Bander

A reckless motorist hit a cyclist in my hometown during an unsafe pass, causing several broken bones and knocking the cyclist unconscious. The motorist plead guilty to failure to yield right of way, and was only punished with $92 (!) in fines. Which I don't understand, because you get fined more than that for speeding or littering without causing serious harm to someone.

https://hamptonroads.com.nyud.net/201...over-collision

The cyclist, Steven Hendricks is now suing for $750,000 in damages. I don't know him, but I can only imagine that this is in some measure to see at least some justice in this case. $92 for mowing someone down with your car is ridiculous.
Best wishes to Mr. Hendricks.

Gojohnnygo.

Hope he gets 20 million

silmarillion

I'm no lawyer, but I think it will be hard to reward punitive damages simply because someone failed to yield right of way. It's obvious that the traffic court thought little of it with such a small fine from the bench.

$750.000 maybe to cover medicals and long term medical care pain suffering, that kind of thing.

I hope the guy is successful. Sometimes the only way to force change is to make people/ins companies pay for damages. Especially when someone suffers a loss and time loss from work.

rydabent

While I usually dont like court cases like this, but a $92 fine in criminal court is totally out of line. In this case I hope the cyclist wins his case for justice.

genec

This is what happens when the laws have no teeth and cyclists are forced to use civil trials to achieve justice.

How many times have we discussed here that there is no penalty for killing a cyclist... that the family is expected to bring a civil suit...

No deaths occurred here, but again, did the laws give justice to the cyclist for the actions taken by the errant motorist?

iconicflux

I'd much rather the laws be made self policing and the burden of proof being the preponderance of the evidence.

silmarillion

Agreed, but the cyclist has suffered a loss. He will be financially responsible for the medical bills until the suit is settled. I find it hard to believe that the driver involved will feel enough sting to serve as a lasting impression that you have to be careful at all times. His/Her ins company will, but it's likely they won't raise his/her premiums unless a large settlement is awarded.

This is one of the reasons that many states are implementing the 3ft law. The violation for hitting a ped or a cyclist is going to hit ya in the pocketbook, and then a civil court has no problem awarding punitive damages for breaking a law that has no gray area. Ambiguity in traffic laws weigh so heavily against the cyclist in many of the cases I have heard of...

GrandaddyBiker

What if the driver has a mortgage on his home and just survives pay check to pay check. That description fits millions of people. The insurance company will pay the maximum of the insured’s coverage and then walk away. I promise you the lawyers have already looked at the defendant’s ability to pay and are already asking for more than they expect to get.

How about the innocent members of the drives family? Should they suffer the consequences of a massive lawsuit that the driver cannot pay? Remember this was an accident. Which one of us can say we will never have an accident where we are at fault?

Was the driver's fine too small? Yes it was. How would a big fine have helped the cyclist?

Should the cyclist get paid for all of his losses and some extra for his pain and suffering? Yes he should.

dougmc

Is it really? I mean, the guy was convicted of a moving violation and so he had to pay a moving violation fine. It's not like the guy was accused of an actual crime (right or wrong, even if moving violations are legally misdemeanors in a certain place, they're still not normally treated as real crimes) that requires a large fine and jail time.

If you run a red light and cause an collision, you get a ticket for running a red light. You pass unsafely and cause a collision, you get a ticket for passing unsafely. Some places will double the fine or otherwise increase it if the infraction causes a collision, but either way ... the fine will be relatively small. (Now, $92 is smaller than any moving violation around here, but that's another matter.)

This money isn't intended to pay for the damages done in the collision -- and in fact, the victim won't see any of it. Had the court ordered $92 restitution, then that would be an outrage, but that's not what happened here.

If the victim wants compensation, he needs to push for that separately. The fact that the driver was cited helps his civil case (if it goes that far) considerably, and the fact that the penalty was small is in his favor as well (after all, this is $92 that the driver can't use to pay his civil judgement. $92 is no big deal, but if the guy was fined $10k, that would be a big deal, especially if the driver only had $10k total.)

Yes, his $10k bike was destroyed, but that's still cheaper than most cars.

I don't see this as really being that different from any typical auto on auto collision -- somebody is at fault, they might get a ticket (but often don't), and then the insurance companies work it out (or you don't get yours involved at all if there's no doubt that it wasn't your fault and the other insurance company isn't trying to screw you over) and maybe it goes to court if an agreement can't be made.

jon c. 

How about the innocent members of the drives family? Should they suffer the consequences of a massive lawsuit that the drive cannot pay?

I would honestly have no concern about that.

But it's true that in most cases you would settle for the Max insurance payment as most defendants will go bankrupt to avoid paying a judgement.

dougmc

What does that mean?

... I guess that would be fine, at least until you were the one put into prison for a crime you didn't commit.

If you think that putting a significant number of innocent people into prison is OK as long as it means some guilty people aren't acquitted, then a "preponderance of the evidence" burden of proof for criminal cases makes perfect sense.

dougmc

Then it doesn't matter if the victim is awarded $20K, $700K or $20M -- he won't get it. "You can't get blood from a turnip" and all that.

If you get to pick who runs you over while you're riding your bike, pick a wealthy guy.

EsoxLucius

The term accident should no longer be in any traffic related vocabulary. These are crashes, pure and simple. An accident is something that cannot be reasonably foreseen or predicted and

cannot be avoided. It just happens. A crash, on the other hand, is the result of choices made and risks disregarded. The incident described was no accident as the driver was full of willful
intent in his actions that caused the CRASH.

Don in Austin

You can ask for anything in a lawsuit. Doesn't mean much, because what is finally awarded is another matter entirely. Then, there is to what extent THAT amount is reduced on appeal. Finally, whatever the judgment is, its another matter how much, if anything, is ever collected.

Don in Austin

northernlights

what an insult. the courts have declared open season on pedestrians and cyclists. if you're not driving you're a loser who deserves whatever happens to you and the cars have a right to run you down whenever they feel like it. the injustice system has made that clear time and again.

silmarillion

When the court decides to award damages, it's usually to pay the legal fee's, time loss from work, property loss, and medical expenses the victim incurs. The zing phrase is "By no fault of their own.."

When my family was struck in our car by a drunk driver, we incurred medical bills to the tune of $75,000 within a weeks time. My wife could not work for two years. Our car was totaled, and my then 7year old son had a head injury.

I won't discuss the settlement, but what I will say is I learned a lot about how the system works when someone suffers a loss at no fault of their own. Especially when the defendant was drunk at the wheel of a company vehicle.

We could have gone to court and may have won a ridiculous amount of money....We just wanted our losses to be settled. We had no desire to topple a company because of one persons bad decision.

I'm so thankful, it could have gone the other way.