Itasca, Hill County, Texas Train Collision — Union Pacific Freight Train Hits FedEx Truck at the SH 81 & FM 67 Crossing: One Killed, One Critical, and What Texas Law Gives Your Family Now
The phone call comes on a Thursday afternoon, or maybe it does not come at all and you are sitting in a hospital corridor staring at a screen that says critical condition, not knowing what the next hour holds. Maybe you are at home in Dallas, and the call was about someone you love who was supposed to be home by now — a 25-year-old riding in a FedEx truck on a route through Hill County, crossing the tracks at State Highway 81 and FM Road 67 in Itasca, when a Union Pacific freight train slammed into the truck and pushed it down the rails. One person died from his injuries. The driver is fighting for his life. And you are reading this at the hour when everything feels broken because you need to know what happens now — what the law allows your family, what the railroad is already doing about this crash, and what the next 72 hours demand of you if you want to protect the people who depend on you.
We are Attorney911 — The Manginello Law Firm, PLLC. We handle commercial-vehicle and wrongful-death cases across Texas, and this page is the work of our senior trial team. We are writing to you — the family of the person who died, the family of the driver who is still in critical condition, or the person who is trying to help someone in that position. Everything here is legal information, not legal advice. Contacting us is free and confidential. And the first thing we want you to know is this: the railroad has already started building its defense file. The time between the crash and the moment you call a lawyer is the time the other side uses to shape the story.
What Happened at the SH 81 and FM 67 Crossing in Itasca
On July 23, 2026, a Union Pacific train collided with a FedEx truck at a railroad crossing near the intersection of State Highway 81 and FM Road 67 in Itasca, Hill County, Texas. Video from the scene showed the FedEx truck had been pushed down the tracks after the train struck it at the crossing. Two people were in the FedEx truck — a driver and a passenger. Both were injured. The passenger, 25-year-old Sheldon Gutierrez-Rangel of Dallas, was flown from the scene to a hospital. The Texas Department of Public Safety confirmed the next day that he had died from his injuries. The driver, whose name has not been released, remained in critical condition. A firefighter at the scene was also treated for a heat-related illness — July in Hill County, where the heat index routinely passes 100 degrees, and where the nearest Level I trauma center is not close.
The cause of the crash has not been released. Union Pacific said the incident is under investigation. The Texas Department of Public Safety is investigating. And here is what that means for your family: the official story is being assembled right now, by people who are not working for you.
Your Rights Under Texas Law After a Train Collision Death
Texas law gives your family the right to hold a railroad accountable when its negligence — or the negligence of those responsible for crossing safety — causes death or catastrophic injury. That right lives in two separate legal claims that are usually filed together but serve different purposes, and understanding the difference is the first step in understanding what your case is actually worth.
The Wrongful Death Claim belongs to the surviving family members — the spouse, children, and parents of the person who died. Texas’s Wrongful Death Act allows these family members to recover for the losses they personally suffered: the financial support the deceased would have provided, the companionship, the guidance, the love, and the mental anguish of losing them. This claim compensates the family for what the death took from them.
The Survival Claim belongs to the estate of the person who died. Texas’s survival statute allows the estate to recover for what the deceased person suffered between the moment of injury and the moment of death — the pain, the fear, the medical costs, the consciousness of what was happening. If there was time between the collision and death — even minutes — that suffering has a legal value, and it belongs to the estate, not to the family members directly.
Here is the deadline that controls both: Texas law gives you two years from the date of death to file a wrongful death lawsuit, and two years from the date of injury for the survival claim. In this case, because the passenger died the day after the crash, both deadlines fall within days of each other — roughly late July 2028. Two years sounds like a long time. It is not. The evidence that decides this case will begin disappearing within days, not years.
Texas also follows what lawyers call a modified comparative negligence rule — and this rule is the one the railroad’s lawyers will try to use against your family from the first phone call:
Under Texas’s modified comparative negligence standard, a person injured or killed in a collision may recover damages so long as their own share of fault is 50% or less. If the injured party is found to be 51% or more at fault, recovery is barred entirely. If the injured party is 50% or less at fault, their recovery is reduced by their percentage of fault.
In plain English: if a jury finds that the truck was 30% at fault for being on the tracks and the railroad was 70% at fault for inadequate warnings, excessive train speed, or a malfunctioning signal, your family still recovers — but the total is reduced by that 30%. Every percentage point the railroad’s lawyers can pin on the truck is money subtracted from your family. That is exactly why they work so hard to build the narrative that the truck “should have stopped,” and that is exactly why the evidence from the crossing — the signal logs, the event recorder, the camera footage — decides everything.
Texas is also one of the few states where a jury may compensate the value of your loved one’s life itself — not just the paychecks that stopped, not just the medical bills, but what that person’s existence meant to the people who loved them. There is no broad cap on non-economic damages in a railroad wrongful death case in Texas (unlike medical malpractice, where such caps exist). The insurance company’s lawyers know that distinction by heart. Now you do too.
