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Texter Not Responsible For Textee's Car Accident, Rules Judge
linuxwrangler writes "After mowing down a motorcycling couple while distracted by texting, Kyle Best received a slap on the wrist. The couple's attorney then sued Best's girlfriend, Shannon Colonna, for exchanging messages with him when he was driving. They argued that while she was not physically present, she was 'electronically present.' In good news for anyone who sends server-status, account-alerts or originates a call, text or email of any type that could be received by a mobile device, the judge dismissed the plantiff's claims against the woman."
The collision appears to be caused by negligence, and was not simply an accident. "Accident" is a euphamism, a weasel word designed to make the violation appear less severe.
Please stop politicizing the headlines, Slashdot.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
I agree that the texter is not responsible for the accident, but the initial ruling:'the slap on the wrist' that the textee got, well, IMHO, $775.00 USD is way too small compensation for two innocent victims, both of which had to undergo leg amputations as a result of textee's 'distracted driving'.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
if i get the sense i'm talking to someone who is driving, i will say "are you driving? i'll get off the phone"
it's not about being a hyperactive boy scout, it's not about the law, it's about living with myself. because if i am on the phone with someone while they are driving and i am AWARE of it, then i am responsible for continuing the conversation, and helping to keep the driver distracted
i have to live with myself. and i have to respect myself
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Posting on FB is for everyone I think while texting is for a specific person so I think even if the judge had ruled otherwise it would not have applied to FB stuff. That said, it was the responsibility of the driver to not text while driving, unless he got a text message saying " I know you are driving lets sext chat"
"Best was ordered to speak to 14 high schools about the dangers of texting and driving and had to pay about $775 in fines, but his driver's license was not suspended."
would have been pretty far fetched if you'd be liable for sending txt's as distraction to someone though... quite ridiculous even. but as publicity stunt it works ok. anyhow, terrorists should just drive around in vans with gas containers texting each others it seems, it's a pretty low fine for putting two people on insurance living for the rest of their lives. (yay a card!).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
I don't think it's greed that motivates two people who've both lost limbs due to someone else's reckless driving to sue whomever their lawyer says they should name in the suit. They've been deprived of something most of us take for granted (basic mobility), and should have the right pursue compensation for the difficulty they'll face the rest of their lives. The stupid shyster they hired simply gave them really misguided legal advice, that's all.
sure, this is good practice. but if you don't know, or are too distracted to notice it is still not your responsibility. being a text, it seems reasonable to assume that the receiver will read it when it is appropriate to do so.
But anyone with an ounce of logic can see it is bad to sue someone who is not responsible. This is completely money grabbing. Just because you have been injured doesn't mean you should try and ruin everybody else's life.
So you're saying that this couple should not have applied basic logic to what their lawyer was telling them?
If the distracted driver had been listening to the radio instead, should they have sued the radio station?
Can somebody with more knowledge ofthe US legal system explain what appears to be a tiny penalty for crashing into and permanently disabling two people? I would have expected a more serious punishment.
Is this a typical punishment for this kind of crime?
Hmmm
The only person responsible for the accident was the driver of the car. He chose to read the text messages whilst driving. What I cannot understand is the reasoning from the courts as to the decision handed down to the driver of the car. Such a serious accident and he did not even get banned from driving? As a motorcyclist that has to contend with car drivers paying insufficient attention to the road on a daily basis, I have to state that the driver should have been penalised much more severely for his actions.
Why is he a douchebag? Just because he and his wife each lost their left legs in the crash while the driver gets sentenced to less than a thousand dollars in fines and has to speak a few schools on the dangers of texting and driving? If she knew he was texting while driving, I'd say there is a small amount of culpability on her part. But I'm guessing that the reason the girlfriend is getting sued is that the kid and his parents have no money. Probably the best the couple can hope for is to get judgement that's to garnish his wages for the rest of his life.
If you don't answer the IM, it remains in your inbox just like an email. If you are unavaliable to take the call, IM, or Email while driving, let it go to voicemail, inbox, etc. I'll still be there when you have time to deal with it.
In many places distracted driving due to phone use is illegal. My contacts know I don't take calls while driving, but I am aware I have a message, either voicemail or text.
The illegal act or dangerous act was the driver's responsibility. I'm not sure if texting while driving is lillegal where he was, but it is still dangerous, which was demonstrated by the driver.
The truth shall set you free!
insightful? are you kidding me?
