NORTHAMPTON — An Amherst resident who alleges his 2009 Mercedes Benz sedan sustained significant damage after hitting a pothole on a town road has filed a lawsuit in Hampshire Superior Court in Northampton seeking a jury trial to recoup the more than $5,000 in repair work.
An attorney for Joshua Feldstein, 0f 23 Alyssum Drive, filed the complaint in court Wednesday asking the town to pay the $5,591 bill from Zyblot Motor Works on Route 9 for fixing the vehicle’s broken axle. The repair was needed following the May 29 incident on West Pomeroy Lane in Amherst, which becomes Moody Bridge Road in Hadley.
“While driving on Moody Bridge Road, plaintiff’s vehicle fell into a pothole so deep that the front axle of plaintiff’s vehicle broke and required immediate repair,” reads a portion of the lawsuit brought by Ryan P. McLane, an attorney with McLane & McLane LLC of Feeding Hills.
The complaint goes on to state that, “Defendant Town of Amherst failed to exercise due care in repairing the obvious dangerous condition that existed on its public way after it knew or should have known of the dangers that it caused, in that it received prior notice of the pothole, failed to inspect the pothole and failed to repair the pothole.”
The town has a process by which pothole, sidewalk and roadway claims must be filed with the town clerk’s office within 30 days of an incident. Those forms are then forwarded to the town’s insurer for action.
In the claim form that was given to the town clerk’s office within a week of the incident, and attached to the lawsuit, Feldstein writes that the incident occurred about 100 yards west of the intersection with Farmington Road.
“The entire front end of the car dropped into the hole and slammed the car,” he wrote, describing the pothole as more than 2 feet long, 1.5 feet wide and 8 inches deep.
Sedgwick Claims Management Services Inc. of Lexington, Kentucky, a third-party administrator for the town’s insurance company, Argonaut Insurance Co., wrote in response to Feldstein that the town’s insurance would not pay for the damage.
“As the town did not receive prior notice of the defect, they cannot be found to be negligent for failing to repair it in time to avoid your accident,” wrote Christina Sprague, a claims adjuster for Sedgwick.
Also attached to the complaint are exhibits that include the itemized bill from Zbylut, showing $3,782 for parts and $1,501 for labor, with a $5,591 total bill that includes taxes and hazardous material disposal, and a photo showing a person standing in the pothole.