The Defendant: Union Pacific Railroad — Structure, Scale, and Why Structure Determines Your Recovery
Union Pacific Railroad is one of the two largest Class I freight railroads in North America. Its parent, Union Pacific Corporation, is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange. The railroad operates across 23 states, maintaining roughly 32,000 miles of track, and moves freight through Texas on main lines that pass through small towns like Itasca — crossings that sit at the intersection of state highways and farm roads, where the warning systems vary wildly from one crossing to the next.
What this structure means for your case is this: the entity that operated the train, the entity that maintains the track, the entity responsible for the crossing signal, and the entity whose insurance will pay are all parts of the same corporate body. Union Pacific is not a small contractor with a single policy and a fragile balance sheet. It is one of the largest transportation companies in the world, with a claims department staffed by career railroad adjusters who handle grade-crossing collisions as a routine function of their jobs — not because they are careless, but because they have done this hundreds of times. They know exactly what evidence to secure for their side, exactly how fast it needs to be secured, and exactly how to frame a crossing collision in a way that minimizes the railroad’s exposure.
Union Pacific is also what the insurance industry calls self-insured or high-deductible. This means the first layer of any settlement or verdict may come directly from the railroad’s own treasury, not from an outside insurance carrier. That matters because it means the people deciding whether to fight your family’s claim or offer a fair settlement are Union Pacific’s own risk managers — people whose performance is measured by how much they save the company, not by how fairly they treat the families of people killed on their tracks.
The railroad’s defense strategy in a grade-crossing collision almost always follows a predictable arc: argue that the crossing was properly marked and maintained, that the train was operating within speed limits, that the horn was sounded, and that the truck — not the train — was the negligent party for being on the tracks. They will point to the crossbucks or the flashing lights or the gates and say the warning was adequate. They will produce the train crew’s statements and the event recorder data that supports their narrative. And they will do all of this within hours of the collision, while your family is at the hospital, not at the crossing.
The counter to every one of these arguments lives in the evidence — and the evidence is already on a clock.
The FedEx Corporate Structure: Which Entity Owns This Truck, and Why It Changes Your Case
The FedEx truck involved in this collision was not simply “a FedEx truck” in the way most people understand that phrase. FedEx Corporation is a parent company that operates through multiple separate divisions, each with its own employees, its own insurance, and its own legal structure — and the division that operated this truck determines who is liable, what insurance tower applies, and whether workers’ compensation is even part of the picture.
FedEx Express operates its own fleet with its own employees. If this truck was a FedEx Express vehicle, the driver was a FedEx employee, and the insurance covering that truck is FedEx Express’s commercial auto policy — a policy with substantial limits, layered with excess coverage, designed for a company that operates tens of thousands of vehicles nationwide.
FedEx Ground operates through a network of independent service providers — companies that contract with FedEx Ground to run delivery routes using trucks branded with the FedEx logo. The driver of a FedEx Ground truck may work not for FedEx directly but for a small LLC that holds the route contract. FedEx Ground insists these drivers are independent contractors, not employees — a legal position that has been challenged in courts and legislatures across the country for years. What this means for your case is that the company whose name is on the truck may argue it is not responsible for the driver, even though its routing app, its delivery quotas, its scanners, and its brand are all over the operation. This is a corporate-structure fight we know how to run — and it is a fight that determines whether the insurance tower that covers your family’s loss is the one with a million-dollar floor or the one with a $30,000 minimum.
FedEx Freight operates less-than-truckload shipping with its own employee drivers. Each of these divisions maintains separate insurance, separate safety policies, and separate corporate counsel. Knowing which division operated this truck — and whether the truck was operated by an employee or a contractor — is the first question in building the liability map.
The reason this matters so much in a train-collision case is that the truck’s presence on the tracks could be the result of the truck driver’s negligence (failing to yield, running a signal, stalling on the crossing) or the result of the crossing’s failure (inadequate warning, malfunctioning signal, blocked sight lines). If the truck driver was negligent, the passenger’s family has a claim against the truck driver and the truck operator — and Union Pacific may argue comparative fault. If the crossing was dangerous, the truck’s occupants have a claim against Union Pacific and potentially against whoever maintains the crossing signal. In most grade-crossing cases, the truth is that both sides contributed — and the question is not whether the truck was on the tracks, but why the truck was on the tracks and what the railroad did or did not do to prevent a collision at that specific crossing.
The Workers’ Compensation Fork: Two Lanes Your Family May Not Know About
If the people in the FedEx truck were on the job — and they almost certainly were, given that they were in a commercial delivery vehicle on a weekday afternoon — then two separate legal lanes exist for their families, and most people only know about one.
Lane 1: Workers’ compensation. If the truck driver or passenger was an employee of FedEx (or of a FedEx Ground service provider that carries workers’ comp), the injured worker or the family of the deceased worker may have a workers’ compensation claim. In Texas, workers’ comp provides death benefits to surviving dependents and covers medical expenses — but those benefits are capped. They are no-fault, meaning you do not have to prove anyone was negligent, but they are also limited, meaning they will not come close to compensating what a 25-year-old’s life was worth in lost earning capacity alone.
