Midland County Car Accident on FM 1788: What Happened, What It Means, and What to Do Next
If you are reading this from a chair at Midland Memorial Hospital, or from a kitchen table in Midland County at two in the morning, we know what brought you here. Someone you love was cut out of a vehicle on Farm-to-Market Road 1788. The Midland Fire Department came with the tools — the Jaws of Life, the hydraulic spreaders, the ram — and they spent minutes that felt like hours pulling that person free from the wreckage. Now they are in a hospital bed, and you are fielding calls from an insurance adjuster who sounds friendly and is not. You have questions. We have answers, and we are going to give them to you straight, because that is what you need right now — not a sales pitch, but the truth about what just happened to your family and what comes next.
We are Attorney911 — The Manginello Law Firm, PLLC. We handle car accident cases across Texas, including the Permian Basin, and we have spent more than 27 years in courtrooms fighting for people who were sitting where you are sitting right now. Ralph Manginello, our managing partner, has been licensed in Texas since 1998. Lupe Peña, our associate attorney, spent years on the other side — inside a national insurance-defense firm, in the rooms where adjusters and their software decided how to deny, delay, and devalue people exactly like you. Now he sits on your side of the table. We know this road. We know this county. We know what the insurance company is already doing while you are reading this page, and we know how to stop it.
Your medical treatment comes first. Nothing on the legal side should interfere with your care at Midland Memorial. But the legal clock is already running, and physical and electronic evidence from the vehicles and the intersection is already beginning to disappear. That is why we are writing this — so you understand, before you make a single decision, what is true in Texas law, what the insurance company is doing, and what steps protect your family’s rights.
What Happened at FM 1788 and West County Road 40
On May 8, a collision occurred at the intersection of West County Road 40 and Farm-to-Market Road 1788 in northwest Midland County. Midland Fire Department crews responded to the scene and found at least one person trapped inside a vehicle. Firefighters performed an extrication — meaning they used hydraulic rescue tools to physically cut, spread, or force the vehicle’s structure apart to reach the trapped occupant and remove them. The individual was then transported to Midland Memorial Hospital for treatment. No information about the person’s condition has been released. Scene photographs show significant damage to multiple vehicles, including a heavily damaged black car and a pickup truck that came to rest off the roadway. The cause of the crash remains under investigation.
Those are the facts the public knows. Here is what those facts tell us — and what they should tell you.
The extrication itself is evidence of force
When firefighters have to cut someone out of a car, it means the vehicle’s passenger compartment was compromised badly enough that the doors would not open and the person could not get out under their own power. That does not happen in a low-speed fender-bender. It happens when the collision forces exceeded what the vehicle’s crash structure was designed to absorb — when the steering column intruded, when the dashboard collapsed inward, when the roof bowed, when the floor pan buckled, or when the door frame was pinched shut by the impact itself. The extrication is proof of a high-energy collision, and that high energy transfers directly into the human body inside.
The pickup truck off the roadway is a critical fact
The pickup truck that came to rest off the roadway is significant for two reasons. First, its resting position — off the road, potentially in a ditch or field — tells a reconstruction engineer something about the speed, angle, and post-impact trajectory of that vehicle. A vehicle that leaves the roadway after a collision carries evidence in its path, its final orientation, and the damage pattern on its body. Second, and this is the question that could change the entire value of your case: was that pickup truck being driven for commercial purposes? In the Permian Basin, pickup trucks are frequently work vehicles — oilfield service trucks, company vehicles, vehicles being driven to or from a well site, a pipeline job, a fracking operation, or a company yard. If that pickup was being operated within the course and scope of employment at the time of the crash, a completely different set of defendants, insurance policies, and liability theories opens up. We discuss this in detail below, because in Midland County, it is one of the first questions we ask.
Why Rural FM Road Intersections in the Permian Basin Are Dangerous
FM 1788 is a state-maintained farm-to-market road running through western Midland County in the heart of the Permian Basin. If you live here, you know what that means. If you are reading this from outside the area, here is what you need to understand about why this intersection is the kind of place where serious crashes happen.
The speed differential is the killer
Farm-to-market roads in West Texas are built for distance. Posted speeds on FM routes through rural Midland County are typically high — often 60 to 70 miles per hour on the open stretches. County roads like West County Road 40 cross those FM routes at intersections that may be controlled by nothing more than a stop sign on the county road, with through-traffic on the FM route flowing at highway speed. When a vehicle on the county road pulls out or crosses in front of a vehicle traveling 65 miles per hour on FM 1788, the closing speed and the energy of the collision are enormous. A vehicle traveling 65 mph carries nearly four times the kinetic energy of one traveling 35 mph — because energy scales with the square of speed. That is not a statistic. That is the difference between a car you can open the door of and one you have to cut open.
