The tragic circumstances surrounding the death of a Fort Mill school district crossing guard earlier this year have prompted his family to take legal action. Stanley Brucker, 61, was struck and killed by a vehicle while on duty outside Fort Mill Elementary School on March 21, a case that is now at the center of a wrongful death lawsuit filed against both the school district and the driver involved in the incident.
According to WBTV, the lawsuit claims the district was negligent in its duties, having assigned Brucker to a spot known or that should have been known as unsafe. The family alleges, that Brucker was employed by Cross Safe, a company contracted by the district to position crossing guards at various locations and that the district failed to ensure a safe environment for him to carry out his duties. Compounding the tragedy, this legal action comes on the heels of another incident in which a crossing guard was injured on October 15 in a separate collision, also within the district’s domain.
In the lawsuit, outlined by WCNC Charlotte, the family of Brucker accuses the driver of the vehicle that hit him of not operating the vehicle safely, despite the driver facing no criminal charges after the accident, as determined by both the Fort Mill Police and the South Carolina Highway Patrol.
The Charlotte Observer reports that the wrongful death lawsuit seeks actual and punitive damages, citing that Brucker suffered "mental trauma, anguish, and conscious pain and suffering before he died." The action also occurs amidst calls for a review of school zone safety by the S.C. Department of Transportation, a pressing matter given the repeated incidents involving school crossing guards in the area. While the Fort Mill School District has remained tight-lipped, stating they generally do not comment on pending litigation, Charleston attorneys J. Rutledge Young III and Hunter L. Windham formally filed the lawsuit on behalf of a family member of Brucker's.