Lane 2: The third-party tort claim. Workers’ compensation bars you from suing your own employer — but it does not bar you from suing a negligent third party who is not your employer. Union Pacific is not the employer of the FedEx truck’s occupants. If the crossing was inadequately maintained, if the signal failed, if the train was operated negligently, or if the railroad failed to take reasonable steps to make the crossing safe, then your family has a full wrongful death and personal injury claim against Union Pacific — a claim that can recover everything workers’ comp cannot: the full earning capacity, the mental anguish, the loss of companionship, the pain and suffering, and potentially punitive damages if the railroad’s conduct rises to gross negligence.
This fork — comp on one side, tort on the other — is the single most important thing most families do not understand after a work-related death on the tracks. The company hopes you hear “workers’ comp” and stop there. The real case is often the third-party claim against the railroad, and it is worth multiples of what comp will ever pay.
The Evidence Clock: What Exists, Who Holds It, and How Fast It Dies
This is the section that decides whether your case is built on proof or built on the railroad’s narrative. Every grade-crossing collision generates a trail of evidence — but that evidence is held by the railroad, by the trucking company, and by government agencies, and it dies on a clock that does not wait for your family to grieve.
The Locomotive Event Recorder. Every freight locomotive operated by a Class I railroad like Union Pacific is equipped with an event recorder — the railroad equivalent of an airplane’s black box — that captures the train’s speed, throttle position, brake applications, horn activation, and alerter resets in the moments before, during, and after a collision. Federal regulations require this data to be preserved after a reportable incident, and the railroad’s own operating rules typically require the crew to secure the recorder immediately. But the event recorder’s data buffer is limited — it is designed to overwrite old data as new trips occur. If the recorder is not pulled and downloaded quickly, the pre-incident data can be lost. We subpoena this data from Union Pacific and from the third-party vendor that downloads and stores it, and we demand it before the railroad has time to produce a curated version.
The Crossing Signal System Logs. If the SH 81 and FM 67 crossing is equipped with active warning devices — flashing lights, gates, bells — those devices are connected to a signal system that logs every activation and every malfunction. Federal regulations require railroads to inspect and maintain grade crossing signal systems and to keep records of those inspections. These logs can reveal whether the signal activated properly, whether there was a history of malfunctions at this crossing, and whether the railroad knew the crossing was dangerous and failed to fix it. These records are maintained by the railroad or its signal maintenance contractor, and they must be demanded before they are “archived” into a form that is difficult to retrieve.
The Locomotive Camera Footage. Union Pacific, like most Class I railroads, operates locomotives equipped with inward-facing and outward-facing cameras. The outward-facing camera would have captured the truck on the crossing, the moment of impact, and the condition of the warning devices as the train approached. The inward-facing camera would have captured the crew’s actions — whether they were alert, whether they applied the brakes, whether they sounded the horn. This footage is the single most powerful piece of evidence in a grade-crossing case — and it is also the most volatile. Camera systems overwrite on a schedule that can range from days to weeks, depending on the system’s configuration. The preservation letter that freezes this footage must go out immediately — not after the funeral, not after the official report is completed, not after the insurance adjuster calls. The day you call us is the day that letter goes out.
The Train Crew’s Drug and Alcohol Test Results. Federal regulations require railroads to test train crew members for drugs and alcohol after any grade-crossing collision involving a fatality. These tests must be administered within hours of the incident — if they are not, the railroad has violated its own regulatory obligations, and that violation becomes evidence of negligence. The test results are held by the railroad’s medical contractor and by the Federal Railroad Administration. They are not voluntarily shared with victims’ families. They must be subpoenaed.
The Track and Crossing Inspection Records. Federal regulations require railroads to inspect their tracks on a regular schedule and to maintain records of those inspections. The crossing at SH 81 and FM 67 has an inspection history — a record of every time a railroad inspector looked at the track, the signal, the crossbucks, the sight lines, the road surface. That history can reveal whether the railroad knew this crossing was dangerous — whether there had been prior incidents, whether vegetation was blocking the view, whether the signal had been reported as malfunctioning, whether the warning devices were adequate for the speed of trains operating through this crossing. These records are the backbone of a foreseeability argument — the proof that the railroad knew or should have known that this crossing was a hazard.
The FedEx Truck’s Electronic Data. If the FedEx truck was equipped with a telematics system, an event data recorder, or a dash camera — and most commercial delivery vehicles are — that data captured the truck’s speed, braking, and approach to the crossing. This data is held by FedEx or by the independent service provider that operated the truck, and it must be preserved before the vehicle is repaired, scrapped, or “returned to service.”
The DPS Crash Report. The Texas Department of Public Safety is investigating this collision. The official crash report typically takes 5 to 10 business days to complete and may contain the investigating officer’s preliminary determination of fault — a determination that can shape the public narrative and influence the insurance adjuster’s evaluation of your claim. The DPS report is important, but it is not the final word. It is a starting point, and its conclusions can be challenged with the physical evidence, the event recorder data, and the crossing signal logs.
