Yesterday afternoon, will all the familiy in the car, I turned right at traffic lights. There was very little traffic. As I turned right I spotted a car parked close to the junction, facing me and on the opposite side of the road. As soon as I spotted it, the rear offside door opened and a yobbish looking person got out and walked across the road into the path of my car; he then stopped walking! I hauled the brakes on and stopped inches before I hit his legs. He then stared me out, and sauntered across the road whilst being generally abusive.
As I had my wife and two children (baby doesn't count) as witnesses that he got out of the car, walked across the road without looking and stopped in my path, would I have been arrested if I had hit him and possibly seriously injured him? Would I have been believed about his stopping in front of me?
I was sorely tempted to drive over him, but realise that this would have prejudiced my position!
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Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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Depends. If you saw him get out of the car, managed to see what type of clothes he was wearing and then watched him walk along the road, then I'd have to say that whatever kind of idiot he was, you could have played it a little better.
Not that he wasn't an idiot, but seemingly you may have been able to lessen the incident.
If he had leapt out in front of you unexpectedly, then clearly you would have been in a much stronger position.
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espada please report this incident at once to your local Police,this is very important as this idiot may have already done so.
I have had 2 experiences in the past and I repeat please go and report it in person asap.
You should have reported it yesterday after the incident.
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What incident? Slamming on the brakes?
I can't see them being very interested or happy with you for reporting it.
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Adam
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adam --his word against yours and in my previous expreciences(too long to explain here) it is adviseable to report this to the Police-they will record it-hopefully nothing will happen but you never know-at least you have reported it.
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I understand the urgency in reporting accidents Steve but his word against Espada's word for what? He doesn't have broken legs and there's no yob shaped dent in E's bonnet. What could the lad say? There was no "accident".
(I'm not having a go - I'm genuinely interested in what happens)
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Adam
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I guess the yob was just being yobbish and possibly a little envious he wasn't driving Espada's car himself!
In a similar vein should anyone happen to be driving on a USAF base during school time be prepared for the kids to walk straight across the base roads, literally without looking right or left. I can only presume that having been brought up in a litigious society, and where traffic stops for school buses, they have a sort of dollar-shaped force field surrounding them...
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In reply to Mark, I cannot remeber the clothes he was wearing even now, even though we stared at each other for several seconds. I can just about visualise him. Certainly I had to haul the brakes on before the steering returned to dead centre.
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Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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I didn't mean to sound quite so damning;
I really meant if you had time to watch what he was doing, see him get out of the car etc. etc. then at the least you leave yourself open to accusations of contributory negligence.
Certainly it is quite possible to be prosecuted for an accident which is not strictly your fault but which you could have avoided and knowingly did not.
Only you can know whether or not you could have avoided anything.
However, as someone said [Tom, I think], sooner or later he'll get his.
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I didn't mean to sound quite so damning;
Thats OK - I knew what you meant...: -)
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Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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Console yourself with the thought that one day he will try that on someone with the same mentality that he has.
On an occassion a few years ago I had a group of teenagers do more or less the same thing one night. I turned the lights off, dipped the clutch and floored the throttle. They did not call my bluff.
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This also happend to me last year - driving home from work at about 2am - pulled up at some traffic lights - next thing I know about 8 girls surround the Discovery and start banging on the window trying to get me to open the window etc. Luckily all doors were locked and I wasn't going to open a window. Just reved the engine up and I think the thought of a large 4x4 about to run over them made them get out my way - and I confess that I did run the (pointless as no other car was coming out of the side road onto the main road) red light (no camera!) and if plod had been there to see me do that I would have made sure my reasons for doing so would be dealt with too.
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Oh man I wish that had happened to me.
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Classy girls wouldn't do that Dave.
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Adam
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Think Vicky Pollard x 8!! Reckon all their sprogs were just round the corner waiting for the next push chair to come past so they could throw dirty nappies at it!
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>>>In a similar vein should anyone happen to be driving on a USAF base during school time be prepared for the kids to walk straight across the base roads, literally without looking right or left. I can only presume that having been brought up in a litigious society, and where traffic stops for school buses, they have a sort of dollar-shaped force field surrounding them...<<<
It's not litigiousness, but outside the major cities, American drivers are amazingly polite and pedestrians do just blindly walk out and expect them to stop. I have caught myself walking out of a supermarket and crossing the road to the carpark without even looking, assuming that the drivers will stop.