Two people lost their legs because the asshole was texting. I'd give them a pass for being a little cranky and suing around!
That an AC could be a sociopath devoid of any empathy is par for the course, but mods, really?
Having bad things happen to you does NOT EVER give you a free pass to cause bad things to happen to others.
The greedy part was suing someone who wasn't involved.
If the guy was listening to talk radio, and something they said something that distracted him, would the radio station, or those talking on the radio be at fault? No. The argument is the same. They (those on the radio) have a reasonable expectation that people may be listening while driving. That's the only time a lot of us listen. Morning and evening commutes have higher advertising costs, because they know that's the peak time for listeners. They don't only expect it, they profit from it.
Is it their fault for making the driver pay more attention to the radio than to the road around him? No. The fault was assigned properly in the beginning, with the driver who committed the action. Going anywhere beyond that is trying to profit from the incident. Will they continue on and sue the telephone manufacturer? the carrier? the vehicle manufacturers? the city/count/state highway department? any store front near the incident? owners and advertisers of any billboards that may have been visible? How about the girl jogging, she was clearly a severe distraction.
You *can* sue all of them. You probably won't win any of them, and will make a lot of enemies along the way. That's one of the wonders of our legal system. You can sue anyone you want, any time you want, for pretty much anything you want. It doesn't mean you'll win.
I have sympathy for the people who were injured. Life sucks. I know.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
If someone (the driver in this case) because of massive stupidity or carelessness does something terrible to you (or your loved ones), and the state does not punish them severely, then you are given free pass to extract whatever punishment is due. My opinion only.
You don't consider it douchebagy to sue an innocent person just because they have money?
suing is not "causing bad things to others". it is simply asking a judge "don't you think this person owes me money because of his behavour?". The judge said no, case closed. explain to me the harm they have caused to anyone aside from the inconvenience to walk to court? something that incidentally the defendant did not even do?
But then again, if you cannot even muster the sympathy to excuse the act of "slightly inconveniencing" by the injured couple, I don't think we can ever agree.
Of course you don't have to, it is just that for functioning human beings it is natural to be understanding to people that suffered a loss.
If you get found guilty of filing a frivolous lawsuit... you should be punched in the face.
I'm not going to bother levying a fine. These idiots are litigious jerks and probably are broke anyway. Why bother with that. Just have the bailiff pop him in the face.
Barbaric you say? Not at all. Barbaric would be one person randomly coming up to another person on the street and doing it. The difference between kidnapping someone for ten years and prison is the court system.
So if the court determines you filed a frivilious lawsuit... one solid pop to the face. Nothing more or less. You want to file another suit? Go for it.
I have no idea if this would cut down on bullshit lawsuits but I'd like to experiment with it.
What about corporations? That's a little more complicated. I don't want to just punch the lawyer in the face because for all we know he's just some young legal grad they hired to be a punching bag. I'd probably go with the head of their legal department or possibly their CEO. God knows Steve Jobs should have been punched in the face a few times went he decided to touch off this patent Armageddon.
Possibly a stupid idea... but it would make judge judy more interesting to watch. Can you just picture this in a tv court show? That would be delicious.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Back in another life when I worked in law-enforcement the correct term to use was "traffic collision." This is how you will see it reported on the California Highway Patrol incident page: http://cad.chp.ca.gov/
~~~~~~~
"You are not remembered for doing what is expected of you." - Atul Chitnis
It's not your responsibility to make sure the other person is behaving properly. Do you ask if they just put the baby in the bath, or put a pan full of oil on the stove? I kind of doubt it.
On plenty of occasions, I have answered to say "I'm driving, I'll call you back in a few." If I'm of the belief that where I am driving is too difficult to even do that, I let the phone ring. It's the difference between a long straight empty highway, or navigating city streets with other drivers around.
What if your "sense" isn't right. For example, my mom drives a nice car, that's dead silent inside. Her calls go through via bluetooth to the cars sound system. I can't tell the difference if she's out somewhere, driving, or sitting at home and didn't get to the home phone first. She will tell me "I'm driving, let me call you back."
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
suing is not "causing bad things to others". it is simply asking a judge "don't you think this person owes me money because of his behavour?". The judge said no, case closed. explain to me the harm they have caused to anyone aside from the inconvenience to walk to court?
Sorry, no. Suing someone is saying, "I think this person has done me harm enough that I will take the court's time and incur legal fees to get what I think is coming to me."