The Permian Basin traffic mix
FM 1788 carries the traffic mix that defines the Permian Basin: local passenger vehicles, high-center-of-gravity pickup trucks, commercial oilfield service vehicles, water haulers, frac sand trucks, and equipment transports running on tight schedules to well sites and pipeline projects. This corridor sees heavy industrial vehicle activity because it feeds the oilfield infrastructure that surrounds Midland. The combination of high-speed through-traffic on the FM route and vehicles entering or crossing from county roads creates exactly the kind of intersection conflict that produces high-energy, side-impact, and angle-collision crashes — the type most likely to trap an occupant. If you want to understand more about the specific dangers of Permian Basin oilfield commercial vehicle crashes, that page goes deeper into the trucking and oilfield-vehicle vertical.
Limited lighting, limited sight distance, limited margin for error
Rural intersections in the Permian Basin are not lit the way urban intersections are. Artificial lighting is limited. At night, the only illumination may be vehicle headlights and whatever ambient light comes from distant oilfield facilities. Sight lines may be compromised by vegetation, terrain, dust, or the flat-land mirage effect that West Texas heat creates on asphalt. The margin for error — the distance a driver has to see, react, and stop — shrinks at highway speeds and in low-visibility conditions. When a driver fails to yield at an intersection like FM 1788 and County Road 40, the through-traffic vehicle often has almost no time to brake, and the physics of the collision are determined by speed and mass, not by reaction time.
Extrication Crashes: What Trapped-Vehicle Rescue Tells Us About Injury Severity
When the Midland Fire Department had to use rescue tools to pull someone from that vehicle, it told us something specific about the injuries. Here is what the medicine says about the forces at work in a crash that traps an occupant.
The mechanism: what happens inside the car
In a high-energy collision, the vehicle’s structure deforms — the crumple zones absorb what they can, but when the energy exceeds the design limits, the passenger compartment itself begins to collapse. The steering column can intrude into the driver’s space. The dashboard can collapse downward and inward. The A-pillars — the vertical supports at the front corners of the windshield — can buckle, allowing the roof to bow. The floor pan can buckle upward. The doors can be pinched shut by the frame rails bending. When any of these happen, the occupant is trapped, and the extrication that follows is not just a rescue — it is a medical event with its own injury profile.
Traumatic brain injury from deceleration forces
The brain floats in cerebrospinal fluid inside the skull. In a high-energy crash, the skull stops — against the steering wheel, the airbag, the window, or the headliner — but the brain keeps moving. It strikes the inside of the skull, and the rotational forces twist and shear the brain’s white-matter tracts — the wiring that connects one region to another. This is called diffuse axonal injury, and it is the mechanism behind many traumatic brain injuries. The cruelest part: a standard CT scan in the emergency department can come back completely normal in a patient with a real, significant brain injury. The damage is microscopic — tearing of nerve fibers at the cellular level — and a CT was never designed to see it. If your loved one was dazed, confused, or “not right” at the scene, or if they cannot remember the moments around the crash, that is a brain injury symptom even if the scan looks clean. You can learn more about traumatic brain injury and how it is proven — and how it is fought — on our dedicated page.
Spinal column injury from axial loading and whiplash
The same deceleration forces that injure the brain can injure the spine. A rear-end or frontal collision can subject the neck to violent hyperflexion-hyperextension — the classic whiplash mechanism — and a roof intrusion or head strike can compress the spine axially, fracturing vertebrae or damaging the spinal cord. Even without a fracture visible on X-ray or CT, the spinal cord itself can be injured. There is a recognized condition called SCIWORA — Spinal Cord Injury Without Radiographic Abnormality — where the cord is damaged but the bones look intact. It shows up on MRI, not on the initial scans. If your loved one has numbness, weakness, or pain radiating into their arms or legs after this crash, that is a spinal injury until proven otherwise — not a muscle strain.
Chest crush injury from steering-column intrusion
When the steering column pushes inward during a crash, it can fracture the sternum, fracture ribs, and crush the chest cavity. The heart and lungs can be contused — bruised — by the force. A myocardial contusion can cause arrhythmias that are not immediately apparent. A pulmonary contusion can cause breathing problems that worsen over the first 24 to 48 hours. The diaphragm can rupture. These are not soft-tissue injuries. They are life-threatening internal injuries that require monitoring, imaging, and sometimes surgical intervention.
Lower-extremity fracture from floor-pan collapse
When the floor pan buckles upward, it can fracture the femur, the tibia, the fibula, or the ankle. Dashboard intrusion can fracture the patella or the hip. These are injuries that require surgical fixation — plates, screws, rods — and months of rehabilitation. They leave permanent hardware in the body and permanent scars on the skin. They change how a person walks, works, and lives.
The conscious experience of being trapped
This is a damages element that is independent of the physical injuries, and it matters. If the person was conscious while trapped in the vehicle — waiting for firefighters to reach them, hearing the hydraulic tools start, feeling the car being pulled apart around them — that conscious experience of fear, pain, and helplessness is a separate, compensable element of mental anguish and pain and suffering. The time between the impact and the extrication is measurable, and that measurement is part of the damages calculation. We do not minimize it. We do not let the insurance company minimize it either.
Texas Comparative Negligence: How Fault Affects Your Recovery
Texas follows a modified comparative negligence rule, and it is one of the most important laws affecting your case. Here is what it means in plain language.
