After reaching an out-of-court $6.95 million settlement deal with Susan Camicia last year, the city of Mercer Island settled another lawsuit last week involving a bike accident injury, this time mid-trial and for $7.25 million.

The plaintiffs in the case were Margarete Chenoweth and her family. Chenoweth suffered a spinal cord injury and was rendered quadriplegic after a bike accident on April 15, 2013 on Forest Avenue Southeast, where she lived at the time.

According to her claim for damages submitted in January 2014, Chenoweth moved over to avoid a passing car and hit an “unmarked and unseen bump thereby flipping her over her handlebars and causing her neck to impact a 4×4 mailbox post on the side of the road.”

That “bump” is a water diversion berm, meant to divert rainwater into the ditch on one side of the road and away from the properties on the other. The street is 18.5 feet wide and has an 18 degree downhill slope.

Chenoweth sought more than $83 million from the city, and her husband and three children also claimed damages totaling $5 million.

The city denied liability, noting that the berm is 35-41 feet away from the mailbox structure, according to a brief the city filed on Jan. 28. There are about 66 of these berms on Mercer Island.

“Prior to her unfortunate accident, Mrs. Chenoweth had successfully traversed this exact water diversion berm and street almost daily (hundreds, if not thousands, of times) for over eight years as a resident of this street, without any reported issues or complaints,” the brief continues.

The Chenoweths and their attorneys claimed that the city was negligent in its design, warnings and maintenance of the water diversion berm on the road.

“The bump is extremely difficult to see even if you know it’s there,” according to a brief filed Jan. 12 by the plaintiffs’ counsel, Lawrence Kahn.

The plaintiffs also said that the berm was unmarked and unpainted, and there were no warning signs related to it.

The city denied all negligence, noting that the road was resurfaced in 2003 and no incidents or accidents were reported until Chenoweth’s. The berm was installed in 2004.

The city also claimed that Chenoweth’s allegations “rely on mere speculation and conjecture.” Chenoweth experienced a head injury and “immediate neuro deficit,” as noted during her initial medical treatment. The medical records are unclear on if she lost consciousness or not.

The city alleged that Chenoweth “cannot recall specifically how her accident occurred,” and “offers only a theory that the water diversion berm caused her crash.”

The city’s attorneys also said that Chenoweth had taken her left hand off of her bike to wave at a car as it passed and squeezed her brake with her right hand.

Chenoweth’s “allegations are unsupported by evidence to establish causation,” according to the city’s brief.

In its Jan. 28 brief, the city requested that the jury visit the site on Forest Avenue and view the area to “better understand the evidence.”

The trial originally was set to begin on Feb. 8, but was continued to July 5.

The city used two groups of attorneys for outside counsel: Sedgewick LLP and the Christie Law Group. The trial went for more than four days, before the parties reached a settlement, which will be covered by the city’s insurance.

In a similar case, Mercer Island settled with Camicia in October 2015. Camicia sustained severe injuries from a bicycle accident in 2006 on the Interstate 90 Trail in Mercer Island.

She was paralyzed after hitting a fixed wooden bollard while attempting to avoid temporary construction fencing that extended onto the trail.

That suit tested the limits of “recreational immunity,” as the status of the I-90 trail as a park or a transportation corridor was disputed.

Chenoweth’s case was more about “safety in society,” according to her attorneys.

The city currently does not have plans to mark or paint the berms. The berms are a necessary component for stormwater management, said Kari Sand, city attorney, and are all “different and unique” due to the topography and built conditions on the Island.

“There’s no one size fits all solution,” she said.