ATLANTA -- A metro Atlanta widow is demanding a change. Two years after her husband was killed by a drunk driver while on the job, she wants justice.
Derryl Simmons was the passenger in a garbage truck when the driver lost control and flipped it, throwing Simmons from the cab. Even though an investigation proved the driver's blood alcohol content was three times the legal limit, his widow tells 11Alive News she has no legal recourse. She says the only way anything will change is if the city is forced to take responsibility for what happened.
After years of stonewalling, Louise Simmons says the city won't give her any information about his death, and state law prevents her from getting justice.
"Great smile, we were so happy," Simmons said while looking at pictures of her late husband, Derryl. "He loved Western movies. He would always say if someone doesn't like Western movies, there's something wrong with them, baby."
Derryl and Louise Simmons both worked for the city of Atlanta. They had been married for 10 years when her supervisors came to her door.
"When they told me, it's like my whole world just stopped," she said.
Police found half a bottle of vodka on the ground at the crash. Derryl did not have any alcohol in his system.
Simmons says that when the city told her Derryl was dead, it also told her that under the state's sovereign immunity law, she couldn't sue and was not entitled to anything other than the worker's compensation payout.
"It was cold they way they handled it. I was his wife. My husband wasn't a piece of paper. He was a human being," she said.
Simmons had trouble getting information about what happened after Derryl's death. 11Alive did too. After submitting Open Records Requests to the city for almost two months, the city told 11Alive no policies have been changed to prevent it from happening again.
"The people who knew this, I want them held accountable! Somebody had to know that this guy was drinking and that he didn't have a license. I know somebody knew," Simmons said.
As it turns out, someone did know. A city paper trail shows supervisors knew Melvin Callahan got a DUI and had his commercial driver's license suspended, but they kept him at the wheel of a city dump truck. Department supervisor Gayla Dodson even got a raise a year later -- and now makes $124,000 a year.
"Nothing's going to change, because there's no consequence," Simmons said.
Legal analyst Christopher Chestnut says the state's sovereign immunity law prevents Simmons or anyone employed by the city from suing.
"If you can't sue your employer for putting you in harm's way and knowing they're putting you in harm's way, then why would they go out of their way to make anything safer?" Simmons said.
She is trying to get support for what she calls the Simmons Exception -- a piece of legislation she drafted with a law firm that would allow the family of someone killed on the job to sue when the employer clearly acts negligently.
"They look at me like, how dare you be upset? No, I dare you, for treating my husband's case like this. He was my husband! Somebody has to be held accountable! How do you know it won't happen again if you don't hold accountable those who allowed it to happen the first time?" Simmons said.
She says this might be her only shot to get justice for the man she loved.
"I am not going to crumble. I am here to see that justice is done and that my husband's death is not in vain," she said.
Simmons has talked to several lawmakers who are interested in the legislation, but so far she does not have a sponsor for the bill.
The driver in that fatal crash died a few months later, so absolutely no one faced consequences for this deadly and preventable crash.
City of Atlanta spokesman Keith Reed provided this statement to 11Alive Monday night:
"The City of Atlanta holds its employees to a high standard of conduct and accountability. We uphold a stringent policy for alcohol use for city employees while on-duty under any circumstances, and we expect supervisors to uphold and reinforce the City code of conduct. The City also conducts random drug testing of employees operating vehicles or in safety sensitive positions on a routine basis."
11Alive News reached out to the city for an interview with the department supervisor multiple times about this crash, but officials declined.
