Episode 16 of Jersey Justice™ Podcast: How Fault is Determined in Automobile Accidents in New Jersey

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Welcome to Jersey Justice, a

civil law podcast that shares

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practical tips and stories about

personal and workplace injuries.

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Join two of the brightest New Jersey

injury attorneys, Gerald Clark and Mark

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Morris of Clark Law Firm, as they take

you behind the scenes of justice and civil

5

law, but first, a quick disclaimer, the

information shared on this podcast is

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for general information purposes only.

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Nothing on this site should be

taken as legal advice for any

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individual case or situation.

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This information is not intended

to create and does not constitute

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an attorney client relationship.

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Today, I'm here with Mark and

Stephanie, and we're going to be

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talking about how fault is determined

in automobile accidents in New Jersey.

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And also we're going to be talking

about accident reconstruction.

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So welcome Mark.

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Welcome Stephanie.

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Thanks for having us.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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Absolutely.

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So I'm excited to talk about this topic.

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Mark, why don't we start the conversation

off with the , potential client wants

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to know how is fault actually determined

in an automobile accident because a

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lot of times it can be a he said she

said thing unless there's a dash cam

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or there's evidence like the previous

episode we just recorded, what are your

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thoughts on that from a legal standpoint?

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Sure, so 1 of the 1st steps, like,

anytime we take a case on or we're

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investigating cases, we'll look at the

police report and the police support

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isn't necessarily like a be all end

all of who's at fault for the crash.

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But a lot of times there's a lot of good

things in there that that can be helpful.

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, there's motor vehicle

codes that they have.

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If you ever look at a

police report, there's.

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Numbers all up and down the sidelines

and they're on the sides of the document

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and throughout, and those different

numbers actually mean something like there

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will be a code for driver inattention.

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There will be a code if.

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There was sun in the eyes

or anything like that.

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So we'll almost always start by

looking at the police report.

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You know, again, someone

may have gotten the ticket.

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A lot of times we see a careless driving.

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Sometimes you see reckless driving or

unsafe driving, but again, that ticket's

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not automatically going to come in.

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And a lot of times it doesn't

come in, in a personal injury

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case, that's a big thing.

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There'll be witness statements

every once in a while, but, but

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really it comes down to, there's.

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Only so many different types of

auto cases, you'll have like a

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rear end hit a left hand crash.

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Maybe someone runs a stop sign

runs through a red light or what?

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And just kind of doing it over the years.

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I know Stephanie can talk about it too.

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Is you get a sense like if it's a

rear end collision, it's almost always

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100 percent the defendant's fault.

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I mean, I have case after case now

where it seems to be more of like a

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relatively new phenomenon where instead

of just saying like, Hey, yeah, rear

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end collision, they give an excuse.

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Like one guy says my foot cramped, you

know, someone else was like the floor,

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the mats came up and I couldn't hit

the brake pedal, just things like that.

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But at the end of the day, New

Jersey law is pretty straightforward.

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You're responsible for

what's in front of you.

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You have to maintain a

safe following distance.

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If someone stops in front

of you and you hit them.

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It's almost always still your fault,

but sometimes that will come into play.

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If there's like a stop short

allegation, like say it's a three

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car pile up our cars in the middle.

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If the car in front of them stop short,

and then the person behind our client

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rear ended them, they hit into the car in

front, you know, every once in a while,

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there could be a small percentage of fault

put on the person that stopped short, but.

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That's not automatic, and then as crazy

as this is, even if you're going through

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an intersection where there's a green

light going through an intersection

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where you don't have a stop sign, you

still have an obligation to make proper

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observations before you're going through.

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So, pretty rarely, but every once

in a while, we'll see, like, if the

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case goes to arbitration or something

like that, they could put some fault

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on our client who went through a

green light or went through an.

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Intersection without a stop sign,

just because he's still an obligation

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to make proper observations.

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I don't necessarily agree with that, you

know, and I'm sure Stephanie too, like if

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we go to arbitration and our client's got

a green light mind in their own business,

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and someone runs through a red light and

slams into him, like we showed in that

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video clip before, I don't really think my

client should have done anything different

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or, or what, but that's really it.

