Boyes Turner’s personal injury solicitors secured a £250,000 settlement in a road accident claim for a motorcyclist who suffered multiple injuries when his motorbike collided with a van as it turned across his path. Our client suffered multiple spinal and upper limb fractures, internal injuries, and damage to the arteries and nerves of his arm. He was left with reduced manual dexterity as a result of his injuries. He suffered a psychological injury. Liability and police investigations Despite the severity of our client’s injuries, the police refused to visit him in hospital to take his statement during their investigation of the accident. As soon as he was able to leave hospital, he volunteered to attend the police station to offer his account of the accident, but the police continued their investigations without speaking to our client and advised us that there was little point pursuing the case based on the unproven assumption that he had been over the legal drug-driving limit at the time of the collision. It was several months before the police disclosed the evidence obtained in their investigations. Their blood tests were negative, and further toxicology investigations revealed the presence of a controlled substance in his system, but at a level that was below the legal limit. Urgent funding for rehabilitation Whilst waiting for further police and dashcam evidence relating to the cause of the accident, our priority was to secure urgent rehabilitation and treatment for our client. We notified the defendant van driver’s insurers of our client’s injury claim and secured their agreement to pay for his early injury rehabilitation. This rehabilitation funding meant that we were able to appoint a case manager to assess our client’s immediate needs and arrange for our client to receive vital early inpatient rehabilitation, hand physiotherapy, occupational therapy (OT), psychological therapy and vocational rehabilitation. We were also able to secure an interim payment of £10,000 to help ease our client’s financial hardship following the accident, which the insurers agreed not to reclaim if the awaited evidence about the cause of the accident was unsupportive of our client’s claim. Litigation risk from contributory negligence When the additional witness and dashcam evidence was received it suggested that there was a significant risk that our client might not succeed with his claim, or could have his compensation reduced by up to 75% or more for his own contributory negligence, depending on the judge’s assessment of the evidence at trial. The evidence suggested that he was weaving through the traffic and overtaking at speed and that the van driver had been proceeding correctly, had indicated and had almost completed his manoeuvre. Our client’s case would depend on whether the judge would find that the van driver should have seen our client approaching in his rearview mirror and waited before turning, and whether our client’s recollection that the van driver had not indicated before turning would be accepted or the conflicting recollections of two other witnesses would be preferred. £250,000 settlement plus interim payment, CRU and funded rehabilitation Before we issued proceedings, the defendant’s insurers made a settlement offer which would give our client a lump sum of £250,000 in addition to the interim payment, CRU benefits and funded rehabilitation he had already received. The settlement offer represented a full liability offer of £1.1million assuming a finding of 75% contributory negligence. After careful consideration of the risks and potential benefits of proceeding with the claim, our client accepted the offer. If you have been seriously injured in a road collision, and you would like to find out more about funded rehabilitation or making a claim, you can talk to one of our experienced solicitors, free and confidentially, by contacting us.
