Welcome to our new web site!

To give our readers a chance to experience all that our new website has to offer, we have made all content freely avaiable, through October 1, 2018.

During this time, print and digital subscribers will not need to log in to view our stories or e-editions.

City Listed in $200,000 Lawsuit For Erroneously Turning on Water

Posted

McKENZIE (March 17) — The City of McKenzie’s Water Department is the defendant in a lawsuit filed Friday, March 17 in the Carroll County Circuit Court by Phillip Colwell, Sr. and Phillip Colwell, Jr., as renters of a commercial building in McKenzie.

Attorney Harold E. Dorsey filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Colwells, who claim warehoused merchandise was ruined when the McKenzie Water Department opened the wrong water valve and flooded the building they are renting at 15143 Highland Drive, McKenzie.

The complaint indicates that on March 21, 2022 at approximately 7:15 p.m., the plaintiffs received a phone call from building owner Donald Tolbert of McKenzie. Tolbert told the Colwells the building was flooding. The Colwells used the former bread store as a warehouse, storing merchandise, including NFL and college team shirts, jerseys, etc., that they ‘bought and sold at a large profit.’

According to the legal complaint, the house next door was supposed to have the water turned on. Instead, the Water Department turned on the wrong water line and flooded the former bread store building, where water service had been terminated for seven to 10 years because the plumbing in the building was in disrepair.

The complaint indicates the Colwells’ merchandise was damaged and has no value. They are seeking $100,000 in actual damages and $100,000 in compensatory damages for loss of earned wages, suffering - both past and future, reimbursement cost for hired labor to clean the building, cost of storage of the damaged items, and all other damages as allowed by the laws of the State of Tennessee. They also seek attorney’s fees and other costs.

The City has yet to have the opportunity to answer this complaint that was filed Friday afternoon.