Update on the Dean Waters Case

By Gail Myers

It has been a little over 13 months since Dean Waters’ life changed forever. The night of his accident, August 8, 2002, he wasn’t even expected to live. He underwent 10 hours of surgery to place rods in his spine, which was shattered, and was put in the trauma unit at UT. He was a patient at UT for three weeks and then transferred to Patricia Neal Rehabilitation Center for two more months. He still has the rods in his back and the doctors want to leave them in as long as they can, but a recurring staph infection has put Dean back in the hospital for IV antibiotics during his year of recovery. He is on antibiotics by mouth now and will soon finish them. If the staph infection comes back the doctors have told Dean that the rods will have to be taken out. Although Dean has suffered a few setbacks during his recovery, he has endured a very long and hard rehabilitation to get to where he is today. His determination is what “drives” him said his wife, Jackie. Dean also attributed his recovery to the very strong support from Jackie and the rest of his family, plus a multitude of friends.

Both of his knees were dislocated in the accident and he faces surgery on both of them in the future. He is now walking without the use of any type of aid, crutches or a walker. A fact that he seemed very proud of when I spoke to him. He exercises regularly at the Paragon Athletic Club in Oak Ridge, where he walks on the treadmill and rides the stationary bike. He has to do lower bodywork since he can’t lift weights with his arms. According to Jackie, Dean’s normal exercise routine takes an hour to an hour and a half to complete. In addition to this routine, he also walks around the neighborhood regularly. He does this in spite of still having a tremendous amount of pain in both of his feet. Despite these obstacles, he has returned to work part time at the U.S. Enrichment Corporation where he is the Chief Scientific Officer.

The man who was driving the van that hit Dean will appear in court in Clinton on October 10, 2003. His lawyer has filed a motion to suppress any DUI charges. He is questioning the procedures performed by the police in administering the Breathalyzer test. According to previous newspaper articles, the test was administered two hours after the incident and showed a level of 0.16 percent. On the date of the accident, intoxication was legally presumed at levels of 0.10 percent and higher. Dean says he plans on attending the hearing.

You can find more information in our original article.