The Scene Evidence. The crossing itself — the condition of the crossbucks, the warning signs, the sight lines, the road surface, the vegetation, the angle of the tracks relative to the highway — is physical evidence that degrades with every train that passes, every rainstorm, every road crew that makes changes. Skid marks wash away. Debris is cleared. Vegetation grows back or is cut back. The scene must be documented by an independent investigator — photographs, drone imagery, measurements — before the railroad’s own team frames the physical evidence in its favor.
Here is the hard truth: the preservation letter that freezes all of this evidence is the first thing we do, and it must go out before the railroad has finished its own investigation. We are not saying we have sent one in this case — we have not been retained, and we do not represent anyone involved in this collision. But in every case like this that we handle, the preservation letter goes out the day you call. Not the next week. Not after the funeral. That day.
The Medicine: What a Freight Train Does to a Human Body
The reconstruction engineer’s voice speaks here, and then the trauma surgeon’s, because the physics of this collision and the medicine of its aftermath are inseparable from the legal case.
A Union Pacific freight train weighs thousands of tons — a single loaded freight car can weigh 130 tons or more, and a train may consist of 100 or more cars. The FedEx truck, fully loaded, might weigh between 10,000 and 25,000 pounds. The mass ratio between the train and the truck is not 10 to 1 or 20 to 1 — it is hundreds to 1, possibly thousands to 1. In a collision between a freight train and a delivery truck, the train does not “crash into” the truck the way two cars collide. The train demolishes the truck. And then, because a freight train cannot stop quickly — a train traveling at 50 mph may need more than a mile to come to a complete stop — the train carries the truck down the tracks. The scene video confirms this: the FedEx truck was pushed down the tracks after the impact.
What that means for the human body inside the truck is a cascade of forces that no vehicle is designed to protect against. The initial impact produces catastrophic blunt-force trauma — the truck’s cab collapses inward, crushing the occupants. The secondary forces — the sustained pushing along the rails — produce what trauma surgeons call crush injuries: prolonged compression of tissue that leads to muscle breakdown (rhabdomyolysis), kidney failure, compartment syndrome, and internal bleeding from ruptured organs. The liver, the spleen, and the bowel are particularly vulnerable to crush forces. The deceleration when the train finally stops produces a third wave of injury: the brain continues moving inside the skull after the body stops (coup-contrecoup injury), the spinal cord may shear, and the aorta may tear from the deceleration forces.
The 25-year-old passenger who was flown from the scene was taken by air medical transport — a helicopter — because Hill County does not have a Level I trauma center. The nearest Level I trauma centers are in Fort Worth and Waco, roughly 30 to 60 miles from Itasca depending on direction. That flight time — every minute between the scene and the trauma surgeon’s table — is not just a medical reality. It is a legal reality: the delay in reaching definitive care affects the injury’s progression, the prognosis, and the damages calculation, and it is part of the story your case tells.
The passenger died from his injuries. The driver remained in critical condition — which in medical terms means his life was in immediate danger, with unstable vital signs and probable multi-system organ damage. Critical condition in the context of a train collision typically means one or more of the following: traumatic brain injury with intracranial bleeding, spinal cord injury with paralysis, crush syndrome with acute kidney failure, internal bleeding requiring emergency surgery, severe fractures of the pelvis or spine, or respiratory failure requiring mechanical ventilation.
For the family watching this happen in an ICU, the medicine is not abstract. It is the tube in the throat, the machines beeping, the nurse coming in to say “we are adjusting the settings,” the surgeon explaining a second operation. It is the moment you realize the person you knew — the person who left for work that morning — may not come back the same, or may not come back at all. The legal case does not replace that person. What it does is force the railroad to pay for every dollar of medical care, every year of lost income, every moment of pain, and every loss your family will live with for the rest of your lives. That is what wrongful death and catastrophic injury law is for.
The Money: Coverage, Damages, and What a Case Like This Is Worth
The life-care planner and the forensic economist speak here, because the value of a train collision case is not a single number — it is a structured calculation built from every cost category the collision created, projected across the injured person’s expected lifespan or the deceased’s lost remaining years.
The Coverage Ladder. Union Pacific, as a Class I railroad, maintains either self-insurance or a large-deductible insurance program with layers of excess coverage that run into the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars. This is not a $30,000 Texas minimum auto policy. This is a defendant with the resources to pay a full verdict — which means the question is not whether the money exists but whether your case is built strongly enough to force them to pay it.
If FedEx or its operating division is also a defendant — because the truck driver’s negligence contributed to the collision — that entity carries commercial auto insurance with substantial limits, typically starting at $1 million or more for a fleet operator, layered with excess policies that can add millions in coverage. If the truck was operated by a FedEx Ground independent service provider, that ISP may carry a separate policy with lower limits, and FedEx’s own contingent coverage may apply on top.
If workers’ compensation applies — because the truck occupants were on the job — the comp carrier provides death benefits and medical coverage regardless of fault, but those benefits are capped and represent only a fraction of the full case value. The comp carrier may also assert a lien against any third-party recovery, which must be negotiated down.
