The San Francisco city attorney’s office agreed to pay nearly $5 million to a motorcyclist who was badly injured in 2013 when he was struck by a fire truck driven by a city firefighter suspected of being drunk on the job, officials said Tuesday.
The motorcyclist, 53-year-old Jack Frazier, sued the city on Oct. 28, 2013 — four months after a 32-ton ladder truck plowed into him at Fifth and Howard streets and the firefighter behind the wheel was arrested on suspicion of being intoxicated.
“We think this is a fair agreement to resolve the case and avoid further costs and risks of litigation,” said Andrea Guzman, a spokeswoman for City Attorney Dennis Herrera. The $4,990,000 settlement will go through the Board of Supervisors’ Government Audit and Oversight Committee before the full board votes on whether to accept it.
The firefighter, Michael Sean Quinn, now 45, was arrested on suspicion of drunken-driving-related charges after he allegedly slammed into Frazier on June 29, 2013. A San Francisco Superior Court judge, though, all but doomed the prosecution’s case when she tossed out key evidence, saying police bungled the investigation.