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Um, at the end of the day, we've,

we've talked about to a lot, like

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Jerry mentioned on one of the last.

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Episodes, like if it's a rear end hit,

they'll still blame our client, like

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throughout the case, say they should

make proper observations, whatever it

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may be, and then get to trial and say,

Hey, you know what, we admit fault.

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And that's not now because they're

trying to be like good guys.

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There's strategic reasons behind that.

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But that's really kind of it.

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Starting points, the police report,

just from doing this, you know, there's

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different jury instructions on different

mechanisms of how crashes occur.

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And then sometimes too, like we'll even.

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If I share my screen real quick, I could

show you like, there's a diagram every

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once in a while in these police reports

that give an indication of what happened.

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Um, let me know when you can see this.

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All right, can you see what's up there?

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Yeah, now we can.

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All right, so this is vehicles

are numbered, you know,

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vehicle one, vehicle two.

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There's almost always a

description of what happened.

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You know, it says like.

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Driver 2 is traveling east, Highway 36,

vehicle 1 came on Eatontown Boulevard,

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struck his vehicle on the driver's side.

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Vehicle 1 then ran off the

road and struck a one way sign.

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Driver 1 said he was crossing Highway 36.

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Driver 1 said he thought he

had a green light signal.

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So you move down to the police

report, it says multiple witnesses

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in the area say that Driver 2 had

the green light, Driver 1 had the

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red light, so that's a good fact.

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In this case, because we've got driver tip

in this particular case, it says dash cam

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video was also submitted on this case file

showing vehicle to had the green light,

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which again, that's very helpful to us.

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That's rare that that happens.

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But so, in a case like that, where you've

got multiple eyewitnesses, you've got dash

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cam footage, and it seems pretty clear

that vehicle 1 had a red light ran through

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the red light and hit into our client.

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I don't really see that being a case

where there would be much liability

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that that could get, put on our client.

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But again, last episode, we went

through, we read the discovery responses

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from the defendant insurance company.

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And they blame our client up and down, say

they should have watched, you know, where

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they were going, follow motor vehicle

codes, all things like that, which,

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which happens in, in all these cases.

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So this one was a little bit more

straightforward than we're used to,

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but sometimes if it's like a more

complicated case, or if it's a really

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bad crash or really bad collision, like

fatalities or catastrophic injuries,

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the police will bring out like a

fatal crash reconstruction unit that

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does a way more detailed analysis.

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Or we'll go out and hire an expert that

that does something along those lines.

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I think Stephanie had a case

like a few years back, that

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that she can talk more about.

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But my understanding, I just.

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Remember from talking with her about

it like it was a girl that was crossing

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the road I think it was nighttime and

it was a really really like bad crash.

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She got real hurt and I don't know enough

about it Stephanie you could tell like if

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you guys had a good report like this So

I did have one of those cases that were

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similar to what you're saying, which is we

received the case in from another attorney

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and the police report was not really

favorable to our client and the other

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attorney was like, I don't think this is

a case, but Once we started digging into

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it, we realized that there was more to it.

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And so what it involved was a young woman

and her friends were getting off a bus.

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Over in freehold, maybe like three

to three in the morning, maybe

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about three o'clock in the morning

and, , they got off the bus and they

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were starting to cross route nine.

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they were in a crosswalk.

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But it was in dispute of whether

they had the right to cross and

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whether the little person was lit

up telling them they could cross.

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And what happened was a woman, she

worked for a paper delivery and she

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had just picked up the papers and she

was on the way to go deliver them.

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And she hit the first person

that my client was with.

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And then she hit my client.

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They went flying, severely injured.

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They had to be airlifted.

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My client had really bad injuries.

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We got the police report.

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They had to do what

Mark was talking about.

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They had to do a detailed investigation.

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A shoe was found here.

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A piece of clothing was found here.

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And it was all marked off,

and it was all measured.

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And when it came to, it did appear as

if they were in the crosswalk, and they

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were kind of about halfway into the

roadway, which is relevant for New Jersey.

