US embassy crash widower awarded $1.7 million
The husband of the victim of a car accident, caused in 2011 by a driver working for the Swiss embassy in Washington, is to receive compensation of $1.725 million (CHF1.68 million).
The Swiss government will pay $1.425 million, while civil liability insurance will cover the remaining $300,000, the foreign ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.
The government took note of the agreement, which was reached by the lawyers of the victim’s husband and those of the Swiss embassy. The agreement thus brought the case to a definitive end, it said. The civil lawsuit had been seeking compensation of $10 million.
Trudith Rishikof, 64, was crossing a busy street in the US capital on October 6, 2011, when she was knocked down by a four-wheel drive Swiss embassy vehicle.
Her husband, Harvey Rishikof, a former professor of law and national security at Washington’s National Defense University, filed his lawsuit against the Swiss government at the federal court in Washington.
Gaddafi ties
Last autumn a court in Washington rejected a suit against the driver, whom the court judged to have diplomatic immunity.
The driver, who had been employed by the embassy since March 2009, was previously the domestic servant of Hannibal Gaddafi, son of former Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi. The foreign ministry had given him refuge at the embassy in Washington for protection in the wake of the Geneva affair in 2008, which involved the individual complaining of having been abused by the Gaddafi couple.
The foreign ministry said it had terminated his contract at the end of 2014.
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