As far as the kids are concerned, in the USA they all travel in special yellow school buses. When these buses are stopped and are loading/unloading it is ILLEGAL to pass them even on the other side of the road (the buses have special flashing lights and moving signs to reinforce this). Therefore the kids expect they can get out of the bus and walk across the road without looking.
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It's amazing how there are idiots about who seem to think that if a metal object weighing possible 1500 KG and moving at speed hits them they will come off best!! Would you risk being left a crippled for the rest of your life? What are they on??
As frustrating as it is, I understand that if you are driving a motor vehicle you are legally bound to avoid hitting a pedestrian - even if the said walks out in front of you. As tempting as it was, you would be in trouble if you drove over this idiot on purpose --- now if it was an accident and the sun was in your eyes for that split second ........
I,ve had similar happen to me so I know how you feel!
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Do you think that this was lads daring each other in the latest form of 'Chicken', or attempting a hijack?
My son was driving through a village in the evening recently when he noticed one youth leave a group of about six waiting on the pavement near to a pub. The lad walked into the road, stopped in front of the car and turned towards it. My son had visions of what had happened to me in an attempted hijack when he was a child. He reacted instinctively, turned the car more towards the lad and accelerated. The lad jumped aside and my son swerved to pass him comfortably. When he arrived home he rang the police and informed them. I suppose that reporting it was a very sensible thing to do.
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Driving back late night (1am) I had a drunk step out literaly in front of me whilst driving through the town centre (coming round bend) thankfully I had heard drunken shouting a few minutes before and was driving slowly (20mph)otherwise 2 tons of steel would have been on top of him.
As it was the side of my bullbar clipped him and he ran off - I very much doubt de will do anything so stupid again.
Paul
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If my memory serves me, about 5 years ago a drunken youth was run over by a car after having prostrated himselp in the road, this man subsequently tried to sue the car drivers insuerers for damages the case went to the court of apeal and was thrown out.
Paul
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I was once driving along a fast stretch of A road and saw well ahead a man with a wheelbarrow waiting at the side. He seemed to be looking my way, and waiting for me to pass. So I continued. As I got nearer he moved a bit bit nearer to the kerb, looking as if he were just getting ready to cross as soon as I had passed.
Then he just pushed his barrow out into the road, and walked very slowly across. I slithered to a halt and just managed to stop.
Then I realised he was blind.
I had seen the whole thing enacted in slow motion, from a considerable distance. But I just did not believe that he was going to do what he subsequently did. In my case, the unexpected factor was his blindness. In yours, the bloke was clearly deranged, drugged, or just playing chicken. Some people for whatever reason just do not behave in a predictable way. In the end only a court would decide whether one acted as a "reasonable" person would have done in running them down.
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There was a very sad incident a few years ago in Handforth when a blind man stepped into the path of a car. The blind man was a noted local character - he would walk into the the road without hesitating, raising his white stick horizontal as he left the kerb - he'd been doing it for years. This one evening he did it after dark. The local police were very upset and the driver was totally traumatised.
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I had a slightly similar experience to Cliff a few years back.
I was driving along the street I live on in the snow, and a pedestrian was walking toward me on the road (snow too deep on footpaths). The pedestrian didn't move out of my path as I approached and I thought "This is a stupid kid messing about."
Then the person looked up, and I realised that it was a young woman who had neither seen me (she was wearing a hood and looking down because snow was falling) nor heard me - the snow muffled the noise of the car.
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A similar experience near Shoreditch... 6 AM on a Sunday, almost no traffic, but there is a confused, spaced-out guy wandering in the road, possibly high on drugs. Sees me coming and when I'm right on top of him, walks straight into my path. Fortunately as a Londoner from birth I have anticipated this and managed to stop in time, but my (American) wife was shocked, having never seen anything like that before.
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I was once driving through Guiseley looking for the Brook Motors works when I saw an old lady (probably about my age) standing on the kerb and looking intently to her left, away from me. She looked and looked and looked, and I went slower and slower and slower, until she stepped out and I stopped with her between my front nearside wheel and the kerb. She looked quite shocked to see me, and stepped back onto the kerb. I got the impression that she was almost blind. I'm very glad that I noticed her first.
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