For someone who doesn't have a lawyer on retainer, being sued will generally cost a minimum of several hundred dollars.
The recipient of such messages is in complete control as to whether or not to acknowledge such messages. Although this might on the surface seem similar to cases where a bartender was held responsible for serving a 'drunk', in this case, the recipient of the messages is in full control of their faculties.
I don't think it's greed that motivates two people who've both lost limbs due to someone else's reckless driving to sue whomever their lawyer says they should name in the suit.
The job of the lawyer is to suggest all possible avenues of recourse. The job of the people in the accident is to realize that the person sending the text is in no way responsible and telling the lawyer not to submit them to a frivolous lawsuit.
If someone doesn't have a lawyer on retainer, it's going to cost them hundreds of dollars to deal with being sued, even if they're completely innocent.
No, this had nothing to do trying to get money from her.
When something bad happens, you sue everybody who's connected to the defendant and to the incident in any way. That's the standard unofficial rule. By doing that, you're hoping that the defendants turn on each other, or at the very minimum, that one of them talks too much.
suing is not "causing bad things to others". it is simply asking a judge "don't you think this person owes me money because of his behavour?". The judge said no, case closed.
Sure, as long as they pay the defendant's court costs for bringing such a stupid lawsuit, I'm okay with it. (as it is the article has been slashdotted so I can't read whether or not they did)
AccountKiller
explain to me the harm they have caused to anyone aside from the inconvenience to walk to court?
Walking to court costs nothing.
Walking to court with a lawyer will cost you $600/hr, for who knows how many hours to prepare for the completely baseless case. Luckily she had a judge that was smart enough to throw the case out quickly. God help her if this was dragged to trial, as the 'inconvenience' could have run into the thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.
They are assholes for dragging a woman into court that they know is completely innocent. Period.
... so then you will just get sued for failing to keep the car's AV definitions up to date? Or for rooting your car to get rid of the carrier bloatware (car will still an internet connection, after all... subsidized cars on a two year contract, anyone?) so the turn by turn navigation won't drive you ten miles out of your way in order to pass in front of an olive garden that has a targeted ad pushed to you?
Some states do not allow the wages to be garnished. In Florida a garnishment is excessively rare although the system has one or two now and then. Combine that with a physical injury cap of 10K per person and the victims can't even pay for the initial ER bills much less the tons of bills and loss of income and life long disabilities. And it gets even worse. In some counties many people have no insurance and not even a driver's license. Retired people who feared loss of life time savings set these laws and policies into motion.
I think the law needs to be altered to change that from "assholes" to "criminals" at the judges discretion.
Actually, they were injured because some asshole was reading texts (OK, maybe he was replying as well). But he didn't have the good sense to leave his f*cking phone alone while driving.
The fact that the driver's sentence was just a slap on the wrist is what is disturbing. But just going after the next person with deep pockets or a paid up liability policy is ludicrous.
Have gnu, will travel.
No it isn't. The job of the lawyer is to advocate for his client. Suggesting to the clients dumb ideas which won't work and will only end up costing them legal fees is not advocating.
so then you will just get sued for failing to keep the car's AV definitions up to date?
That would be Google's job, not yours. And why would the car need AV at all? It's not gonna be running Windows and it will be an embedded system.
Or for rooting your car to get rid of the carrier bloatware (car will still an internet connection, after all... subsidized cars on a two year contract, anyone?) so the turn by turn navigation won't drive you ten miles out of your way in order to pass in front of an olive garden that has a targeted ad pushed to you?
If the system has been perfected, this would not be an issue. There would be no carrier. Why would anyone in their right mind consider relying on internet connection for safety? The car would be completely autonomous with no need for the internet. Maybe a map upgrade once in a while only, which can be done via wifi overnight.
Then why sue anybody at all?
Because that's the only system we have. IANAL, but I don't think they could sue anyone asking for a "permanent cell phone" ban (not that it would be enforceable anyway).
Personally I'd rather see them sue asking for the removal of the driver's thumbs. Because if there's any chance to make the driver believe even for a second that he could actually lose his thumbs, he might finally understand that he shouldn't be playing with his damn phone while driving.
P.S. I completely disagree with them suing the girlfriend, but I can't say that I wouldn't get equally suckered by a slick-talking lawyer in a similar situation. Walk a mile, and all that...