The Damages Categories. A wrongful death case in Texas can recover:
- Past and future medical expenses — every hospital bill, every surgery, every flight, every day in the ICU. For the passenger who was flown to a hospital and died, those costs include the helicopter transport, the emergency department, the trauma team, and every intervention attempted before death. For the driver in critical condition, these costs are accumulating every day he remains in the hospital — one day in a trauma ICU can cost $10,000 or more.
- Funeral and burial expenses — a cost no family expects and that the railroad should bear if its negligence caused the death.
- Lost earning capacity — what the 25-year-old would have earned over his working lifetime, reduced to present value by a forensic economist. A 25-year-old has roughly 40 working years ahead. At even a modest income, the present value of that earning stream can exceed a million dollars, and it can be much higher depending on education, career trajectory, and industry.
- Loss of companionship, society, and emotional support — what the deceased’s presence meant to the family. In Texas, this is a separately compensable damage, and it is the one the railroad’s lawyers will fight hardest to minimize — because it cannot be calculated with a calculator, a jury must decide what it is worth, and Texas juries have shown they are willing to assign significant value to the loss of a young person’s life.
- Mental anguish — the grief, the suffering, the emotional devastation of the surviving family members.
- Pain and suffering of the deceased (through the survival claim) — what the passenger experienced between the collision and death. If he was conscious, if he was aware, if there was time between the impact and the end, that suffering has a legal value.
- Exemplary (punitive) damages — if the railroad’s conduct rises to gross negligence. Texas allows punitive damages when a defendant’s conduct involves an extreme degree of risk and conscious indifference to the rights of others. Texas caps punitive damages under its statutory framework, but the cap does not apply to the economic and non-economic damages. If the railroad knew this crossing was dangerous — if there were prior incidents, if the signal had been reported as malfunctioning, if the sight lines were known to be obstructed — the argument for punitive damages becomes real.
How a Real Number Is Built. The adjuster’s first offer is a fraction of the case’s true value — that is how the system works. A real valuation is built by assembling a life-care plan (for the surviving driver, if he survives with catastrophic injuries) that projects every future medical cost, every future surgery, every future therapy session, every piece of medical equipment, and every hour of attendant care — reduced to present-day dollars by a forensic economist. For the deceased passenger, the valuation includes the economic loss (earning capacity, benefits, household services) and the human loss (what his life meant to the people who loved him). The number at the end of that calculation is what the case is worth — not what the adjuster offers in the first phone call.
Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes. But the firm has recovered $50 million in aggregate across its practice, including a $5 million-plus brain-injury settlement, a $3.8 million-plus amputation settlement, a $2.5 million-plus truck-crash recovery, and millions recovered in trucking wrongful-death cases. Those numbers exist to tell you what is possible when a case is built correctly — not to promise you a specific result.
The Insurance Adjuster’s Playbook: The Plays That Are Already Running
Lupe Peña spent years inside a national insurance-defense firm — the rooms where adjusters and their software decide how to value, delay, and deny claims. He sat in those meetings. He knows the plays. And every one of them is already in motion for your family.
Play 1: The Fast, Friendly Phone Call. Within days of the collision, someone will call your family — or the injured driver, if he is able to speak — and present themselves as sympathetic, concerned, and helpful. They will say they just want to “get your side of the story” or “see how you are doing.” They will ask you to “just tell us what happened” on a recorded line. Everything you say will be transcribed and used to build the railroad’s defense. If you say “I’m not sure” or “I think the truck might have…” those words will come back in a motion for summary judgment arguing that even your own family acknowledges the truck was at fault. The counter: Do not give a recorded statement to any insurance adjuster — not Union Pacific’s, not FedEx’s, not anyone’s — until you have spoken with a lawyer. You are not required to give a statement. You are not being rude by declining. You are protecting your family.
Play 2: The Quick Settlement Check. A check may arrive fast — sometimes within weeks of the collision — with a release document attached. The release, once signed, extinguishes your right to sue forever. The amount will seem substantial to a family that is drowning in medical bills and funeral costs, but it will be a fraction of what the case is worth — because the railroad knows that the full extent of the injuries and the full strength of the evidence have not yet been developed. The counter: Never sign a release without a lawyer reviewing it. A check that arrives before the medical records are complete, before the event recorder data is analyzed, and before the crossing signal logs are obtained is a check designed to close the case cheaply — not to compensate your family.
Play 3: The Blame-Shift. The railroad’s lawyers will work to pin fault on the truck from the first day. They will argue the truck driver failed to yield, failed to stop at the crossing, ignored the warning devices, or was inattentive. They will commission a “reconstruction” that places the truck on the tracks negligently. They will use the DPS report — if it contains any language suggesting truck fault — as a talking point in every conversation. The counter: The comparative negligence fight is won with evidence, not argument. The event recorder shows the train’s speed and braking. The crossing signal logs show whether the warning activated. The camera footage shows what the crew saw and did. The crossing inspection records show whether the railroad knew this crossing was dangerous. Every one of these records must be demanded — by subpoena, by preservation letter, by formal discovery — before the railroad’s narrative hardens into the official story.
