A Marine Corps family whose 8-year-old son died last year after he was struck by a vehicle while riding his bicycle on Camp Pendleton has sued the companies that provide housing on base to military families, alleging in the lawsuit that overgrown hedges at a residential intersection were a “substantial factor” in the crash.
Lucas Antczak was fatally injured on Oct. 26 when he was struck in a neighborhood off Vandegrift Boulevard near the San Luis Rey Gate. He died a week later, on Nov. 1, at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego.
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William and Brooke Antczak alleged in their lawsuit filed Friday in San Diego federal court that Liberty Military Housing, a company that provides housing to military families on or near bases around the country, and two related companies “negligently designed, approved, constructed, controlled, supervised and/or maintained the landscaping” on the street corner where the crash occurred.
The lawsuit alleged that overgrown bushes and hedges on the corner of Harris Street and East Barnett Circle “blocked the vision of traffic in both directions … (and) created or increased the foreseeable risk of people, like Lucas Antczak, being seriously injured or killed. The dangerous condition was a substantial factor in causing Lucas Antczak’s death, because the landscaping made it difficult or impossible for Lucas Antczak to see an oncoming vehicle and for the vehicle to see Lucas Antczak.”
The suit also accused the driver involved in the deadly crash of motor vehicle negligence.
“We were devastated by the tragic accident that occurred in October 2024 at East Barnett Circle,” a spokesperson for Liberty Military Housing said in a statement. “Our team members have joined neighbors in the community in coming together in support of the family during this sad time. All the information currently available to Liberty indicates that the hedge did not play a role in this accident.”
The company has not yet responded to the lawsuit in court, nor has the driver, who could not be reached for comment.
According to a Defense Department website, William Antczak is a Marine Corps officer with the rank of captain as of last September. Documents contained in the lawsuit showed the family lived about a block from where the crash occurred.
Craig McClellan, one of the attorneys representing the Antczak family, said there’d been previous complaints about the hedges in question. He said they didn’t serve to block access to homes in the neighborhood nor obscure the homes from the views of passersby — they only obscured the views of drivers, McClellan said.
The suit accused Liberty Military Housing and the related companies of negligence for failure to maintain property and premises liability. It alleged that the defendants “had received sufficient and ample notice of the dangerous condition that existed” because of the overgrown hedges, and that a crash such as the one involving Lucas was foreseeable.
“Defendants knew that the subject neighborhood was inhabited by many children who rode bicycles and scooters around the neighborhood,” the lawsuit alleged. “Despite the ample and sufficient time to correct the dangerous condition before October 26, 2024, Defendants failed to do so.”
The suit also alleged that the driver “drove his vehicle at too high of a speed and/or failed to take reasonable steps to avoid a collision with Lucas Antczak, such as braking.”
The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount of economic and non-economic damages from the defendants.