Texas follows a modified comparative negligence standard with a 51% bar, meaning a plaintiff cannot recover if they are 51% or more at fault, and damages are reduced proportionally for any fault below that threshold.
In practice, this means two things. First, if the investigation shows that your loved one was partly at fault for the crash — say, 20% at fault for failing to yield, while the other driver was 80% at fault for speeding — your family can still recover, but the recovery is reduced by that 20%. If the full damages are $500,000, the recovery would be $400,000. Second, if your loved one is found to be 51% or more at fault, the recovery is zero. That line — 50% versus 51% — is the single most fought-over number in a Texas motor vehicle case, and it is exactly why the insurance adjuster is working so hard to pin percentage points on your family.
Why the adjuster is already working on fault allocation
Within days of the crash, the at-fault driver’s insurance company will have an adjuster assigned, a reserve set on the claim, and a strategy in place. One of the first plays in that strategy is to gather evidence that shifts fault toward your loved one. Every statement you give them, every answer to “how are you feeling,” every casual admission — “I didn’t see them coming” or “I might have been going a little fast” — is being recorded, transcribed, and filed for use at the fault-allocation fight. This is not paranoia. This is how the system works. The adjuster’s job is to reduce what the insurance company pays, and the single most effective way to do that in Texas is to push your loved one’s fault percentage above 50%.
What this means for you right now
Do not give a recorded statement to the other driver’s insurance company. Do not speculate about what happened. Do not apologize. Do not post on social media. The investigation is ongoing, and the Texas Peace Officer’s Crash Report — the CR-3 — has not yet been completed. When it is, it will contain the investigating officer’s diagram, witness statements, road conditions, and a preliminary fault assessment. That report is foundational, but it is not final. Fault allocation in Texas is ultimately a question for a jury if the case goes to trial, and the jury applies the 51% bar. Everything between now and then is about preserving the evidence that lets us tell the true story of what happened at that intersection.
The Evidence Clock: What Exists, Who Holds It, How Fast It Disappears
This is the section that may matter more than any other on this page, because the evidence from this crash is already on a clock, and some of it is dying faster than you think. Here is what exists, who holds it, and how fast it can legally be gone.
Event Data Recorder (EDR) — the car’s black box
Nearly every modern vehicle carries an Event Data Recorder — a module that, under federal regulation, captures a snapshot of the seconds before, during, and after a crash. It records vehicle speed, brake application, throttle position, steering angle, seatbelt status, airbag deployment timing, and the change in velocity at impact. This is the car’s own sworn statement about what happened. But EDR data can be overwritten — if the vehicle is started after the crash, if the module is powered up during repairs, or if the vehicle is salvaged and crushed. The preservation demand to the vehicle’s owner or insurer should go out within days, and the vehicle should be inspected by a qualified accident reconstructionist before any repair or salvage disposition. If the vehicle is destroyed before the data is pulled, that evidence is gone forever.
The physical vehicles and crash damage patterns
The crush profiles, impact angles, and intrusion patterns on both the black car and the pickup truck are the primary physical evidence for accident reconstruction. The damage tells the story of the speed, the angle, the point of impact, and the direction of force. An insurance carrier may authorize repair or disposal of a vehicle within weeks of the crash — sometimes faster. Once the vehicle is repaired or crushed, the physical evidence is destroyed. A preservation letter demanding that the vehicle be held in its post-crash condition, and a stipulated or court-ordered vehicle inspection, must be scheduled before any destructive examination or repair.
The Texas Peace Officer’s Crash Report (CR-3)
The official law enforcement crash report contains the investigating officer’s diagram of the collision, witness statements, road and weather conditions, vehicle information, driver information, and a preliminary assessment of contributing factors. It is typically available within days to weeks after the crash, depending on the investigating agency. It is foundational to the liability analysis, but it is not the final word — the officer’s assessment is one piece of evidence, not a binding determination of fault. We request it from the investigating agency as soon as it is filed.
Cell phone records
Distracted driving — texting, calling, or using an app — is a leading causation factor in intersection crashes. Cell phone records can establish whether a driver was using their phone at the moment of collision. But carriers retain detailed records for limited billing cycles, and the data becomes harder to obtain as time passes. A preservation letter should go out immediately to the carrier, and a subpoena may be required if the records are not voluntarily produced.
Dashcam or surveillance footage
Video evidence is the most compelling proof of how a collision occurred — vehicle paths, speeds, signal compliance, and failure to yield, all captured in real time. This is a rural intersection in northwest Midland County, which means commercial surveillance cameras are less common than in an urban setting. But this is the Permian Basin — there may be nearby oilfield facilities, pipeline compressor stations, or residential security cameras within range of the intersection. Those systems overwrite footage on a rolling cycle — often 24 to 72 hours. If there is a camera within sight of FM 1788 and County Road 40, its footage of the crash is already being erased unless someone demands it be preserved. A canvass of the area must happen immediately.
Midland Fire Department incident and extrication records
The MFD records from this incident document the extrication timeline, the vehicle access difficulties, the patient’s condition at the scene, and the trauma mechanism. These records support both the liability narrative (the severity of the collision) and the damages narrative (the conscious experience of being trapped and the injuries documented at the scene). A public records request should be filed promptly. MFD retention schedules vary, and scene documentation may not be preserved indefinitely.
