Bellingham reaches settlement related to lawsuit over teen who was injured in crosswalk
Bellingham has settled a lawsuit, accepting responsibility for its role in a crash that injured a teenage boy who was crossing a street in the Barkley neighborhood nearly three years ago.
City Council members unanimously approved on Monday a settlement of $325,000 with Matthew and Lyndsey Stodola of Bellingham, who brought the lawsuit on behalf of their son, who was 14 at the time of the incident in February 2022.
After the settlement was announced Monday night, Councilman Michael Lilliquist provided context for the lawsuit, which council members discussed in a closed session earlier Monday.
“This was a terrible situation where a young man was crossing the street on a bicycle. There were many factors to blame, but one of those factors to blame had to do with a misfunctioning crosswalk signal,” Lilliquist said. “I hear that he is recovering well, but nonetheless he sustained serious harm in the accident.”
Matthew and Lyndsey Stodola filed a federal personal injury lawsuit on Jan. 2 in the Western District of Washington in U.S. District Court. They named the city of Bellingham, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Matthew Murphy, who was driving an official government vehicle, according to previous Herald reporting.
Murphy was an ICE employee at the time of the incident, according to federal court records. The Stodolas, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of their son, accused ICE, Murphy and the city of Bellingham of negligence and sought general and special damages.
According to the lawsuit, the Stodolas’ son pushed the button to activate the flashing yellow lights on a marked crosswalk on Barkley Boulevard east of Manning Street. He was heading north from a spur off the Railroad Trail around 6 p.m. Feb. 10, 2022. Sunset was 5:23 p.m.
A witness said she pressed the button on the north end of the crosswalk just before the boy was hit, but only the lights on the north side of the crosswalk flashed. As the woman started to cross Barkley Boulevard from the north, the Stodolas’ son started to cross from the south, according to court records. Murphy was eastbound on Barkley Boulevard and hit the boy.
At the time of the incident, the pedestrian sign placed to alert drivers traveling east on Barkley Boulevard was covered in plastic. The flashing light system on the south side of Barkley Boulevard, where the boy was hit, was not working. The lawsuit alleged that city employees knew that the flashers weren’t working and that the city did not provide signs or other safety measures to warn that it was not operating, court records state.
U.S. District Court Judge Tana Lin was scheduled to hear the case Sept. 22, 2025, according to court documents. It was a bench trial, meaning that Lin would rule on the case without a jury.
The Stodolas’ lawyer, Scott Kirk of the Bellingham firm Brett McCandless Brown & Conner, wasn’t immediately available for comment.
ICE officials didn’t immediately return an email from The Bellingham Herald, but a Bellingham official said that the federal government has agreed to a settlement.
This story was originally published December 19, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
