Widow of Man Who Drove Into Aqueduct Files Lawsuit

Screenwriter Gary Devore’s widow has sued the state Department of Transportation over his 1997 fatal plunge into the California Aqueduct, claiming dangerous conditions on the road led to his death, according to her lawyer.

Devore, who authorities said was fatigued and disoriented after driving for 12 hours on his way home to Carpinteria from Santa Fe, N.M., got on the Antelope Valley (14) Freeway headed north in the southbound lanes and accidentally drove off the road and into the aqueduct.

He was missing for more than a year before a tip from an armchair sleuth led detectives to investigate the possibility he was driving the wrong way. His body was recovered last October.

Geoff Wells, a lawyer with the Santa Monica-based firm Greene, Broillett, Taylor, Wheeler & Panish, said Devore’s widow, Wendy Oates-Devore, hired the firm to represent her in the wrongful death suit, filed last month.

A Caltrans spokesman said he was not yet aware of the lawsuit and could not comment.

Wells said someone at a Denny’s restaurant in Mojave remembered Devore stopping in for a cup of coffee the night he died. The restaurant is 36 miles from where Devore’s body was found, still seat-belted into his Ford Explorer.

“He was obviously fatigued,” Wells said. “I think it’s a combination of unclear signage that led him to be confused which way to get on.”

Investigators said that in the area of the freeway near Lancaster where Devore died, a paved median leads to an unfenced drop-off into the aqueduct.