Legal Question in Personal Injury in New York

Re: depraved indifference byfamily-elderly driver caused accident

It does not appear that you could bring a cause of action against the driver's family. Your best option is to pursue all available insurance policies. The car itself (the car owner) should have had insurance coverage. You could also look to the possibility of Underinsured coverage through your own policy if the other car had less insurance than yours. You could also look to see if the elderly driver was part of a household which had other drivers and other insurace policies. If you have already performed an asset search I am assuming you have looked into these possibilities already. If not, then that should be your next step. I would be happy to discuss this further with you if you have any additional questions.

Re: depraved indifference byfamily-elderly driver caused accident

Its unlikely that the family can be held responsible for the driver's action UNLESS the driver did not own the car. If someone else owned the car, that person might be liable for negligent entrustment of the car but those are tough cases. The owner would have had to know that the person should not have been driving due to a some physical ailment. Hopefully the driver had a decent insurance policy and/or you have a larger policy and therefore can get underinsurance coverage from your carrier. If you do not already have an attorney, I would be happy to discuss you case with you as I handle auto cases all the time.

Re: elderly driver caused accident

What you are referring to is generally known as vicarious liability; with auto accidents, the vehicle owner may be held vicariously responsible

for the negligence of the drivers he allows to use his or her car.

It generally does not work the way you suggest.