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So even if they would have had, even

if the other driver had the green

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light, it was still relevant that

they were halfway into the crosswalk.

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So we kind of did a little discovery.

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Deposed the defendant and she was

this little tiny, tiny woman who could

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barely see over the steering wheel.

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So when we saw pictures of her car

inside her car, first of all, there was

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just crap everywhere, drinks and stuff.

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Papers were in the back and she had to

sit on a thing just to lift herself up

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So I'm not sure whether she even saw

our clients when she was deposed This

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is one of those cases where sometimes

it goes the right way when you have

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a case that seems clear cut against

your client But this woman this driver

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was not the least bit sympathetic.

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She said I thought I hit a deer I

was the one that was up Meaning her,

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she was the one that was so upset.

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She didn't know what happened.

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She thought it was a deer and, you

know, and I explained to her, well,

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once you found out it was Two people

that you hit then what did you do?

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She was oh, I was just so upset So it

was all about her which is super helpful.

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I'll get to that second We did not have

to go to trial But it was going to be

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helpful that she was not sympathetic

a jury would not be sympathetic to her

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Just cut the way she portrayed herself.

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So as we were doing a little bit more

digging That's when we learned, like I

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said, see, seeing pictures of her car.

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Hey, were you delivering newspapers?

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And so then once that happened, then we

brought in the newspaper carrier and they

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tried to say, Oh, she wasn't within our

control, but you know, you only have.

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Access to her, you know, you're only

entitled to go after her car insurance,

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which was only a hundred thousand dollars

So once we started doing some depositions

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and the questions then surrounded whether

The the paper carrier controlled her

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actions meaning that they told her what

time to pick up the papers They told

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her exactly how to deliver the papers.

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They told her what route to take and

so once we determined that then we were

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able to bring the newspaper carrier

in We also had our own investigator go

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out there and what he did, which was

kind of interesting because the other

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driver was saying, Oh no, I was going

to speed limit, I wasn't going too fast.

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And so what he did is one of the

things he went out and did an

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analysis over like an hour.

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hour and a half for three days and saw

that people normally go a certain speed.

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And so we were able to see, Oh, okay.

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So the normal person is going

10, 15 miles over the speed

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limit during that time period.

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So it was most likely that

she was also speeding too.

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So that was super helpful

with respect to that.

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Our client was a doll.

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She was, like I said, she

was seriously injured.

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She had a hard time getting

through her deposition.

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So we just had to keep taking breaks

and keep walking her through it.

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That case ended up settling for 500,

000, probably could have settled

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maybe a bit more if the liability.

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Was clear cut and that kind of goes along

with what Mark was saying in the beginning

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if that would have been a case where she

was in a car and she was rear ended or

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she clearly had the crosswalk sign and

she was driving and then this, I mean,

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she was walking on the crosswalk and this

driver blew a red light, then it would

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have been a whole different story, but

when you're settling it or when you're

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going to trial, there is some liability

that is assessed against this Mike, our

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client who It appears walked against a

red light, but it was still a very, very

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good settlement for that type of case.

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Yeah.

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And Dimple too, I don't want to, I may

have just taken this for granted, but

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like why it matters, like percentages of

fault, like Stephanie's talking about how,

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like her client could have been blamed

for, you know, going against a red light.

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Like if she was found more than

50 percent at fault, then she

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would get nothing in the case.

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And if there was like, you know,

the case went to trial and a jury

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came back and gave a verdict where,

say they awarded 100, 000 and they

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determined that Stephanie's client

was 30 percent at fault, like

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she'd only be able to get 70, 000.

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So the recovery gets discounted by

whatever percentage of fault you are.

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And that's what.

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The law is in New Jersey, like some

States, it's contributory negligence,

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where if you're one iota at fault,

you get nothing like I had a case one

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time that got transferred to Maryland.

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That was the law down there,

which is really, really tough.

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New Jersey's comparative

fault, which is good.

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So as long as you're not more than 50

percent at fault, you can recover since

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it appears she went against the crosswalk

indicating that she was free to go.

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She could have most likely.