Play 4: The Delay Aimed at the Deadline. The two-year statute of limitations is not just your deadline — it is the railroad’s countdown to the day your claim expires. Adjusters will request “additional documentation,” ask for “more time to evaluate,” promise to “get back to you next week,” and string the process along until the deadline approaches. The closer the deadline, the more pressure your family feels to accept whatever is offered. The counter: The clock is the reason you call a lawyer now, not later. A filed lawsuit tolls the deadline. A preservation letter freezes the evidence. The day you call is the day the clock starts working for you instead of against you.
Play 5: The Surveillance and Social Media Watch. The insurance company may assign investigators to monitor the social media accounts of everyone in the injured person’s family — and the injured person himself, if he survives. A photograph of the injured driver smiling at a bedside visit, posted by a well-meaning relative, can be cropped and presented as evidence that the injuries are “not that serious.” The counter: Set every social media account to private. Do not post about the collision, the injuries, the hospital, the legal process, or the deceased. Tell your family and friends to do the same. The adjuster is not your friend, and the investigator is not gathering evidence for your benefit.
Play 6: The Independent Medical Examination (IME). If the driver survives, the insurance company will demand that he be examined by a doctor of their choosing — a doctor whose practice depends on producing reports that minimize injuries. The IME report will say the injuries are pre-existing, or less severe than claimed, or that the treatment was excessive. The counter: You have the right to have your own doctor present at the IME, and your lawyer can challenge the IME doctor’s credentials, bias, and methodology. The IME is not neutral — it is a tool, and it is shaped by the hand that pays for it.
The Proof Story: How a Train Collision Case Is Actually Built
Here is what the months after a grade-crossing collision look like when a case is built the right way — not from the adjuster’s perspective, but from ours.
Week One: The Preservation Letter. The day you call, a spoliation preservation letter goes out to Union Pacific, to FedEx or the relevant operating division, to the crossing signal maintenance contractor, and to any other entity that holds evidence. That letter demands, in writing, that the locomotive event recorder data, the camera footage, the crossing signal logs, the track inspection records, the train crew’s test results, the DPS investigation file, the FedEx truck’s electronic data, and every other piece of evidence be preserved and produced. The letter creates a legal duty: if the evidence disappears after the letter is received, the jury may be told that the destroyed evidence would have helped your case — an adverse-inference instruction that can shift the entire weight of the trial.
Week Two to Four: The Scene Investigation. An independent reconstruction team documents the crossing — photographs, drone imagery, measurements of sight lines, the angle of the tracks relative to the highway, the condition of the warning devices, the distance at which a driver approaching the crossing could first see a train. The team measures the stopping distance of a train at the speed the event recorder shows it was traveling. They document the road surface, the signage, the vegetation, and anything else that affects whether a driver had fair warning of the approaching train.
Month One to Three: The Records War. Formal discovery begins — written interrogatories, requests for production of documents, subpoenas to third-party data vendors. The railroad’s lawyers will object, delay, and produce partial records. We push. We file motions to compel. We depose the signal maintainer, the track inspector, the train crew, the railroad’s safety director. Under oath, in a room with a court reporter, the safety director answers questions about the crossing’s history — whether there were prior incidents, whether the signal had been reported as malfunctioning, whether the railroad knew the sight lines were obstructed, whether anyone recommended upgrading the crossing from passive crossbucks to active gates and lights, and if so, when, and what was done about it.
Month Three to Six: The Expert Assembly. A railroad safety expert examines the crossing’s design against federal standards and industry best practices. A reconstruction engineer runs the physics — the train’s speed, the truck’s speed, the stopping distance, the time between signal activation and impact. A forensic economist builds the lost-earning-capacity model. A life-care planner builds the future medical cost projection for the surviving driver, if he survives with catastrophic injuries. A neurologist or neuropsychologist documents the brain injury, if one exists, with testing that the defense cannot dismiss.
Month Six to Trial: The Depositions and the Number. The corporate depositions — the people who set the safety budget, who decided whether to upgrade the crossing, who knew about the prior incidents — are where the case is won or lost. A railroad safety director who testifies that the crossing met “minimum federal standards” is not the end of the case. Minimum compliance with a regulation is not the same as reasonable care — and a jury is allowed to find that a railroad that met the bare regulatory floor still acted negligently in failing to make a crossing safe when it knew the danger.
Then the number. The demand is built from every cost category, every record, every deposition, every expert opinion. It is not a round number. It is the product of months of work — and it is the number the railroad knows it will face at trial if it does not settle. That is the point of building the case: not to guarantee a trial, but to make the railroad understand that a trial would cost them more than settling with your family. If you want to understand what that process looks like in more detail, our firm has produced educational content on exactly this subject.
The First 72 Hours: What to Do, What Not to Do, and What to Refuse
If you are reading this within the first 72 hours of the collision — and if you are, you are likely exhausted, in shock, and being pulled in a hundred directions by the hospital, the insurance company, and your own grief — here is what matters most.
