Without taking the time to look it up, I’d guess that the brother either died before the accident from unrelated causes and she is suing his estate, or the brother died in the interim of when she named her defendants and when this was written. But I must applaud you noticing that- I read right over it without a second thought, and if someone did bother to research this it might be something suspicious to begin a search with.
As people love to point out- Canada has feee health care, so I can’t see her being able to claim therapy bills. I’m not super up on Canadian law- so I have to speak based on US legal principal. In the US you can only really hope to seek punitive damages (things like pain and suffering) where a person either acted with malicious intent, such that their actions were intended or likely to cause the harm you are suing for, or if they exercised gross negligence. In fairness to the woman- without further research and just what is known, we can’t say the boys weren’t acting in such a way- like jumping in front of cars like squirrels to cause motorists a fright for example (although I doubt that is the case I have no proof otherwise.) So I largely consider this a very low move- disgusting. But.... I can’t condemn her yet considering there isn’t enough evidence. On the surface though the idea is repulsive.
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· 6 years ago
As much as I hate it...you're right. We cant condemn her without evidence.
Well- I hate to disappoint, so I took a break and did some research. The woman was out drinking the night it happened the three boys were riding bikes 3 abreast in the road to the local plaza for a hot dog, toxicology showed no drugs or alcohol in the boys systems. The woman hit the kids, killing one and causing moderate to severe injuries to another. The police investigation cleared her and didn’t bring any charges or an arrest. Just might mention- her husband is a police officer. The allegations of speeding come from tests done by a private lab at the defendants lawyers request. They defendants lawyer also claims to have statements made by the woman to a fried that she was reading a text from her mom when it happened. So it’s still too early to condemn her per se- but I know which way I’m leaning strongly based on this.
@pokethebear- in a bit of somewhat dark humor- the father of one of the boys did in fact say that the lawsuit was a slap in the face, that they were expecting an apology and not a law suit.
It was a moonlit night. The boys were wearing reflective clothing. My research on Canadian bike laws indicate that bicycles are to be ridden in the street, and have the same rights and responsibility as motor vehicles- except on specifically prohibited road ways and high ways where bikes aren’t allowed, and when crossing certain intersections (where the bicyclist is to walk the bike and obey pedestrian signals), and obviously on designated bike paths or trails. I did not find in my (very quick) search wether or not sharing lanes between cyclists was allowed or not. I know California allows motorcyclists to share lanes while most US states do not, and I know California also allows bicycles to share lanes, but do not know for Canada or the rest of the US. Also of note- I know some local bike laws can differ across a state or country as well.
Oh- and the official (contested) police report shows she was doing 90kmh in an 80kmh zone, but the defense experts estimate closer to 113kph in an 80 (55mph~ in a 50~ vs 70mph~ in a 50~.)
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· 6 years ago
These boys would have to been planning a murder for this lady to get off scot free the way its going.
Just to add some notes I've found so far:
-The actual incident happened in 2014
-No charges were filed against the driver
-The family of the deceased boy believes they have evidence the police botched up the incident report at the time
-Apparently the family of the boy (as well as one of the other families? Not sure) sued the driver for $900,000 before she tried to sue them. This may néed some additional fact checking.
-at least one article mentions the driver's husband is a police officer
-she hit them from behind
For some reason everyone feels the need to point out the boys were riding "three abreast," which seems a bit irrelevant if they were all in the same lane, seeing as she would still have hit at least one of them even if they'd been riding single file. Unless they'd been hugging the side of the road, but she would have had no real business passing them at those speeds anyway, regardless of whether they were supposed to be there. I see dogs in the no-dogs-allowed parks sometimes, but that hardly gives me leeway to put a rake through their skull just because I wanted to clean up the leaves right then and there
I don’t think it’s an excuse or a condemnation that they were riding 3 to the lane. It’s just a pertinent fact of the incident. Ultimately if you hit a bicyclist who is obeying the law in public just following along the road, their exact position or number isn’t very relevant to the fact you would have hit anything in the road. That’s how I see it- you could MAYBE miss a single bicycle, but if 3 are riding side by side, it gets much harder in my mind to claim you didn’t see them. Especially when they are all seeing reflective clothing and have reflectors fitted. So I see t more as a support of the case that the car driver was negligent.
Hopefully you're right. Some of the recent posts on this website seem to be doing their best to make me sign up for the next mission to Mars at the moment. So I'll try and take the statement about them riding 3 abreast from the perspective you're saying, rather than as an attack on the victims, and use it as a small glimmer not to give up hope just yet
-The actual incident happened in 2014
-No charges were filed against the driver
-The family of the deceased boy believes they have evidence the police botched up the incident report at the time
-Apparently the family of the boy (as well as one of the other families? Not sure) sued the driver for $900,000 before she tried to sue them. This may néed some additional fact checking.
-at least one article mentions the driver's husband is a police officer
-she hit them from behind