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Then more than 50 percent at fault,

she was very happy with that, but

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that was a case where originally when

we looked at the police report, it

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seemed like, Oh, this is not a case.

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This is not a good case.

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The prior attorney had said now hands off.

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And then once we kind of dug into

it a little bit more, got our own

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investigator, did a lot of depositions.

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Found out some little holes in the story.

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You know, we actually actually deposed

the bus driver and everybody up to that

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point had said, Oh yes, your clients,

they did not have the right away to walk.

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The driver had a green light, but

this bus driver, he let them off.

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And as he started pulling away.

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I asked him, did you look up

and see what the light was?

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And he said, yeah, I think it, I

think the other driver might've

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had a red one, but I'm not sure.

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So it gave me a little bit of a

doubt where it was like, okay,

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everybody else is saying it.

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She, the driver definitely had a green.

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And then this bus driver was like,

no, she might've had the red.

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And so then, which in our case created

a nice little question of fact, because.

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Maybe my client didn't

go against the red light.

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So little nuances like that are super

important and taking depositions and

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finding little nuggets like that,

that can help your client and help

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your case are why we do what we do.

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So I was sitting here as you were

talking about, like doing the deposition,

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this case was way pre COVID, right?

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Like this was back in 2016.

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So I picture because depositions

for the past three plus years

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have all been over Zoom.

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Like if that had been a depth over

deposition over zoom, you may have not

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even known that she was this like five

foot, nothing person, like I'm seven

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feet tall, I'm sitting in this chair

or I'm, you know, four foot eight.

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There's no way to know.

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So that probably made a big

distinction too, because it paints a

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totally different picture, a totally

different analysis of the case.

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Like if you're just picturing

someone going along, you're like,

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what, like, what could happen?

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But then you're picturing some

little old lady or just not

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assuming she's old or what picturing

someone like down like that.

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That's a totally different analysis.

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Absolutely.

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And that's why also discovery is great

when you get photos of the, um, cause the

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police did a really thorough investigation

and they had photos of her car.

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And like I said, it was not only a mess,

but then there was a big pad on her seat.

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I mean, like, like three phone books.

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Big.

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And I remember saying to her, do you,

do you need to sit on that to drive?

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And she was like, yeah.

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And then, So I think I literally

think that's exactly what happened.

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She was this little tiny

lady could barely see.

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And it was dark and you know,

they allegedly had dark clothing

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on my client and a friend.

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Stephanie does.

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And this is like a little hype for

her, but she does such a good job

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kind of peeling off like the layers

of the onion of cases like this.

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Like she's saying, she took it over

from an attorney that rejected it.

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And then goes and gets a half

a million dollar recovery.

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And just even like talking about

noticing that there's a bunch of

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newspapers in the car and like,

were you delivering newspapers?

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Because if you're doing something in

the scope of your employment, that opens

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up another potential layer of insurance

coverage, which is normally going to

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be much higher than someone's just.

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Personal auto coverage, so just to even

get into that ballpark of another layer

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of coverage was a great step because

these crosswalk cases are not easy.

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You talk about like

apportioning liability.

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I had 1 where a girl was

crossing and same thing.

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It was dark out.

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I think she was going against

the light or came out.

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She was going against the light, but

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through the intersection when she got hit.

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So that was a fact that

was kind of helpful.

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And the guy that hit her was like 88,

89 years old or something like that.

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So that was kind of another factor

that was like, Hey, look, you know,

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reasonable person probably would have

seen her it's kind of helpful there.

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And then it, it matters to like

what the insurance coverage was.

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I think in my particular case,

it was like a hundred thousand

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dollars policy or maybe even less.

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And she had a ruptured globe to her

eye, which is like a nasty injury.

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And the insurance company, their

analysis is going to be, would

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probably be more expensive to fight

that case than just to pay out.

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Like Stephanie's case, it's like,

that's not like a, ah, here you

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go type of money to give out.

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Like that's a really, really good

result in a, in a tough case.

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But I'll tell you another

kind of funny story.

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I had a client who was also hit

in a crosswalk by another old

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gentleman who was small and he

was properly in the crosswalk.

