Compare and contrast with a road accident. People involved aren’t (generally) victims of crime, even if someone not in a big metal box typically comes off considerably worse. There may well be blame, there may or may not be law breaking (driving without due care, running a red light, whatever), but you can’t just blanket assume the largest vehicle is at fault in the same way that you can in the case of personal crime. They’re different situations and not directly comparable.

That isn’t what’s going on here though, the courts do not blanket assume that the driver is at fault. As has already been stated and I’m sure has been done to death in the courts, wearing a high visibility jacket would have not mitigated the risk entirely and therefore cannot be a reason for denying her the insurance payout. The degree to which a high viz jacket would have mitigated her risk is at best a guess – guesses and court aren’t the best of friends. Even walking into traffic can in many circumstances fail to negate a lot of the risk of walking on the road, if you have very little time to react once you’ve seen an oncoming car.

You made a very long statement saying nothing of any real value about the issue at hand. The equivalent analogy to your phone example would be playing chicken with articulated lorries on the M1.

None of the analogies in this thread are relevant to the case referred to. The court has already ruled on blame. What is happening now is that the Insurers are seeking to reduce the amount they pay out and to delay that payout for as long as they can.
The girl is disabled and in need of 24/7 care, the driver is probably finding it difficult to live with the consequences of that night. Meanwhile, the insurance company are going to drag it out for as long as they can…

you can’t just blanket assume the largest vehicle is at fault

When the largest vehicle runs into the other party you can. I don’t believe there is any suggestion that the girl in this case walked into the car.

The court has already ruled on blame.

Yes, but the insurers have taken it to appeal (hence the current judgement isn’t necessarily valid) and are busy trying to argue the same as some people on this thread, that the girl could have helped to prevent the incident by not walking across the empty city park late at night wearing hi-viz.

But at the end of the day it’s men cars that are the problem and rapists drivers should be held fully accountable for their actions

the actions of the girl make the rapist driver… no less responsible.

But at the end of the day it’s men cars people that are the problem and rapists drivers adults should be held fully accountable for their actions

Fun game.

the insurers have taken it to appeal (hence the current judgement isn’t necessarily valid) and are busy trying to argue the same as some people on this thread, that the girl could have helped to prevent the incident

She almost certainly could have helped prevent the incident. Are you suggesting she couldn’t? If she’d been able to hear the vehicle or be more clearly seen, the accident might well have been avoided. Without knowing more detail, it’s hard to say for sure.

However, as I’ve said several times now, that doesn’t mean she’s in any way to blame for the accident.

I’m going to bow out here I think. A few folk are either still misunderstanding me or aren’t reading what’s being discussed, and there’s only so many times I can rephrase the same thing.

I have only a little sympathy for the driver. But clearly the driver did not anticipate anyone being there; probably driven down that road in that manner hundreds of times without incident. Not evil, just human nature.

My friend did something similar, colliding with someone changing a wheel in the bottom of a hidden dip; nothing indicates mate was speeding, just did not anticipate a car and a man stationary in the road at that point. The man lost a foot 🙁 Mate took the brunt of the blame (fair enough) but the stupidity of the victim was taken into account (I forget how it was years ago)

Being “blamed for the accident” is being confused with “could have taken steps to avoid the accident in the first place”

he almost certainly could have helped prevent the incident. Are you suggesting she couldn’t? If she’d been able to hear the vehicle or be more clearly seen, the accident might well have been avoided.

When deciding on whether to give needed compensation to a crippled girl, you can’t really be dealing in guesstimates when deciding whether to give her the money or not. There’s a chance that she might have been able to prevent the crash, then again theres a chance she could not have….you have to side with the latter.

Being “blamed for the accident” is being confused with “could have taken steps to avoid the accident in the first place”

Why is “could have taken steps to avoid the accident in the first place” even being discussed then. Surely she’s been punished enough by being crippled.

If the girl was deaf, as opposed to wearing headphones listening to music, it would be an entirely different matter.

But then again, knowing she was deaf, she probably would have taken steps to compensate for the lack of aural awareness….. like wearing a hi-vis jacket perhaps?

Being “blamed for the accident” is being confused with “could have taken steps to avoid the accident in the first place”

Indeed – and with whether her actions amount to contributory negligence, which is the only thing that’s actually worth discussing. I don’t think anybody disagrees that the most sensible thing to do is to make yourself as visible as possible, so any discussion on here other than whether she should be held partially legally responsible is just confusing the issue and results in “A few folk are either still misunderstanding me or aren’t reading what’s being discussed, and there’s only so many times I can rephrase the same thing.”

If the girl was deaf, as opposed to wearing headphones listening to music, it would be an entirely different matter.

Really? What do you think she might have done differently to avoid the accident had she not been wearing headphones?

Whenever I drive along the road in the dark, I always think “What if a black cow was standing in the road?”

IMO most drivers drive far to fast in the dark, especially on unlit rural roads. Fools doing 80mph plus in the dark on the A9 when the weather is poor, driving the deer out of the hills, are crazy.

No matter how good your lights, they do not illuminate sufficiently your stopping distance. I use Osram Nightbreaker Plus bulbs on all our vehicles which output “Up to 90% more light than standard halogen lamps, illuminating 50-75 metres on the road in front of your vehicle.” However, at 70mph stopping distance is 96m…

Still thinking about that black cow? I am.

I think part of the insurers argument is that as a horse rider, despite her age, she knew that she and the horse had to be visible on the road at night, but failed to apply that to herself.

And courts do deal in guestimates – experts for each side will put forward their views, and the judge will decide which is the most likely outcome. Despite a few cock ups along the way, it’s worked fairly well for centuries.

If the girl was deaf, as opposed to wearing headphones listening to music, it would be an entirely different matter.
Really? What do you think she might have done differently to avoid the accident had she not been wearing headphones?

She was walking on the grass verge. If she had been walking on a Tarmac footpath, and been clipped by a car, in the dark, driving too fast, would all you lot still think she was partially responsible?
Please, by all means, explain, in simple terms, how a pedestrian can be walking off the road in both cases, but be partially responsible in one case, but, presumably, not be partially responsible in the other, by virtue of being on Tarmac instead of grass.