1. Put medical care first. If anyone in your family was injured and has not been examined, get them to a hospital. Symptoms of serious injury — traumatic brain injury, internal bleeding, spinal damage — can be delayed for hours or even days after a collision. A “normal” CT scan in the first hours does not rule out a brain injury. If the driver survives and is released from the hospital, he needs follow-up care, and he needs a doctor who documents everything — because the medical records are the evidence that proves the injury.
2. Do not give a recorded statement to anyone. Not to Union Pacific’s adjuster. Not to FedEx’s adjuster. Not to any “investigator” who shows up offering to help. You are not obligated to give a statement. You are not being uncooperative by declining. Every word you say will be used to build the defense file.
3. Do not sign anything. A release, a waiver, a medical authorization, a “proof of loss” form — if someone puts a document in front of you and asks you to sign it, do not sign it until a lawyer has reviewed it. A release can extinguish your family’s right to compensation forever. A medical authorization gives the insurance company the right to go fishing through your medical history for anything they can use to minimize your claim.
4. Do not post about the collision on social media. No photographs. No updates. No comments. No tributes. Set your accounts to private and tell your family to do the same. The insurance company’s investigators are watching.
5. Preserve everything you have. The phone the deceased was carrying. The work schedule. The pay stubs. The photographs of the truck before it was towed. The names and contact information of anyone who witnessed the collision or saw the aftermath. Every piece of paper, every electronic record, every physical item that connects to the collision or to the people involved.
6. If the collision resulted in a death, understand the personal-representative process. Before a wrongful death lawsuit can be filed in Texas, a personal representative must be appointed — the person authorized by the probate court to bring the family’s claim. If the deceased did not have a will, the court appoints an administrator. This is a process we handle for families — but it takes time, and the clock is running.
7. Call a lawyer. Not next week. Not after the funeral. Not after the official report comes out. The preservation letter that freezes the locomotive camera footage and the crossing signal logs must go out before that evidence is overwritten or archived. The scene investigation must happen before the physical evidence degrades. Every day that passes is a day the railroad uses to build its defense and a day your family loses access to the proof that case depends on.
“SH 81, South of FM 67 is closed in all directions. FM 67, West of SH 81 is closed in all directions. Please avoid the area.” — Hill County Emergency Management, the day of the collision.
The roads reopened. The evidence is still there — but not for long.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long do I have to file a lawsuit after a train collision death in Texas?
Texas law gives you two years from the date of death to file a wrongful death lawsuit, and two years from the date of injury for the survival claim. In this case, because the passenger died the day after the collision, both deadlines fall in late July 2028. Two years is not as long as it sounds — the evidence that decides the case begins disappearing within days, and the legal process itself takes months to build. The day you call a lawyer is the day the clock starts working for you.
Can I sue Union Pacific if my family member was killed at a railroad crossing in Itasca?
Yes — if the railroad’s negligence contributed to the collision. Railroads have a legal duty to operate their trains safely, to maintain their crossings, to provide adequate warning of approaching trains, and to take reasonable steps to make dangerous crossings safer. If the crossing’s warning devices were inadequate, if the signal malfunctioned, if the train was operated negligently, or if the railroad knew the crossing was dangerous and failed to act, your family has a wrongful death claim against Union Pacific. The strength of that claim depends on the evidence — the event recorder, the signal logs, the camera footage, the inspection records — and that evidence must be secured before it disappears.
What if the truck driver was partly at fault for being on the tracks?
Texas follows a modified comparative negligence rule. If the truck driver was 50% or less at fault, your family can still recover — reduced by the driver’s percentage of fault. If the driver was 51% or more at fault, recovery against the railroad may be barred. This is why the railroad’s lawyers work so hard to pin fault on the truck: every percentage point they assign to the truck is money subtracted from your family’s recovery. The comparative negligence fight is won with the physical evidence, not with argument — and that evidence is what we go find.
How much is a train collision wrongful death case worth in Texas?
There is no single answer — the value depends on the deceased’s age, earning capacity, family relationships, the pain and suffering experienced before death, the railroad’s degree of fault, and whether punitive damages are available. A 25-year-old has roughly 40 working years ahead — the lost earning capacity alone can exceed a million dollars at even a modest income, and the loss of companionship, guidance, and emotional support is separately compensable. Texas does not impose a broad cap on non-economic damages in railroad wrongful death cases. The number is built by a forensic economist and a life-care planner from the specific facts of the deceased’s life — not pulled from a formula.
Who gets the money in a wrongful death case in Texas?
Texas’s Wrongful Death Act allows the surviving spouse, children, and parents of the deceased to bring the claim and share in the recovery. If the deceased was unmarried and had no children, the parents bring the claim. If the deceased was married with children, the spouse and children share. The survival claim (for the deceased’s pain and suffering and medical expenses) is brought by the estate and distributed according to the deceased’s will or Texas’s intestacy laws. The personal representative appointed by the probate court manages the process.
Does workers’ compensation apply if the person was driving a FedEx truck?