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And.

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driver that hit him only

had a 15, 000 policy.

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And I remember showing up

at the deposition and I was

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like, what do you people do?

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And why are you not tendering the 15?

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He's like, ah, we probably

will after the deposition.

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I said, all right, I'm deposing

the guy really nice old guy.

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And so I'm kind of asking him

like, what were you doing that day?

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And ended up coming out that

he was delivering auto parts.

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I asked the question, were you in the

course and scope of your employment?

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I phrased it a little bit differently.

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Were you working at that time?

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Had you just had delivering?

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And he was like, Oh, yeah, yeah,

I was working and I remember his

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counsel was like, you were working

and I was like, you were working.

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Well, I mean that case ended up settling

for eight hundred thousand So had we

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not dug that dug into that a little

bit and that was actually a really fun

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one in the respect of the auto parts

place This guy had a punch in like

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an old fashioned time punch card So I

requested all of his punch cards for

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like a year before this incident, right?

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And including the day of the incident,

every other time, every other

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time the guy worked from 8 to 4.

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30, but on this day, and it was an

actual punch out, but on this day,

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he allegedly clocked out at 3 p.

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m.

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And that was the only time

card in all of them that was

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handwritten with the guy's initials.

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So take it as you will, which I took it as

the auto parts place actually, you know,

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it's said that he was clocked out at that

exact time before the incident, meaning

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he wouldn't have been in the course and

scope of his employment at the time of.

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That he hit my client.

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That was like time card, time card.

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It was probably 50, 60 time cards.

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I had to show the guy and

each one was the same thing.

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That was a good one.

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That one settled for,

I think over 800, 000.

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Yeah.

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Like you can't help, but have these

like soapbox moments kind of when you're

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doing this, like to call it, but like

play, everyone thinks plaintiff, you

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picture like, Oh, the guy that goes and

slips on ice and it's like, Oh, great.

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I'm going to go get like money

out of this, that example.

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Just doesn't even really stand out

as something that ridiculous because

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it happens in so many of these

cases, like construction cases.

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You have to file motion after motion

to get like the contract for the job.

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It could be like a multi

million dollar job.

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And they're like, oh, there's no contract.

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Oh, there's no safety plans.

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And then 3 court orders later,

they're like, okay, here you go.

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Here's the 200 page contract.

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Here's, you know, 1000

site photos and like.

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All our safety records, but it takes

like thing after thing after thing.

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And what Stephanie is talking

about, there's sometimes it's

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a jury charge that, that deals

with like spoliation of evidence.

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Like if you get rid of evidence to try

and thinking it will help the case, like

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the jury can be charged against that, but

like fabricating evidence or people think

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that that could be, you know, it's going

to end up helping them out, but you get

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good attorneys that pick up on that stuff

and dive into it and it backfires so bad,

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or like it makes the case so much worse.

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Like Stephanie picking up on that and

going exploring that, like everybody,

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well, you would hope everybody sees

through that, what that is, and

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like, that adds value to the case.

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Like that doesn't mean the guy's

injury is worse or what, but like

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everybody's analysis involves

what's a jury going to do.

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Every way we look at a case is like,

what's going to happen at trial.

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How would a jury perceive this?

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It's one thing that the

guy got really hurt.

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It's another, then that the defendants

in the case are trying to cover up

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evidence to stop this guy from getting

like fair compensation for what happened.

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Like that should piss people off.

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Like that should get jurors like upset.

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And like an angry jury for

us is like, is a good jury.

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Yeah, that's a great point.

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What I love is it's finding the loophole

and Stephanie's so thorough and Really

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noticing the details of what matters in a

case like sometimes It's like the smallest

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thing and someone else may overlook

that can make the biggest difference in

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What's gonna be the outcome of that case?

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So thank you for sharing that

Stephanie Yeah, those like,

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what do you mean by that?

403

Or like, like, why do you say that?

404

Questions sometimes can open up such

like doors that you would never expect.

405

Yeah.

406

So that's just awesome.

407

And Mark, did you have anything else?

408

I think that's really it.