Medical records from Midland Memorial Hospital
The hospital records establish the nature and severity of the injuries, the treatment rendered, and the clinical relationship between the crash mechanism and the diagnosed conditions. These records are generally preserved under retention requirements, but they should be obtained early to lock in the acute injury picture — before intervening causes, treatment complications, or the passage of time can complicate the causation narrative. The emergency department records, imaging studies, operative reports, and admission notes from the first hours and days are the foundation of the medical proof.
Scene evidence — skid marks, gouge marks, debris, fluid trails
Physical scene evidence corroborates vehicle speeds, braking response, point of impact, and post-impact trajectories. Skid marks fade within days. Debris is cleared by maintenance crews. Weather can obliterate tire marks within hours. A scene investigation with photography, total-station surveying, or drone mapping should occur within 48 to 72 hours if it has not already been conducted by law enforcement. Every day that passes, the physical record of what happened at that intersection degrades.
Commercial Vehicle Discovery: Why the Pickup Truck May Carry Commercial Insurance
This is the section that could change the entire financial picture of your case, and it is specific to the Permian Basin. Here is why.
The pickup truck question
The vehicle that came to rest off the roadway was a pickup truck. In Midland County, in the heart of the Permian Basin, pickup trucks are not just personal vehicles. They are work trucks. They are oilfield service vehicles. They are company trucks being driven to well sites, pipeline right-of-ways, fracking operations, gas plants, compressor stations, and company yards. If the pickup truck involved in this crash was being operated within the course and scope of employment at the time of the collision, a completely different set of liability theories and insurance coverage opens up.
What changes if it was a commercial vehicle
If the pickup was a work vehicle, several things change. First, the employer becomes a defendant under the doctrine of respondeat superior — the employer is liable for the negligence of its employee acting within the course and scope of employment. Second, a commercial vehicle may carry far more insurance coverage than a personal vehicle. The federal minimum for an interstate commercial motor carrier is $750,000, and many commercial policies carry $1 million or more in primary coverage, plus excess and umbrella layers above that. Third, if the employer was negligent in hiring, training, retaining, or supervising the driver, that is an independent basis of liability beyond respondeat superior. Fourth, if the vehicle was being used for oilfield purposes, there may be specialized coverage, fleet policies, or self-insured retention layers that significantly increase the available recovery.
How we find out
The investigation begins with the CR-3 crash report, which should identify the registered owner of the vehicle and the driver’s employer, if any. But the crash report is not always complete — drivers do not always disclose that they were working at the time of a crash. We dig deeper. We look at the vehicle itself — does it carry company markings, a fleet number, a DOT number, or commercial license plates? We look at the driver — were they in work clothes, carrying a company ID, driving a route consistent with an oilfield commute? We look at the employment records — through discovery, we can subpoena employment records, timecards, dispatch records, and vehicle-use logs that establish whether the driver was on the clock. In the Permian Basin, this investigation is not an afterthought. It is one of the first things we do, because it can be the difference between a case valued against a personal auto policy with Texas minimum limits and a case valued against a commercial policy with layers of coverage.
The oilfield earning-capacity question
There is another reason the commercial question matters. If your loved one was employed in the oil and gas industry — as is common in Midland County — their lost earning capacity damages could be substantial. Oilfield workers earn wages that are specific to their industry, and a catastrophic injury that ends their ability to work in the oilfield represents a loss that must be projected by a forensic economist using industry-specific wage trajectories. A rig hand, a frac crew member, a pipeline welder, a wireline operator — these are skilled workers whose earning capacity is tied to the Permian Basin economy. The loss of that capacity is a real, measurable, and often enormous component of the damages in a Midland County catastrophic injury case.
What Your Case May Be Worth
We are not going to tell you a number, because the honest answer is that the value depends on facts we do not yet have — the medical picture, the liability determination, and the identity of the defendants. But we can tell you how the number is built, and we can give you the range that the available information supports.
The range
Based on what is publicly known — a crash requiring extrication, at least one person hospitalized, significant vehicle damage, and an ongoing investigation — the case value range is deliberately wide. If the injuries prove to be moderate — soft tissue damage, minor fractures, a concussion without lasting deficit — and the person was discharged from Midland Memorial within days, the case value may be in the lower range, particularly if no commercial defendant is identified. If the extrication mechanism produced catastrophic injuries — traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, or multiple fractures requiring surgical intervention and long-term care — and a commercial defendant is identified through investigation, the case could justify a multi-million-dollar demand. The primary deflator is liability clarity: without a completed crash report or witness identification, fault allocation is entirely unknown, and comparative-fault exposure could significantly reduce recovery.
How the number is built
A real damages number is not a guess. It is built from specific, documented components, each established by evidence and projected by experts.
