The mother of one of Denver’s most esteemed personal injury lawyers died after being runover by a truck. For Kyle Bachus, it was a tragic turn. After spending decades representing injury victims, he became one himself. To help guide others going through similar experiences, he wrote a book, Unthinkable. In this post, we asked Kyle for some insights he gained from the personal tragedy he had to deal with. Kyle spoke with our blogger, Simon Crittle
Question: You’ve written a seriously useful book for families navigating their way through unfamiliar circumstances involving death and injury cases. Do you think lawyers like you should also read this book? If so and they did, what would they get out of it?
Answer: Yeah. I do. Before my mom was killed, I liked to think I did a good job representing families. But I really think most personal injury lawyers just tackle one piece of the puzzle – the civil piece. But the problems people face are much more holistic. There is so much more rolling around in someone’s head. What I learned through my experience, and why this is a terrific book for lawyers, as well as victims, is that clients need a much more comprehensive approach. Previously I’d never thought about things like keepsakes or someone’s legacy or how to secure Facebook, say. All of this is covered in the book. The book exposes lawyers to all the different things families are going through, and all the decisions they must make, that go beyond just bringing the civil case. You’re a lawyer and counselor at law, right. This book can help lawyers like me be better at the counsellor part.
Question: What surprised you the most about becoming a victim in an injury case, trading places with the people you’d been representing for so many years?
Answer: Weird stuff. Like the way people spoke to me about what happened. People would say, “Gee, I’m really sorry your mom passed away.” But the whole time I’m thinking that some driver killed my mom. She didn’t die naturally. She was runover in the street. So now when I talk to my clients, I’ve changed the way I use language. Before I would talk like a lawyer, addressing the legal issues, almost not wanting to say what happened. But the family wake up and live with it every day. It’s not going away. You can’t sugarcoat it. Saying what actually happened to my mom doesn’t hurt me anymore than I am hurt already. I’m now in a much better position to communicate directly with families because I understand language is important, but not in the way I used to think. People try to soft sell it. But reality is reality.
Question: During the case stemming from your mother’s death, did the legal process seem frustrating, slow, unfair or anything else that might typically aggrieve a victim but seem normal to a lawyer representing a victim?
Answer: I separate it between the civil and criminal justice systems. I found the criminal system to be all of that – slow, unfair, stupid. There was no concern for my loss. We were just a number and a case in the criminal justice system. That’s why I want to help families through the process. With the civil system, there were no surprises. Because I’d done it for so many years. I was incredibly equipped to go to the matt. I was so over the top. I did an entire Facebook campaign targeting former employees of the company that owned the truck that killed my mom – to give me inside information. I had such a leg up. We beat the shit out of that company. No expense spared. But I can’t imagine what it must be like for families who have no knowledge of the criminal or civil justice system and be trying to navigate through that alone. So that’s why I did the book – to give people real answers about what’s really gonna happen. It’s like a roadmap for people.
Question: Your book reads as though it was written by someone with a level-headed approach to dealing with your mother’s death. Weren’t you angry about the way your mother died? If so, what did you do about or with your anger? Does anger in these circumstances serve any useful purpose? Were you ashamed of your anger? Proud of it? Neither?
Answer: It’s a very interesting question. I think it depends on the person. I think people need to find a way to grieve that allows them to go on living their life. I think about my own family. My brother is a psychiatrist. He’s probably more forgiving. I’m not. I don’t forgive the person who did this to my mom. They killed her. Why? To get through a traffic light five seconds faster? Now I don’t have a mom. Now my kids don’t have a grandparent. But if all I did was wake up and think about that – that’s a disservice to her legacy. That’s a disservice to my children, to our future, everything. That’s why coming to terms with things is important. Like I say, for me as a counselor, I can just do my job dealing with the civil justice system, or I can be dealing honestly with the client by telling them that nothing I am going to accomplish is going accelerate a process of grieving. It’s a strange burden for victims. It changes your life forever. Does that mean you can’t live the rest of your life and be happy? No. You have to find a way through.
Question: Aside from legal advice, what is the number one piece of personal advice you would give a client dealing with a tragedy, now that you’ve been through the tragedy of your Mother’s death and the way she died?
Answer: It’s going to sound like a cliché. But it’s true. Take some steps immediately to take control of what’s happened to your family. Having some knowledge and control, in the freefall and chaos that you’re experiencing, is critical. Get somebody on your side. Find somebody who can start getting you answers. I was lucky. In my case, my partner called me and said, “I know you’re not even thinking about this, but do you want me to find out what happened?” And I just said “go.” That helped me and my family start to gain some control over what at the time felt uncontrollable. Sure, you can call a lawyer. But if they just say they’ll file a civil case, it’s not going to really help you. There’s so much more we lawyers can be doing. Yes, lawyers wanna make money but they also wanna help people. Well, you wanna help, then really help! And you do that by getting involved in the criminal case. Getting answers for the family. Be there when they are talking to the police. Whatever it is. Every aspect of it.
Question: I’m sure you use private investigators in your work. Has your view of private investigators or the way you use of them changed since your mother’s death?
Answer: I have found a greater need for private investigators in every single one of my cases. If you think that a case is more about helping a family gain control than just filing a lawsuit, then what you need is information. So what I do is immediately get a private investigator to do everything other experts like engineers can’t do. That means, immediately go out and talk to every witness. Scour for video evidence. Don’t just wait and see. Get 911 recordings. Get bodycam footage. For instance, in my case, the cops didn’t tell us that my mom had been runover by a commercial truck. A private investigator told us that. In my office, when we get a case, we triage what we need to do, to begin to take back control for the family. And 100 percent of the time, hiring a private investigator is at the top of the list.
Question: For people who haven’t read your book or don’t know your story, what was the outcome of the civil and criminal cases surrounding your mother’s death? Did you get any kind of closure? Where you satisfied by how things turn out? Or did it not go the way you would have liked?
Answer: It was during COVID, and at the time, the police were trying not to personally interact with people, including defendants. So as part of the criminal case, they mailed a ticket to the driver of the truck and forgot to check the box marking it was a fatality. So instead of writing a ticket for careless driving resulting in death, they wrote a ticket for careless driving, just like if somebody had been speeding. The driver immediately paid the ticket. When the police realized they’d screwed up and wrote a second ticket, the truck driver’s lawyer got the ticket thrown out of court. He paid a $182 fine and lost four points on his license. He never lost his license or missed a day or work, that I know of. It was ridiculous. Horrible. The civil case was different. We were able to locate the truck and get access. We found there was an aftermarket product that this company was putting on the dashboards of these vehicles. It was something that helps trucks inflate and deflate their tire pressure if they need to drive on sand or on construction lots or whatever. Tire ware is a big issue with these companies. So the driver’s vision was blocked – by 75 percent down to the right. We were able to get the company to voluntarily remove these devices from the dashboards of all their vehicles. This was a big company. A lot of trucks. That was a great outcome. As far as anything else goes, I am subject to a confidentially clause that doesn’t allow me to say anything other than — the matter has been resolved.
