Georgia, Jalen Carter respond to lawsuit stemming from fatal crash

Georgia and former Bulldogs football player Jalen Carter have responded to a UGA staffer’s lawsuit regarding a fatal crash in January, according to the Athens Banner-Herald. The lawsuit was filed in July.

Staffer Victoria “Tory” Bowles filed the lawsuit, alleging the university “negligently entrusted” the Ford Expedition to LeCroy — the driver in the crash in which she and Georgia offensive lineman Devin Willock were killed. Bowles was a passenger in the car and suffered injuries to her spinal cord, a fractured clavicle and a collapsed lung.

The lawsuit also said the university knew of four speeding tickets on LeCroy’s record, which included two “super speeder” violations. In addition, the university said Bowles and LeCroy were out drinking for four hours at at least four bars and a strip club following the national championship celebration. UGA added they knew the analyst was meant for transporting recruits and needed to be taken home to park for the next day.

“UGAAA never implied or suggested that analysts could use the rental vehicles for purely personal activities, and it has absolutely never granted permission for analysts to drunkenly drive the vehicles or to race at unsafe speeds through city streets,” the university said, via the Banner-Herald.

Carter was also named in the lawsuit for allegedly “engaging in a grossly negligent joint enterprise-tandem driving/street racing,” according to the Banner-Herald. Through his attorneys, Carter said Bowles “failed to exercise ordinary care for her own safety when she voluntarily assumed the risk of harm by riding in an automobile being driven by an obviously impaired and intoxicated driver … whose negligence was the proximate cause of the subject wreck.”

According to the filing, Carter didn’t try to “outgain, outdistance or prevent LeCroy’s vehicle from passing his vehicle,” per the Banner-Herald. It also added the two didn’t talk about racing, and he denied unlawfully leaving the scene. Instead, the filing said, Carter stopped after the car went off the road and went over to check on those involved.

Then, Carter left “when it was apparent that there was nothing he could do to help and that his presence was not required at the scene.”

“I think there has been a massive PR campaign supporting these two lawsuits to the detriment of the UGA Athletic Association and Jalen Carter and others named in the case without them having the chance to explain themselves,” said Bill Cowsert, an attorney representing Carter, during a conversation with the Banner-Herald. “Jalen Carter is not to blame for this accident at all although he is heartbroken for his friends and athletic employees that were killed or injured in this tragic collision.”