Family of woman killed by falling utility pole to receive $30M settlement

abcnews.go.com:

The family of a South Carolina woman struck and killed by a rotting 70-year-old utility pole will get $30 million in a wrongful death settlement

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The family of a South Carolina woman struck in the head and killed by a rotting 70-year-old utility pole will get $30 million through a wrongful death settlement reached Thursday.

Electric company Dominion Energy, which installed a light on the pole, and communications company Comporium, which owned a drooping pole line in downtown Wagener that was no longer in use, both signed off on the agreement, which resolved a wrongful death suit brought by Jeunelle Robinson's family, according to documents filed in Aiken County.

Last August, a truck snagged the line, pulling it like a rubber band until it broke the poles and launched one into the air, striking Robinson, who was grabbing lunch during her break as a social studies teacher at Wagener-Salley High School, authorities said. The truck had a legal height, they said.

Surveillance video from a nearby store shows Robinson, 31, try to dodge something before the pole strikes her, flipping her body around violently. She died a short time later at the hospital.

“We appreciate the leadership of Dominion and Comporium for working with us to ensure Jeunelle’s family would not have to relive this tragedy in court unnecessarily,” the family's lawyer, Justin Bamberg, said in a statement.

The settlement agreement does not detail how much each company will have to pay of the $30 million settlement, and Bamberg's law office said that would not be released.

The exact age of the poles isn't known because records are no longer available. Markings on them haven't been made in over 60 years. However, the 69-year-old mayor of Wagener