If the truck driver or passenger was an employee — of FedEx Express, FedEx Freight, or a FedEx Ground service provider — workers’ compensation may provide death benefits and medical coverage regardless of fault. But workers’ comp is capped and does not compensate the full value of a young person’s life. The third-party claim against Union Pacific is the claim that can recover the full measure — lost earning capacity, companionship, mental anguish, pain and suffering, and potentially punitive damages. Both lanes can run simultaneously, and the comp carrier’s lien on the third-party recovery can often be negotiated down.
What evidence disappears fastest after a train-truck collision?
The locomotive camera footage is the most volatile — outward-facing and inward-facing camera systems overwrite on a schedule that can range from days to weeks. The locomotive event recorder data must be pulled and downloaded before it is overwritten. The crossing signal system logs can be archived into formats that are difficult to retrieve. The train crew’s drug and alcohol test results must be collected within hours under federal regulations. The scene evidence — skid marks, debris patterns, sight lines, vegetation conditions — degrades with every train that passes and every weather event. The preservation letter that freezes all of this must go out immediately.
Can the railroad blame the truck driver for the collision?
Yes — and they will. The standard railroad defense in a grade-crossing collision is to argue that the truck was on the tracks negligently, that the warning devices were functioning, that the train sounded its horn, and that the truck driver failed to yield. This is not a sign that your case is weak — it is the opening move in a negotiation. The counter is the evidence: the event recorder shows the train’s speed and braking, the signal logs show whether the warning activated, the camera footage shows what the crew saw and did, and the crossing inspection records show whether the railroad knew this crossing was dangerous. The railroad’s argument is only as strong as the evidence behind it — and that evidence belongs to both sides.
What should I do if an insurance adjuster already called me?
Do not give a recorded statement. Do not sign anything. Do not discuss the collision, the injuries, or the deceased. Tell the adjuster you are not ready to talk and that you will have your attorney contact them. Then call a lawyer. The adjuster’s job is to settle the claim for as little as possible — that is not a criticism, it is a fact — and every word you say before you have legal representation will be used to minimize your family’s recovery.
Is there a cap on damages for a train collision death in Texas?
Texas does not impose a broad cap on non-economic damages (pain and suffering, mental anguish, loss of companionship) in railroad wrongful death cases — unlike medical malpractice cases, where such caps exist. Punitive (exemplary) damages are subject to a statutory cap under Texas law, but the cap does not limit the economic and non-economic damages that form the core of the recovery. This is one of the reasons Texas is a favorable state for wrongful death litigation: the jury can assign full value to the loss without an arbitrary ceiling.
The Firm: Ralph Manginello, Lupe Peña, and Why This Team
Ralph Manginello has spent 27 years in Texas courtrooms — including federal court, where interstate railroad cases are often litigated. He was a journalist before he was a lawyer, which means he knows how to find a story that the other side does not want found, and how to tell it to a jury in a language they trust. He is admitted to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas. He is the managing partner of the firm and the lead voice on every case we take. He is a member of the Texas Trial Lawyers Association, and he has spent his career on the plaintiff’s side of the table — the injured person’s side — because that is where he wants to be.
Lupe Peña spent years inside a national insurance-defense firm — the rooms where adjusters and their software decide how to deny, delay, and devalue claims from people exactly like the reader of this page. He sat in those meetings. He knows how the reserve is set in the first 48 hours, how the recorded-statement call is engineered, how the IME doctor is selected, and how the surveillance is deployed. He now sits on your side of the table. He is fluent in Spanish and conducts full client consultations in Spanish without an interpreter — hablamos Español — and that matters in a state where so many families pray, grieve, and seek justice in that language.
The firm operates on contingency. That means: we do not get paid unless we win your case. If we take your case, the fee is 33.33% of the recovery before trial and 40% if the case goes to trial. The consultation is free. The first call costs you nothing. And the first call is where the preservation letter begins, where the evidence clock is stopped, and where your family stops facing the railroad alone.
We have recovered $50 million in aggregate for our clients — including a $5 million-plus brain-injury settlement, a $3.8 million-plus amputation settlement, and a $2.5 million-plus truck-crash recovery. Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes. But those numbers exist to tell you what is possible when a case is built the right way — by a team that knows the railroad’s playbook because one of its lawyers used to sit on the other side of the table.
If your family has been affected by the train collision in Itasca — if you lost someone, if someone you love is in critical condition, if you are drowning in the first hours of grief and phone calls and hospital corridors and you do not know what to do next — call us. The consultation is free and it is available 24 hours a day. The number is 1-888-ATTY-911. We will answer. We will listen. And we will tell you the truth about what your family is facing and what can be done about it. Hablamos Español.
This page is legal information, not legal advice. Every case depends on its specific facts. The firm has not been retained by, and does not represent, any person involved in the collision described on this page. If you are facing a situation like the one described — a grade-crossing collision, a railroad wrongful death, a catastrophic commercial-vehicle injury — contact us for a free and confidential consultation. The railroad has already started building its defense file. The question is whether your family has started building its case.