Tennessee Family Files $7.5M Lawsuit on Response Time

A Cocke County man’s mother and stepfather have filed a $7.5 million lawsuit claiming a long ambulance response left him in a permanent semi-vegetative state.

Tommy L. France, 29, was a passenger in a car headed north on Cosby Highway on November 3. Around 10:50 p.m., driver Dusti Webb lost control, overcorrected, and ran into a telephone pole.

According to witness accounts, France’s side of the car was essentially destroyed. He was partially ejected from the vehicle.

But it’s his long wait for an ambulance that family members believe led to his semi-vegetative state.

“He just lays there,” France’s mother, Sandra Valentine said. “He don’t walk, he don’t talk, he won’t look at you.”

She remembers France as a boy who loved all types of sports and was just starting to raise a child of his own, a son named Easton who will soon turn 3 years old.

France’s stepfather, Robert Valentine, says that’s about the age he entered France’s life. Now, the child he once played with is bed-ridden.

“It’s just hard to see him like that, knowing that I can’t do nothing for him,” he said. “I would trade places with him in a second. In one second, I would trade places with him.”

According to the lawsuit, the first 911 call arrived at 10:52 p.m. A member of the Cosby Fire and Rescue Squad placed a call at 10:53. The dispatcher was working to get an ambulance dispatched at 10:53.

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Cocke Co. family sues over ambulance response time

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