Goddamn we need a loser pays rule!!!

[Perinquus]

Mother sues over son's death on school bus

I know this woman is suffering terrible grief, and in her anguish, want's to blame someone for the death of her son. It's a natural enough reaction. But I'm sorry, it's no one else's fault if her son does something stupid like stick his head out of a moving bus and loses his life thereby. From the sound of this article, the driver wasn't doing anything wrong. He was swerving to avoid an obstacle in the road - in this case, an injured animal that most people would not want to kill unnecessarily - and the plaintiff's son was doing something foolish.

Whatever happened to the days when you were expected to exercise a little common sense? And if you didn't, and got hurt, or even killed... oh well... you should have been a little smarter and more careful. Nowadays, people sue at the drop of a hat, and the danger of facing a sharp lawyer or a gullible jury is real enough to make a lot of people or companies settle when they really shouldn't. This sort of thing ties up the courts' time, and often results in outrageous settlements. A loser pays rule would curtail so much of this nonsense.

[Vympel]

I can't believe you don't have the awarding of costs in the US (at the court's full discretion). Of course, we also have nifty rules like the lawyer can't dig into any award money the plaintiff might recieve.

[Andrew J.]

I know this woman is suffering terrible grief, and in her anguish, want's to blame someone for the death of her son. It's a natural enough reaction. But I'm sorry, it's no one else's fault if her son does something stupid like stick his head out of a moving bus and loses his life thereby. From the sound of this article, the driver wasn't doing anything wrong. He was swerving to avoid an obstacle in the road - in this case, an injured animal that most people would not want to kill unnecessarily - and the plaintiff's son was doing something foolish.

He swerved? I was taught that one is never, ever, supposed to swerve, and when there's an object in the road one is supposed to brake, in a freakin' pre-licensing course!

[Darth Wong]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

[Vympel]

Ah, so it's negligence. The bus driver is fucked, and rightly so. (Didn't read the article).

[Dahak]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

Well, it depends on the animal...
You can easily run over smaller animals, like foxes or rabbits. But going against a full-grown boar or deer for instance can do some serious things to you and and your car...

[Darth Wong]

Ah, so it's negligence. The bus driver is fucked, and rightly so. (Didn't read the article).

Especially for swerving a bus full of kids to avoid a fucking raccoon, of all things. It's bad enough to swerve rather than braking under any circumstances, it's certainly negligent to do so in such a fashion that you end up hitting a tree regardless of whether any kid on the bus had his head out the window, but to do this over a raccoon? What a moron.

[Darth Wong]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

Well, it depends on the animal...
You can easily run over smaller animals, like foxes or rabbits. But going against a full-grown boar or deer for instance can do some serious things to you and and your car...

The day an impact with a raccoon destroys a bus, get back to me and I'll eat crow. Besides, it's still better to brake instead of sliding off the road and jamming your bus against a fucking tree.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

I know you are supposed to brake, but what if it is plenty clear however it happened, you don't have the distance left to stop the vehicle at your chosen speed?

[Darth Wong]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

I know you are supposed to brake, but what if it is plenty clear however it happened, you don't have the distance left to stop the vehicle at your chosen speed?

For a raccoon? Run the fucker over. For a bigger animal? Hang on; if it happens that quickly, you don't have time to safely maneuver around it either.

[Vympel]

I know you are supposed to brake, but what if it is plenty clear however it happened, you don't have the distance left to stop the vehicle at your chosen speed?

Then the animal dies I'd say. In my driving manual it says clearly that if you've got to decide between killing an animal or doing something more unsafe (like swerving)- kill the animal.

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Then the animal dies I'd say. In my driving manual it says clearly that if you've got to decide between killing an animal or doing something more unsafe (like swerving)- kill the animal.

So the official move is "If you can't brake in time, take no further evasive action and ram the obstacle, hoping for the best." OK...

[Darth Wong]

Then the animal dies I'd say. In my driving manual it says clearly that if you've got to decide between killing an animal or doing something more unsafe (like swerving)- kill the animal.

So the official move is "If you can't brake in time, take no further evasive action and ram the obstacle, hoping for the best." OK...

"If you can't STOP in time," you mean. Braking will lower your kinetic energy and greatly improve your survivability even if you don't achieve a full stop.

[Dahak]

I have to agree with Andrew. Swerving to avoid an animal is stupid, irresponsible, and was one of the first things I was warned not to do in my driving class as well.

Well, it depends on the animal...
You can easily run over smaller animals, like foxes or rabbits. But going against a full-grown boar or deer for instance can do some serious things to you and and your car...

The day an impact with a raccoon destroys a bus, get back to me and I'll eat crow. Besides, it's still better to brake instead of sliding off the road and jamming your bus against a fucking tree.

I didn't say a racoon would scratch the paint job of a bus. I'd drive right over it.
But sometime, swerving has merit, especially if you're going to hit a large animal. Those accidents can get very ugly.

