CLAYTON COUNTY, Ga. — A metro Atlanta woman says for two years she’s been trying to get Clayton County to pay for a car that was damaged by a fire truck.
That woman said she had to spend thousands of dollars she did not have to buy a new car because of all of this.
Mareshah Lawson woke up on July 13, 2023, to find her car looking mangled and damaged.
“I had just gotten that car… like just got it,” Lawson said. “I was very shocked.”
She told Channel 2’s Cory James that she was even more shocked to learn how it happened.
“A fire truck that hit my car,” Lawson said.
A crash report says firefighters were responding to a cardiac arrest call around 1 a.m. at a home on Ridgecrest Drive in Riverdale, just a couple of doors down from Lawson’s.
The report said two vehicles parked across from each other on the street made it difficult for the driver to squeeze through.
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That is when, according to the report, the engine’s front right step grabbed Lawson’s rear door panel and ripped it off.
“After the situation, my car drove very heavy. You could tell that something was wrong with the car,” Lawson said.
She said that while she waited to be compensated for the damages, she kept driving the car.
Then, several weeks later, it caught fire on I-285 near Camp Creek Parkway.
“All of a sudden, my car jerks and smoke starts coming, and then I realize the car is on fire,” Lawson said. “And in my head, I’m praying it doesn’t explode.”
Lawson told James that months after the car fire, she received a letter from Clayton County telling her the county was not liable, and it appeared her vehicle “was improperly parked.”
“It was very disheartening to hear that,” Lawson said.
Channel 2 Action News looked into the laws regarding street parking and found a Clayton County ordinance that says, “The parking of a vehicle within the front yard or in front of the principal building within a residential district is prohibited, except on a driveway or other hardened surface made of concrete, asphalt, tar and gravel mix, or the like.”
“Even the neighborhood doesn’t have signs whether or not you can park on the street or not,” Lawson said.
Lawson believes she was not in the wrong and wants all of this to be made right.
“I want them to be accountable and compensate me for what they did,” Lawson said.
James reached out to Clayton County officials multiple times over the last week for comment on this story.
When he told them this story was running on Thursday evening, he got an email saying his request is being processed.