Economic damages are the losses you can put on a spreadsheet. They include the emergency response costs, the Midland Memorial Hospital emergency department and inpatient charges, diagnostic imaging (CT, MRI, X-ray), surgical intervention if required, rehabilitation and physical therapy, medication costs, and — if the injuries prove catastrophic — long-term care, future medical procedures, and a life-care plan that projects the cost of every treatment, device, and caregiver hour the injured person will need for the rest of their life. If the injured person was employed, economic damages also include lost wages from the date of injury forward and lost earning capacity — the difference between what they would have earned over their working lifetime and what they can now earn given their injuries. If they worked in the oilfield, this calculation requires a forensic economist who understands Permian Basin wage structures and industry-specific career trajectories.
Non-economic damages are the human losses that no receipt can capture. They include physical pain and suffering — the pain of the impact, the pain of the injuries, the pain of surgery and recovery. They include mental anguish — the fear of being trapped in a wrecked vehicle, the terror of waiting for rescue, the psychological impact of a life altered. They include the conscious experience of the extrication itself — the minutes spent pinned in the wreckage, unable to move, hearing the rescue tools approach. They include loss of enjoyment of life — the activities, the relationships, the future that was taken. Texas does not cap non-economic damages in motor vehicle negligence cases, which means a jury can award the full measure of these losses without a statutory ceiling.
Punitive damages are available in Texas under the statutory framework in Chapter 41 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code, but they require clear and convincing evidence of gross negligence, fraud, or malice. Gross negligence means an extreme degree of risk, conscious of the risk, and proceeding with indifference to the rights of others. In a motor vehicle case, this could be established by intoxication, extreme speeding, texting while driving, or a commercial driver who was knowingly pushed past hours-of-service limits. None of these has been reported in this crash, but all of them are standard discovery targets. Punitive damages in Texas are capped by a statutory formula tied to the amount of economic damages, but the cap does not apply if the defendant was acting with malice — and in the commercial-vehicle context, a company that knowingly sent a fatigued or dangerous driver onto the road may face that argument.
The Stowers leverage
Texas applies the Stowers doctrine, which obligates an insurer to accept a reasonable settlement offer within policy limits when a prudent insurer would do so. If the insurer wrongfully refuses a reasonable offer and a later verdict exceeds the policy limits, the carrier can be exposed to the full verdict amount — not just the policy limit. This is one of the most powerful tools in Texas personal injury practice, and it is especially potent in commercial-vehicle cases where the policy limits are high and the liability is clear. A properly crafted Stowers demand puts the insurance company’s own money at risk and forces a decision: settle within limits, or potentially pay a verdict that exceeds them out of the carrier’s pocket. We have used this doctrine throughout our practice, and in a Permian Basin commercial-vehicle case, it is often the lever that moves a case from a lowball offer to a fair settlement.
The Insurance Adjuster’s Playbook — and How We Counter Each Move
Lupe Peña spent years inside a national insurance-defense firm. He sat in the rooms where adjusters and their software decided how to value, deny, and devalue claims. He knows the plays because he used to run them. Here are the ones you are likely to face in the coming days and weeks, and here is how we counter each one.
Play 1: The “just checking in” recorded statement call
Within days, someone friendly will call to “check on your loved one” and ask you to “just tell us what happened” — on a recording engineered to be quoted against you. Every word you say is being transcribed for use at the fault-allocation fight. “I think they might have been going a little fast” becomes “plaintiff admitted liability.” “They seem okay” becomes “plaintiff reported no serious injuries.” The counter: do not give a recorded statement. You are not required to. The only statement that matters is the one you give to the investigating officer at the scene, and that is already in the CR-3. If the adjuster insists, the answer is: “I have retained counsel, and all communication goes through my attorney.”
Play 2: The fast settlement check with a release
A check may arrive fast — sometimes within weeks — with a release document attached, sometimes printed on the back of the check itself. The offer will come before the full medical picture is clear, before the MRI results are in, before the cognitive deficits surface, before the surgeon has determined whether a second operation is needed. The purpose is to close the file before the true cost of the injuries is known. The counter: never sign a release, never deposit a check, and never accept a settlement offer before the medical picture is complete. A premature settlement is final — it bars any future recovery, even if the injuries turn out to be far worse than anyone knew on the day the check arrived.
Play 3: The “you were partly at fault” argument
In Texas, the 51% bar is the insurance company’s favorite weapon. The adjuster will frame the collision as shared fault — “your loved one should have seen the other vehicle,” “they entered the intersection too quickly,” “they contributed to the crash.” Every percentage point of fault they can pin on your family is money in their pocket. The counter: we do not concede fault. We preserve the evidence — the EDR data, the skid marks, the witness statements, the crash report — and we let the physical evidence tell the story. The physical evidence does not have an agenda. It shows what happened, and what happened is what we prove.
Play 4: The defense medical examination (IME)
The insurance company has the right to request that your loved one be examined by a doctor of their choosing. That doctor is not neutral — they are selected by the defense, paid by the defense, and their report is written for the defense. The examination may be brief, the report may minimize the injuries, and the doctor may attribute symptoms to pre-existing conditions or malingering. The counter: we prepare our clients for the IME, we attend when permitted, we obtain a copy of the report, and we rebut it with the treating physicians’ records — the doctors who actually treated the injuries, not the doctor who was hired to minimize them.