It's certainly reasonable for someone to think, "this lawyer's advice is awfully illogical and almost evil." But the law is a regulated profession. How often is common sense really useful in law? We trust lawyers, enforced by regulation, to give their clients good legal advice because a client cannot be expected to differentiate between a good and a bad legal strategy. The same is true of doctors or any other licensed and regulated profession. You should be comfortable in trusting the advice of your lawyer; if your lawyer gives you bad advice, the onus is on them as a professional.
Actually, you should read what he wrote. That's exactly what he said. It is out of a sense of responsibility, and he does "sense" if they are driving.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
I guess you've been watching too many TV law shows. Plus you're a shiester if you think suing everybody, and not just a responsible party is a good idea. So this idiot driver ruined some people's lives. And now you're saying that they in turn get to go and financially rape somebody else who has no fault in the incident? Lawyers to defend against frivolous lawsuits are not free and aren't cheap. Why should the guy's girlfriend have to go broke to pay for one when it wasn't her fault. If the guy was driving, he should have put the phone down and kept his hands on the wheel and eyes on the road. Sue him. He's the guilty party. Only a lowlife would want to punish people who didn't do anything.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
They tried this at a driving school in Belgium. Most people realised pretty quickly how dangerous it was.
Yeah, regulated by lawyers. What the fuck is up with that? That is why legalize is so hard to understand. It's so they can keep regulating themselves by arguing that the average person can't understand law without a degree. But I guess that is especially true when you invent a language that requires years of schooling to understand. But really, that is just the cost to join the club where you get to fuck with people's lives and if you do something wrong, some other guys in the same club get to judge you, but will be lenient lest they be judged by others in the same club. There should be no self regulated groups.
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
You wouldnt need an antivirus. This is one of the cases where a walled garden provided by manufacturer/google works really well. You can only run apps tested and signed by Google/manufacturer.
I doubt they would target ads this ways, as I most likely will not even look out of the car. I would simply watch a movie, read the daily news, till I reach the destination.
They are assholes for dragging a woman into court that they know is completely innocent. Period.
You don't know innocence or guilt until a person is tried, and they may have had reason to believe she was at least partially culpable. If she knew her boyfriend was driving, there's a case there that she was a party to an act of gross negligence.
I agree entirely with the judge's ruling: the court has to set hard limits to where you can assign blame so as to prevent an inquisition. We don't know if the texts reveal that she knew, also, but it seems unlikely.
But in light of how severe their damages were, I think they were right to bring it before the court, even though it was a long shot.
And they probably also felt morally wronged by her, and it's not at all unreasonable to seek out justice through the system that society has set in place to resolve such disputes. Especially when, you know, you just lost your fucking leg.
The fact that he gets a light fine means nothing when the *CIVIL LAWSUIT* is prepared. Unless otherwise mentioned, I assume he has liability insurance. His insurance company will probably settle out of court with the motorcyclists. They have an open+shut case, and a jury will be very sympathetic to them, so the insurance company will probably pay very close to their initial demands.
Going after his girlfriend is sleazy, however. That crosses the line.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
Suing a person who has no involvement just because they have money clearly qualifies as douchebaggery.
I would say it's not exactly the same. The bartender is able to see the status of the person right in front of them. On the other hand the person texting probably doesn't know if the recipient is driving.
The lack of national health care and a decent social safety net in the United States is one of the biggest drivers behind "frivolous" lawsuits like this.
In most European countries, the injured couple would have all their medical expenses automatically covered. They would not face the risk (ubiquitous in the U.S.) of medical bankruptcy. They would also be able to take advantage of other social programs if they were too seriously injured to continue work in their current jobs.
In the U.S., when you get seriously injured, you face the very real probability that you will be financially ruined as well. Therefore, your only defense is to find someone with deep pockets who is arguably responsible for the accident, and sue them.
Likewise, in Europe, it's harder and less lucrative to sue for injuries arising from consumer products – but there are also much stricter safety regulations and the regulators are less shy about yanking products from the market if they do prove genuinely unsafe.
We as a country have decided to outsource large parts of our regulatory and insurance apparatus to the courts, and this is the result.
Well if they had stopped and thought about it for a second they would have realized that the ONLY person responsible was the one driving the car.
Just because the driver of the car got off lightly on criminal charges doesn't mean that they can't sue him for ruining their quality of life.
If she knew her boyfriend was driving, there's a case there that she was a party to an act of gross negligence.
And that line of thinking is why our legal system is so fucked up. She didn't text while driving, and she didn't hit the couple. Why the hell is she responsible for making sure someone else isn't doing something stupid and irresponsible?
