The parents of a teenage girl killed in a car crash last summer are suing the young driver.
Richard and Yolande Cherepak filed the lawsuit last week in Yukon Supreme Court.
Fifteen-year-old Clare Cherepak, Brendan Kinney, 20, and Derrick Gibbons, 18, were in the car with a then-15-year-old female driver around 3 a.m. on August 9, 2014.
The car collided with a transport truck on the Alaska Highway at Robert Service Way.
Kinney, the front seat passenger, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Cherepak died after being transported to Whitehorse General Hospital.
Gibbons was severely injured and medevaced to Vancouver General Hospital but survived.
The driver of the car was taken to Whitehorse General Hospital, treated and released.
She has since been charged with two counts of criminal negligence causing death and one count of criminal negligence causing bodily harm.
She cannot be named because of her age.
The civil lawsuit alleges it was the negligence of the driver, known only as Jane Doe, that caused or contributed to the crash.
Documents list nearly three dozen ways Cherepak’s parents allege the driver was negligent. They include: driving without due care and attention, failing to see the oncoming truck in time, driving at an excessive or inappropriate speed and driving when she was impaired by alcohol, drugs or fatigue.
“Jane Doe so negligently operated the car that it collided with the semi in a violent manner,” the documents say.
The lawsuit also names Linda Powers, the mother of one of the passengers and owner of the car. It says she was also negligent when she consented to the use of the car knowing that the driver would be impaired in some way or did not have enough training.
The driver of the transport truck, William Petrie, and the company he worked for, Alberta’s Wiebe Transport Seaboard Liquid Carriers Limited, are also named.
The lawsuit alleges Petrie failed to keep a proper lookout, failed to see the oncoming car in a reasonable time and failed to yield the right of way or approached too closely.
The Cherepaks are seeking an undisclosed amount of money for the loss of their daughter’s companionship and support.
The case is scheduled for a case management conference on Sept. 1.
Contact Ashley Joannou at
ashleyj@yukon-news.com