Play 5: Social media surveillance
The insurance company will monitor your social media. A photograph of your loved one smiling at a family event, a post about going to work, a check-in at a restaurant — all of these can be taken out of context and presented as evidence that the injuries are not as serious as claimed. The counter: set all social media to private, do not post about the crash, do not post about activities, and do not discuss the case online. Assume that everything you post will be read by the defense and shown to a jury.
The Medicine: What Extrication-Level Forces Do to the Human Body
We have discussed the mechanisms above — brain injury, spinal injury, chest crush, and lower-extremity fracture. Here is what the family needs to understand about the long arc of these injuries, because the medical reality is what drives the damages, and the damages are what the insurance company is already trying to minimize.
The “mild” brain injury that is not mild
If the hospital diagnosed a “mild” traumatic brain injury — a concussion — based on a Glasgow Coma Scale score of 13 to 15, understand what that word means and what it does not mean. “Mild” is a triage classification, not a prognosis. More than one-third of patients with a GCS score of 13 — the very top of the “mild” range — have potentially life-threatening intracranial lesions on imaging. A normal CT scan does not rule out a brain injury — in a so-called mild TBI, the CT comes back clean about 90% of the time, not because nothing is wrong, but because the damage is microscopic tearing of nerve fibers that a standard scan was never designed to see. And the symptoms — headaches, dizziness, memory gaps, personality changes, inability to concentrate, irritability — can persist for months or become permanent. At least one in seven people with a “mild” brain injury never fully recovers. You may see it across the dinner table before any scan sees it — the person who forgets a word, who loses their temper, who cannot follow a conversation the way they used to. These injuries are proven with neuropsychological testing, advanced imaging, and the testimony of people who knew the person before.
The spinal injury that shows up late
A spinal cord injury can be present even when the initial X-ray and CT are normal. SCIWORA — Spinal Cord Injury Without Radiographic Abnormality — is a real diagnosis, and it shows up on MRI, not on the initial scans. If your loved one has numbness, weakness, or radiating pain, the right imaging study is an MRI, and the right specialist is a neurosurgeon or orthopedic spine surgeon. The ASIA Impairment Scale — the standard grading system from A (complete) through E (normal) — determines the severity and the prognosis, and the most reliable grade is the one taken after spinal shock wears off, not the one taken in the emergency department. An incomplete injury — one where some function is preserved below the level of injury — can still mean a lifetime of neurogenic bladder, bowel dysfunction, chronic nerve pain, and care needs that the insurance company’s lowball offer does not begin to cover.
The long-term costs the adjuster will not mention
A catastrophic injury does not end when the patient leaves the hospital. It begins. The lifetime cost of a severe traumatic brain injury, a spinal cord injury, or multiple fractures requiring surgical fixation and rehabilitation runs into the millions — and that figure covers only medical care and living expenses, not the wages the person will never earn. A life-care plan, built by a certified life-care planner to a published professional standard, prices out every surgery, therapy session, medication, wheelchair, prosthetic, and caregiver hour the injured person will need, year by year, for the rest of their life. A forensic economist then reduces that cost stream to present value — the lump sum that, if invested today, would pay for all of it. That is how a real damages number is built. The adjuster’s first offer is a fraction of it.
How a Case Like This Is Actually Built
Here is the chronological walk — from the day you call to the day the case resolves — told by someone who has run it.
Week one: preservation
The preservation letter goes out the day you call. It goes to every vehicle owner, every insurance carrier, every potential commercial employer, and every entity that holds evidence. It demands that the vehicles be held in their post-crash condition, that the EDR data be preserved, that any dashcam or surveillance footage be saved, that cell phone records be retained, and that all physical and electronic evidence be frozen pending inspection. This letter converts automatic deletion into sanctionable destruction. If the other side lets evidence die after receiving this letter, a judge can tell the jury to assume the missing evidence was as bad as we say it was.
Weeks two through four: investigation and the crash report
The CR-3 crash report is requested from the investigating agency as soon as it is filed. We review it for the officer’s diagram, witness statements, and contributing-factor assessment. We identify the registered owners of all vehicles, the insurance carriers, and the employment status of every driver. We begin the commercial-vehicle investigation — was the pickup truck a work vehicle? Was the driver on the clock? We pull the FMCSA SAFER database if any commercial entity is identified. We retain a board-certified accident reconstructionist to document the vehicles, download the EDR data, and analyze the crush profiles and scene evidence before anything is repaired or disposed of.
Months one through three: the medical picture
We obtain the complete medical records from Midland Memorial Hospital — the emergency department records, the imaging studies, the operative reports, the admission notes, the discharge summary. We follow the treatment as it progresses — follow-up appointments, specialist referrals, physical therapy, neuropsychological testing if a brain injury is suspected. We do not value the case until the medical picture is clear, because a premature valuation is a gift to the insurance company. If the injuries are catastrophic, we retain a life-care planner to build the future-cost projection.