[aerius]

It's a schoolbus, it'll run over anything short of a horse or cow without problems. Swerving to avoid someone's dog I ca understand, but a raccoon? Sorry, raccoons are vermin, you're supposed to run them over.

[Tsyroc]

He had an IQ described as low average or borderline, according to the suit filed in Marion Superior Court. He was hyperactive, suffered from attention deficit disorder and had problems comprehending language, according to the lawsuit.

I don't know if his IQ etc... will help or hurt the case.

The bus was traveling along the tree-lined Stop 11 when it approached the injured raccoon in the road. Students rushed to the windows to look at the animal. Raul lowered his window and stuck his head out to see what was happening.

Traveling about 30 mph, bus driver Terri Gregory swerved to avoid the raccoon. The bus tilted into a tree, trapping Raul's head. He died almost instantly, according to the lawsuit.

Do buses tilt that much when swerving at 30mph?

Something just seems odd about this. They were able to see the raccoon enough in advance that the kids wanted moved to get a look at it. Not only that but the kid that got killed had enough time to get his window down and stick his head out. This doesn't seem like the driver just reacted and swerved it makes it sound a little more like he was just going around the animal.

Except, if that was the case why did the bus lean to the point that this kid's head got caught?

The school district is at fault, the lawsuit claims, for allowing the windows wide enough for Raul to stick his head out and for failing to warn Raul of the dangers.

The city and state are at fault for failing to properly design and maintain the road, the suit claims.

It doesn't look like they are faulting the driver's skill or driving decision (probably because they wouldn't get any money from him) but instead going after the "people" with the big bucks.

I rode buses a lot in grade school and we were always told to keep our hands and other assorted body parts inside the bus at all times. I think it was even posted on later buses.

I wonder if the bit about the city & state not designing or maintaing the road properly is in regard to the tree that the kid was killed by?

[Tsyroc]

It's a schoolbus, it'll run over anything short of a horse or cow without problems. Swerving to avoid someone's dog I ca understand, but a raccoon? Sorry, raccoons are vermin, you're supposed to run them over.

Hence the 5-6 (at least) that I saw mashed along side the road between Arizona and Illinois this summer. I didn't know aerius had been touring the states.

[Dahak]

It's a schoolbus, it'll run over anything short of a horse or cow without problems. Swerving to avoid someone's dog I ca understand, but a raccoon? Sorry, raccoons are vermin, you're supposed to run them over.

But they are cute

[Gil Hamilton]

The loser paying court fees will never happen, if only to protect big business groups that use litigation as an offensive manuever, IE suing someone with a case that you can't win but due to vastly greater resources, you can bankrupt them if they fight to protect their innocence on the matter. Think the RIAA, it's one of their standard tricks to go after college students who can't afford a long court trial and thus end up getting buttfucked because frankly, they have no money to spend on a court case. Making the loser pay would deprive them of doing this effectively, so naturally legislation against this would never happen.


On topic, the bus driver swirved for a damn raccoon. That's a major driving no-no, as has been said. He screwed up and was negligent.

[Master of Ossus]

There's definitely something weird with this case.

The school district is at fault, the lawsuit claims, for allowing the windows wide enough for Raul to stick his head out and for failing to warn Raul of the dangers.

However, this ticks me off. If anything, the school and driver were negligent for performing such a dangerous maneuver, but almost every schoolbus in the country has windows wide enough so that a stupid kid may be able to stick his head through one of them.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

My driving instruction course said to swerve to avoid people and big targets. Small things they said to avoid, but run over if you couldn't slow down or avoid them.

[DPDarkPrimus]

It's a schoolbus, it'll run over anything short of a horse or cow without problems. Swerving to avoid someone's dog I ca understand, but a raccoon? Sorry, raccoons are vermin, you're supposed to run them over.

But they are cute

You've never seen the fuckers stare at you out of the sewer at night, their green eyes glowing as they slowly trot towards you while you wheel the garbage can back inside...

[General Zod]

There's definitely something weird with this case.

The school district is at fault, the lawsuit claims, for allowing the windows wide enough for Raul to stick his head out and for failing to warn Raul of the dangers.

However, this ticks me off. If anything, the school and driver were negligent for performing such a dangerous maneuver, but almost every schoolbus in the country has windows wide enough so that a stupid kid may be able to stick his head through one of them.

so does this mean people can sue automanufacturers in case a similar accident happens with their cars because cars have windows wide enough for kids to stick their head out of?

[Alyrium Denryle]

I fail to see how the entire school district is at fault for fucking bus design. The windows on a bus are roughly the same siz as any car window, they are actually smaller.

sorry, but the kids are told regularly to keep all appendiges inside the damn bus. BOth major defendants in this suit are innocent of negligence, only the driver is at fault, but they arent suing him.

[LadyTevar]

This is a case of the young boy not understanding that he is supposed to keep his head inside the bus at all times. this is something that every child is told repeatedly, and in my day, the busdriver would report you to the princple for disobeying.

it's the child's fault for not listening. Period.