City pays out $500,000 in lawsuit

Jun. 27—The City of Odessa has settled a lawsuit filed in connection with a September 2020 crash that killed three teenagers and injured two others.

According to records obtained under the Texas Public Information Act, the city agreed to settle all claims for $500,000 in March.

The families of two teens, Kaenan Gage Garms, 19, and Evan James Hill, 18, sued the city claiming they were killed in a wreck caused by an obstructed stop sign.

According to the lawsuit, which was filed in the 161st Ector County District Court, Garms was driving a Ford F-150 north on Clover Avenue on Sept. 19, 2020 when he failed to see the stop sign at 52nd Street because it was blocked by vegetation and his truck collided with a GMC Terrain being driven by Andrew Jakob Nading, 19.

Garms and Hill, who were both in the Ford, were killed as was Nading.

D'Morriyon Breaux, 18, who was in the Ford, and Benjamin Mathew Luna, who was in the GMC, sustained grave injuries, the lawsuit stated.

The families of Garms and Hill, along with Breaux and Luna alleged in their lawsuit numerous accidents had happened at the same intersection because of the obstructed sign and the City of Odessa was aware of that.

According to an Odessa Police Department report, a video taken at 2:52 a.m. that day showed an unidentified black car run the stop sign as it traveled at a very high rate of speed going north on Clover Avenue and crossing East 52nd Street. Almost immediately after, the Ford is seen chasing the black car at a high rate of speed and running the stop sign.

As the Ford entered the intersection, the GMC, which was also traveling at a high rate of speed on 52nd Street, crossed the intersection, the report stated. The front end of the GMC struck the driver's side of the Ford and both vehicles proceeded toward the northeast corner of the intersection.

The families of Garms, Hill and Nading received $100,000 and Breaux and Luna received the same amount.