Months three through six: discovery and depositions
If the case is in litigation, we serve discovery — interrogatories, requests for production, requests for admission — on every defendant. We subpoena cell phone records, employment records, fleet telematics data, and the Midland Fire Department’s extrication documentation. We take depositions — the at-fault driver, the investigating officer, the company safety director if a commercial defendant is identified, and the defense’s medical examiner. The depositions are where the case is won or lost, because the testimony given under oath is the testimony the jury hears.
The resolution: settlement or trial
Most cases settle. The question is whether they settle for what they are worth or for what the insurance company wants to pay. A Stowers demand — a formal offer to settle within policy limits, with a deadline for acceptance — puts the carrier’s own money at risk and forces a decision. If the carrier accepts, the case resolves. If the carrier wrongfully refuses and the verdict exceeds the limits, the carrier is exposed to the full amount. If the case does not settle, we try it — in Midland County, before a jury of the reader’s neighbors, people who know these roads, who know this oilfield economy, and who understand what a serious crash means to a family in this community.
The First 72 Hours: A Practical Roadmap
Here is what to do — and what not to do — in the first 72 hours after a crash like this.
Medical care first
Your loved one’s medical treatment is the absolute priority. Nothing on the legal side should interfere with care at Midland Memorial. If the hospital recommends a transfer to a higher-level trauma center, follow that recommendation. If a specialist referral is made, keep the appointment. If symptoms worsen or new symptoms appear — headache, confusion, weakness, numbness, difficulty breathing — return to the emergency department immediately. The medical record is being built right now, and it is the foundation of the case.
Do not give a recorded statement
We have said this before, and we will say it again: do not give a recorded statement to the other driver’s insurance company. You are not obligated to. Anything you say can and will be used to reduce the value of your claim or to shift fault onto your loved one.
Do not sign anything
Do not sign a release, a medical authorization, or a settlement agreement without having it reviewed by an attorney. A release is final. A medical authorization gives the insurance company access to your loved one’s entire medical history — not just the records related to this crash. A settlement agreement bars any future recovery.
Do not post on social media
Set all accounts to private. Do not post about the crash, the injuries, the hospital, or any activities. Assume everything is being read by the defense.
Preserve everything
Save the clothing your loved one was wearing — do not wash it. Save any photographs taken at the scene. Save the tow yard information and the vehicle location. Write down the names and contact information of any witnesses. Document everything you remember about the days surrounding the crash — the weather, the time, the road conditions, what your loved one told you about the collision.
Call us
The preservation letter goes out the day you call. The evidence clock is already running, and every day that passes is a day the physical and electronic proof of what happened at FM 1788 and County Road 40 degrades. The call is free. The consultation is free. We do not get paid unless we win your case.
Who We Are
Ralph Manginello has been licensed in Texas since November 6, 1998 — more than 27 years of trial practice. He is admitted to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, including federal court. He is a member of the Texas Trial Lawyers Association and the Houston Bar Association. He was a journalist before he was a lawyer, and he approaches every case the way a reporter approaches a story — find the facts, follow the evidence, and tell the truth to a jury. He leads the active hazing litigation against Pi Kappa Phi and the University of Houston, and he has spent his career in courtrooms fighting for people who were failed by someone else’s choices. You can read more about Ralph Manginello on his attorney page.
Lupe Peña has been licensed in Texas since December 6, 2012 — more than 13 years. He is admitted to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Before joining this firm, he practiced at a national insurance-defense firm — the rooms where adjusters and their software decided how to deny, delay, and devalue claims. He knows how the other side values a claim, how it selects IME doctors, how it uses surveillance, and how it runs the clock. Now he uses that knowledge for injured clients. He is fluent in Spanish and conducts full consultations in Spanish without an interpreter. You can read more about Lupe Peña on his attorney page.
Our fee
We work on contingency. We charge 33.33% if the case settles before trial, and 40% if the case goes to trial. We do not get paid unless we win your case. The consultation is free. The call is free. And if we are not the right fit for your case, we will tell you.
Our commitment
We have a 24/7 live staff — not an answering service. When you call 1-888-ATTY-911, you reach a person, not a recording. We serve clients across Texas, including Midland County and the entire Permian Basin. We speak Spanish. We handle wrongful death claims and catastrophic injury cases across the state.
Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long do I have to file a lawsuit after a car accident in Midland County, Texas?
Texas has a two-year statute of limitations for personal injury and wrongful death actions arising from a motor vehicle accident. The clock starts on the date of the crash — May 8 in this case. If a lawsuit is not filed within two years, the claim is barred forever. There are narrow exceptions, but none that you should rely on without speaking to an attorney. Two years sounds like a long time, but the evidence that wins the case — the EDR data, the skid marks, the witness statements, the surveillance footage — is gone in days, weeks, or months, not years. The deadline is two years, but the urgency is now.
What if the other driver did not have insurance or did not have enough insurance?
Texas requires drivers to carry minimum liability coverage, but that minimum is often not enough to cover a serious injury — one night in the intensive care unit at Midland Memorial can exceed it. If the at-fault driver was uninsured or underinsured, your own auto policy’s uninsured/underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage may apply. UM/UIM coverage in Texas is something you pay for as part of your own policy, and it steps in when the at-fault driver’s coverage is inadequate. We review every available policy — yours, the other driver’s, and any policy that might apply under a household or commercial coverage theory — to find every dollar of available coverage.
