LENOIR CITY, Tenn.*— The state of Tennessee has billed a dead teen nearly $3,000
to replace the guardrail that killed her in a car crash in November.
Her flabbergasted father said that he not only would not pay but also*contends that
the model of guardrail that struck his daughter was poorly designed and dangerous.
Around 5:44 a.m. ET Nov. 1, Hannah Eimers, 17, was driving her father's 2000 Volvo S80 on Interstate 75 northbound*near Niota, Tenn., when the car*left the road, traveled into the median and hit*the end of a guardrail*with the driver's side door, according to a*Tennessee Highway Patrol crash report.
Instead of deflecting the car or buckling to absorb the impact, the guardrail end impaled the vehicle, striking the teen in the head and chest and*pushing*her into the back seat, according to the report. She*died instantly.
Four months later, Steven Eimers of Lenoir City*received a $2,970 bill from the Tennessee Department of Transportation, dated Feb. 24 and addressed to Hannah*for*the cost of labor and materials to install 25 feet of guardrail at the scene of the crash.
"I’m shocked, the audacity," he said.*"What bothers me is that they’re playing Russian roulette with people's lives.
They know these devices do not perform at high speeds and in situations like my daughter’s accident, but they leave them in place."