This seems pretty weird to me - had the guy been drunk, he'd certainly got a much stiffer punishment.
However - the guy is sober, and still decides to do something as idiotic as texting while manoeuvring over a ton of steel, and gets fuck all... Kind of pathetic.
This is why they have harsh punishment for drunk driving, it can lead to results like this. So he gets the result without being drunk, and gets less punishment than driving drunk and not hitting anything. Good job justice.
There's a serious disconnect between punishment for drunk driving, vs. texting, reckless, etc, when they are all dangerous.
Sent from my PDP-11
Only if you are Catholic.
Kid-proof tablet..
Oh. And I almost forgot:
And if you ARE Catholic, then you simply go to confession sometime afterward, and it's all cool.
Morally, at least. As so-defined.
YMMV (my own mileage certainly does vary).
Kid-proof tablet..
You don't know innocence or guilt until a person is tried
Well, actually you can, as much as anyone can "know" anything, anyway. The legal system allows for a very specific process which has specific outcomes based on its rules. You cannot be declared guilty legally without going through that process, even if it otherwise irrefutably known by one or more people that you did, in fact, commit whatever act of which you have been accused.
Granted, I doubt in this particular case the couple actually did know his girlfriend was completely without knowledge of the circumstances, though any lawyer worth their salt should have advised them their lawsuit was completely baseless. Absent some serious edge-case circumstances, there is absolutely no way you can legitimately argue a case of gross negligence from a set of asynchronous communications. It would require very specific conditional knowledge and the burden of proof would be very high indeed. From the article, it appears more as if the lawsuit was to send a message. Whether that's an abuse of process or not I'll leave for another time.
to sue whomever their lawyer says they should name in the suit
If this was their lawyer's suggestion, they should actually be suing him for legal malpractice.
It is because MADD is a very powerful lobby. What these people should have done was spend that money on badgering the courts to stiffen penalties instead of trying to hit the Court Lottery.
There are two douchebags in this case, but they are not the victims of the crime or the merely peripherally involved girlfriend.
The first douchebag is the guy who ploughed into the victims' motorcycle as he texted while driving. The second douchebag is the NJ court which "punished" him with a $775 fine and a few hours community work, but did not even suspend his driver's licence. It has been repeatedly established that texting while driving is more dangerous than driving while impaired by alcohol. He should have received rather more than this slap on the wrist, and the victims of his crime apparently plan to appeal his light sentence.
In Finland and various other countries, and in several states of the US, the law is you stop your car to talk or text on any communication device. You may get fined if observed talking or texting on the phone even if your driving is otherwise perfect.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
I don't understand how it is possible that the driver had to pay less thank 1k. In Italy we have penal sanctions that are too low, for this kind of crime, but the civil penalties can run in the hundreds of thousands, in fact you MUST have insurance to drive to cover them just in case. Don't you have compulsory insurance in the USA?
Ander
@=
? If she knew he was texting while driving, I'd say there is a small amount of culpability on her part.
Nonsense. One reason for sending a text rather than calling is precisely so the recipient doesnt have to drop what they are doing. Maybe, just maybe, if it had been a voice call and the caller knew the other person was driving then they should take some responsibility, but really, unless the other person is in the car and literally screaming in the driver's ear, the buck stops with the driver, and texting while driving is really in its own class of mindbogglingly stupid things to do.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Sorry, what? I don't care if you lost your leg, acting like an ass and suing everyone within range after the fact makes you a fucking douchebag.
Why is this girl even remotely involved in this case at all? When driving, it is the SOLE responsibility of the DRIVER to ensure that they are paying attention to the road and following all relevant laws.
Because she sends a text to him, somehow there's a small possibility that SHE is the cause of the accident? WHAT? It is the DRIVER's responsibility to ensure that he/she is paying attention to the road. He should have ignored the text until it was safe for him to read it - it won't be going anywhere! Phones have this amazing invention called "storage" where it stores the message for you INDEFINITELY until you tell it otherwise...
That there are people in here somehow agreeing with the idea that this woman should be sued by these people simply beggars belief. They should be going after the person who hit them, and if he hasn't received what may be a "fair" punishment then they should be going after the people handing out the punishments.
WTF? You imagine some world where human-driving a car will be banned, but human-driving a motorcycle won't be? And you also think that illegally keeping your high-beamers on is somehow justified because of stupid drivers that won't notice them?
Information theory is life. The rest is just the KL divergence.
