MAYBE GOV. BILL HASLAM NEEDS TO INTERVENE: Tennessee bills teen to replace guardrail that killed her.

The state of Tennessee has billed a dead teen nearly $3,000 to replace the guardrail that killed her in a car crash in November.

Her flabbergasted father said that he not only would not pay but also contends that the model of guardrail that struck his daughter was poorly designed and dangerous.

Around 5:44 a.m. ET Nov. 1, Hannah Eimers, 17, was driving her father’s 2000 Volvo S80 on Interstate 75 northbound near Niota, Tenn., when the car left the road, traveled into the median and hit the end of a guardrail with the driver’s side door, according to a Tennessee Highway Patrol crash report.

Instead of deflecting the car or buckling to absorb the impact, the guardrail end impaled the vehicle, striking the teen in the head and chest and pushing her into the back seat, according to the report. She died instantly.

Four months later, Steven Eimers of Lenoir City received a $2,970 bill from the Tennessee Department of Transportation, dated Feb. 24 and addressed to Hannah for the cost of labor and materials to install 25 feet of guardrail at the scene of the crash.

“I’m shocked, the audacity,” he said. “What bothers me is that they’re playing Russian roulette with people’s lives. They know these devices do not perform at high speeds and in situations like my daughter’s accident, but they leave them in place.”

The guardrail end Hannah hit was a Lindsay X-LITE, a model that the state transportation department had removed from its approved products list just one week earlier.

Sadly, Steve Eimers is a longtime InstaPundit reader. He emails:

I am pushing to get the Lindsay X-Lite off Tennessee roads. Will you please share this story?

But if you do please include this post about Hannah. I am tired of only talking about the way she died! How she lived is far more impressive. Graduated Home School at 15. Self taught ASL, German, and Russian. Self taught piano, guitar, Ukulele, psaltry, and numerous primitive instruments. Wrote six novels, accomplished photographer, and videographer. Worked on the set of Dog Years with Adam Rifkin and Burt Reynolds. Most importantly was how she was an advocate for the orphan. I want this to be what Hannah is known for.

Here’s his Facebook post.