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Washington DOC Pays $78,150 in Bus Slip and Fall

On October 23, 1992 Cheryl Turner Jennings, a free citizen of the State of Washington visiting a prisoner, fractured her left ankle while attempting to exit a bus owned by the State of Washington and the Department of Corrections. Jennings, while exiting the bus at the parking lot area for McNeil Island Correctional Center in Steilacoom, Washington, slipped on an unprotected step when the bus driver distracted her by talking to her.

Jennings claims that the step lacked the rubber stripping which may have prevented the fall. As a result, Jennings has suffered severe and permanent injuries, including but not limited to an extremely comminuted fractured ankle of her left foot. In 1994, Jennings, through her attorney Sam Pemberton of Tacoma filed suit, and in 1996 the State of Washington and DOC settled that suit by paying Jennings $78,150. See: Jennings v. the State of Washington and the Department of Corrections, Pierce County Superior Court, case no. 94-2-09318-1.

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Related legal case

Jennings v. State of Washington and DOC