, Miriello was walking his dog along Vista Leaf Drive in Decatur one morning last August when a Honda Element sped backward down an inclined driveway and hit him.

The impact threw Miriello “more than halfway across the road and his head hit the pavement with such force, that it fractured his skull,” the letter said. 

The driver, Ryan Gasaway, got out and found Miriello unconscious and bleeding onto the street. 

Gasaway ran inside and told his mother to call 911, while a neighbor with first-aid experience tended to Miriello, who regained consciousness and was sitting upright.

When a police officer arrived the neighbor used his flashlight to check Miriello' eyes, which “were pinpoint and non-responsive to light. He was unable to form words and his balance was not steady enough to stand up from the ground,” according to the letter.

Paramedics placed him in cervical collar and on a backboard, and he was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital.

Miriello was admitted to Grady's Surgical Intensive Care Unit with “multiple skull fractures and bleeding in various parts of his brain,” the letter said.

While there, he could not walk or speak and “required extensive neurological and cardiological evaluations.”

A photo of the SUV shows a large dent on the left rear where the nameplate is located; Gasaway was cited and pleaded guilty to improper backing and causing an accident. 

After two weeks at Grady, Miriello was transferred to Emory Rehabilitation Hospital for two more weeks of inpatient and neuropsychological treatment.

After that he continued to undergo speech, occupational and physical therapy.

A therapist reported that Miriello had difficulty speaking and comprehending and was “90 percent impaired for walking and moving around.”

Another therapist reported that he had “impaired cognition including problem solving, decision making, and following directions” and “was confused, distracted, and delayed.”

He continued to receive therapy and medication, and by the time Rafi sent his demand letter in April, his medical bills were nearly $270,000 and were expected to top $300,000.

The letter demanded the $1.5 million policy limit on Gasaway's mother's Farmers Insurance policy, and noted that he had been cited five times for traffic violations, including causing another wreck two months before he hit Miriello and another in December 2018.

“We had affidavits from residents on the street that said he drove like a maniac every day,” Rafi said. “He actually never even saw Mr. Miriello; we assume he just threw the car in reverse and flew down the hill.”

The letter to Farmers Senior General Adjuster Ed Frerichs warned that Miriello “will present favorably to a jury: he is kind, likable, and genuine. Additionally, his symptoms and the way this crash impacted his life come through simply by talking to him and his wife Joanne.

“On the contrary,” it continued, “Mr. Gasaway will not present well to a jury. Reason being, over the last eight years, Mr. Gasaway has demonstrated he has no respect for the rules of the road and caused a crash only weeks before the crash in this case that also caused injury to another driver.”

Last month both carriers tendered their policy limits to settle the case, which Rafi said was finalized June 17.  

A Farmers' media relations representative said she would inquire about a response; none had been received by press time.