Her behavior cost these 2 persons their legs. It might not be legal matter, for good reasons, but the moral responsibility is quite clear to me, and I won't cry for the loss of 200 bucks for this girl that was part of the loss of two legs. Please review your priorities when distributing empathy.
It should have been "Unexplained Outbreak of Sanity Rocks Court"
Indeed. Mod up.
a motorcycle using high beams during daytime is not only not illegal, it's a mandatory requirement in some states.
You are an idiot.
Her behavior was 10s of miles away. She sent a text message. The couple are douchebags for suing her. Next they'll be suing the tire service center for balancing the tires, the oil change service center for changing the oil so the car could drive, and what about that evil gas station that provided the gas to car? After all, they all have "moral responsibility" for the driving douchebag that caused the accident. Might as well go all the way and nail the bank that financed the car (Hey, they have lots of cash - bailout money no less, the people's money being returned to the people!) or the car manufacturer. Heck, what about those miners that mined the iron ore?
As for distributing empathy, the victim couple still get some for the horrible losses they suffered in an accident, and I agree the driver should certainly be charged with a whole lot more than a minor driving offense. But it ends there, as far as the accident went. The girl get empathy for getting dragged into court by this apparently vicious couple who want to punish everyone they can for something that is 1 specific person's fault: the driver.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
Personally I think the girl ought to sue them for false statements, libel and slander, since they'd have had to made all three to file the suit in court. And yes, their actions deserve just such a response, and she'd walk out in a heartbeat with a win, and will send a "message" in doing so that baselessly suing others to send a message is a bad idea and will result in bad things happening to you.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
I used to regularly get calls from work when they knew I was driving. Took them a fair while to stop despite me not answering. I presume some others are a little less willing to reject a call from the boss.
Given the right circumstances, eg: traveling at 10km/h in peak hour, stopped at lights or on a motorway with no other traffic in sight I have taken calls but people get all bent out of shape when you hang up on them when the conditions change. Most people ramble on the phone too much for it to not be a serious distraction.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
I feel sorry for the bicyclists, but hitting a bicycle must be one of the few accidents that is seen as a criminal matter. It should be purely a civil matter. The driver's negligence caused the accident, the driver should be sued, and the driver should be paying this couple half his income for the rest of his life. While the "deep pockets" legal theory holds that someone even 1% responsible can be sued for 100% of the damages, clearly the judge felt that someone sending a text isn't even 1% responsible, because the driver did not need to respond to the text in any way while he was still driving. I can't speak for the details in this case, but in virtually every accident, there are things that all parties could have done to avoid the accident (e.g. staying at home that day). So in most accidents, all parties are partially to blame. In this case, labeling the bicyclists as victims and the automobile driver as the perpetrator is unfair -- just because the vehicle you're driving does a lot less damage does not absolve you of any responsibility for the accident.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
You are free to extract punishment in civil court, yes. Anything else would be a crime under our legal system.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
That there are people in here somehow agreeing with the idea that this woman should be sued by these people simply beggars belief.
And while the judge dismissed the case, he never reprimanded the attorney for filing it, so he 100% agrees with me, and I'll take his expert opinion over your utter ignorance.
Then why sue anybody at all?
Thanks for clipping my quote at the most important part, and therefore completely misquoting me. My original quote stands below:
No, this had nothing to do trying to get money from her.
Emphasis in bold is mine.
You don't know innocence or guilt until a person is tried.
sometimes you do. like in this instance.
had she lost the case i would still know she was innocent.
i spent five minutes thinking and all i got was this crappy sig
s/bicycl/motorcycl/g
The couple was on a motorcycle, not quite the same thing.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
I have only ever heard of that happening once, with Jack Thompson, and that was after repeated lawsuits where he was warned he was out of line, but still kept it up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Thompson_(activist)
It is extremely rare for anything to happen to a lawyer over a case that is filed, even if it is frivolous.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
thanks - clear summary without a political rant!
cheers :-)
I have only ever heard of that happening once, with Jack Thompson, and that was after repeated lawsuits where he was warned he was out of line, but still kept it up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Thompson_(activist)
It is extremely rare for anything to happen to a lawyer over a case that is filed, even if it is frivolous.
It's rare for anything procedural to happen unless the attorney, as in your case, is repeatedly abusing the courts. The reason is it's a waste of time to make a legal case over wasting time. But judges frequently scold attorneys who are idiots, and this one didn't.