Can I still recover if my loved one was partly at fault for the crash?
Yes — up to a point. Texas follows a modified comparative negligence rule with a 51% bar. If your loved one was 50% or less at fault, the recovery is reduced by their percentage of fault but is not eliminated. If they were 51% or more at fault, the recovery is zero. This is why the insurance adjuster is working so hard to pin fault on your family — every percentage point below 51% is money they have to pay, and every point above 50% is money they get to keep. We do not concede fault. We preserve the evidence and let the physical proof tell the story.
What should I do if the insurance adjuster keeps calling me?
Stop taking the calls. You are not obligated to speak with the other driver’s insurance company. Everything you say is being recorded and evaluated for use against you. Once you have retained counsel, all communication goes through your attorney. If the adjuster is persistent, the answer is simple: “I have retained an attorney. Please contact my lawyer.” If you have not yet retained counsel, the answer is: “I am not ready to give a statement at this time.” Then call us.
How do I know if the pickup truck was a commercial vehicle?
The investigation begins with the crash report, which should identify the registered owner of the vehicle. But the crash report is not always complete — drivers do not always disclose that they were working at the time. We look at the vehicle for commercial markings, fleet numbers, or DOT plates. We look at the driver’s employment status through discovery — timecards, dispatch records, vehicle-use logs. In the Permian Basin, where pickup trucks are frequently oilfield work vehicles, this investigation is one of the first things we do, because it can be the difference between a case against a personal auto policy with minimum limits and a case against a commercial policy with layers of coverage.
What if the intersection itself was dangerous — can we sue TxDOT?
If the intersection of FM 1788 and County Road 40 presents a design hazard — inadequate sight distance, confusing control placement, insufficient warning signage, or a maintenance deficiency that contributed to the collision — the governmental entity responsible for the design and maintenance may bear proportionate responsibility. In Texas, claims against governmental entities like TxDOT are governed by the Texas Tort Claims Act, which waives governmental immunity for certain roadway conditions but imposes specific notice deadlines and damage limitations that are shorter and stricter than the general two-year statute of limitations. If you believe the intersection design contributed to the crash, this is something that must be investigated immediately, because the notice window for a governmental claim can be far shorter than the two-year SOL.
How much is my case worth?
We cannot answer that question honestly until the medical picture is clear and the liability investigation is complete. What we can tell you is how the number is built: economic damages (medical costs, lost wages, lost earning capacity, future care), non-economic damages (pain and suffering, mental anguish, loss of enjoyment of life), and — if the facts support it — punitive damages. The range is wide — from the lower end if the injuries are moderate and no commercial defendant is identified, to a multi-million-dollar demand if the injuries are catastrophic and a commercial policy is in play. We do not guess. We build the number from the evidence, the medical records, and the expert projections, and we demand what the case is actually worth.
How long does a car accident case take?
It depends on the complexity, the severity of the injuries, and whether the case settles or goes to trial. A straightforward case with clear liability and moderate injuries may resolve in months. A catastrophic injury case with disputed liability, a commercial defendant, and a life-care plan may take a year or more. We do not rush the case to settle for less than it is worth, and we do not let the insurance company run the clock on the evidence. The pace is driven by the medical recovery and the investigation, not by the insurance company’s desire to close the file cheaply.
Do I need a lawyer if the insurance company already offered me a settlement?
Yes. The first offer is almost always a fraction of what the case is worth. The insurance company’s goal is to close the file before the full cost of the injuries is known — before the MRI results, before the surgeon’s assessment, before the cognitive deficits surface, before the life-care plan is built. A settlement is final. Once you sign the release, you cannot go back for more, even if the injuries turn out to be far worse than anyone knew on the day you settled. Before you accept any offer, have it reviewed by an attorney who knows what the case is actually worth.
What if my loved one was working in the oilfield when the crash happened?
If your loved one was driving to or from work, or driving as part of their job, when the crash occurred, there may be a workers’ compensation claim alongside the personal injury claim. Workers’ compensation provides benefits regardless of fault, but it is capped and does not cover pain and suffering. The personal injury claim against the at-fault driver — and any commercial defendant — is the path to full compensation, including the human losses that workers’ comp never pays. If the at-fault driver was also working at the time, the employer may be a defendant under respondeat superior. These are the questions that define the value of a Permian Basin case, and they are the questions we ask first.
If This Happened to Your Family
If someone you love was cut out of a vehicle on FM 1788, or on any road in Midland County or the Permian Basin, call us. The consultation is free. The call is free. We do not get paid unless we win your case. We have a 24/7 live staff — not an answering service. Hablamos Español. Lupe Peña conducts full consultations in Spanish without an interpreter.
Call 1-888-ATTY-911. Or call our direct line at (713) 528-9070. We will listen to what happened, answer your questions, and tell you — honestly — whether we are the right firm for your case. If we are, the preservation letter goes out the day you call. If we are not, we will help you find the firm that is.
The evidence is already disappearing. The insurance adjuster is already working. The clock is already running. Let us help you stop it.