409

Like Stephanie talked about, it

looks like this was really thorough.

410

The client had taken a bunch of pictures.

411

It looks like we sent.

412

Multiple investigators out there,

one like early on in the case just to

413

document the area and then another.

414

I think, did you end up doing a

crash reconstruction in the case?

415

Stephanie?

416

We didn't have to do a cross

reconstruction because the police

417

did a thorough got it direction.

418

Like I said, the point that helped

us in their crash reconstruction

419

was where the initial impact was.

420

was, and it showed the initial

impact was in the crosswalk

421

in the middle of the road.

422

And in New Jersey, if you are halfway

in the middle of the road in a

423

crosswalk, even if the driver has a

green light, they're obligated to stop.

424

Um, so it was very important for

us to show that they were in the

425

crosswalk and it happened almost

middle of the way through the road.

426

It all like comes down to as well,

again, again, I guess just jumping up

427

on a soapbox, like it's just fairness,

like who the heck hasn't crossed

428

at a crosswalk when there's a green

light, you look like, is it safe?

429

So that from what I would understand

about that, like, if you're halfway

430

through crosswalk, that doesn't just

give the oncoming driver card bonds

431

to the slam into you, you got to

make proper observation and there's

432

jury instructions up and down.

433

Like the law that the judge would read

to the jury at the end of the case about

434

whether someone's in a crosswalk, not

in a crosswalk, whether they've got the

435

right away or don't have the right away.

436

So it's not like, yup, you automatically

win just cause you're in a crosswalk

437

or Nope, you automatically lose

because you weren't in a crosswalk.

438

And I do have like, it would probably

take me a second to pull it up.

439

So it might not make sense, but the

idea of like what a crosswalk is

440

a lot broader than you would think

to, it's not just the actual, like.

441

Stephanie, when it comes to determining

fault in accidents, right, what

442

type of car accident is the most

difficult to prove who was at fault?

443

Is there a particular type?

444

Because like Mark was saying

earlier, you get hit from behind.

445

It's usually the person who hit him.

446

It's their fault.

447

But is there a particular scenario where

it is hard to determine who is at fault?

448

We actually have a new case right now

where both of them are saying that they

449

had the green light in an intersection

with our client saying she had a

450

green light, the other client saying

they had green light and they don't,

451

there's no cameras, the police, they

actually did not interview a lot of

452

the witnesses because they said they

didn't have time apparently, but there

453

were some witnesses that actually

witnessed that the other driver went

454

through the green light and we're

trying to find one of those witnesses.

455

So that one's going to be a

little bit more of a challenge.

456

We had an actual witness or a lot of

times they have the video cameras in the

457

intersection that makes it much easier,

but that's definitely a hard case.

458

A left turn case.

459

If our client's coming out and making

a left turn and somebody is coming from

460

their left, , I had one of those cases

was a few years ago and it was a really

461

nice old guy and he was coming out

and making a left and the other driver

462

hit him and automatically off the bat.

463

You.

464

You would think, well,

your guy was making a left.

465

He should have, you know, and the other

woman had the proper right of way.

466

But once again, we kind of did a little

digging and she was on her way to school.

467

She was a school cafeteria aide.

468

And so I subpoenaed the records

for the school and showed that

469

she was supposed to get there.

470

a lot earlier than she was going

to be getting there, which kind of

471

supported our theory that she was

speeding up and over that hill.

472

That definitely helped.

473

And then we ended up settling

that case for the policy, but

474

those are definitely tough cases.

475

Yeah.

476

I think I covered a

deposition on that case.

477

I remember that.

478

Which again, that's awesome.

479

That's peeling back the onion layers.

480

I'm telling you, this isn't like, again,

soapbox and like self promotion, but

481

like, there's not a lot of attorneys and

law firms out there that are going to

482

take that extra step with an auto case

like that, that Stephanie just talked

483

about, like subpoenaing the defendant's

employment records to show that she was

484

late for work, that was a case from what

I recall, where like every case it's,

485

you know, who's at fault, what are the

injuries, what's the insurance coverage.

486

Almost always one of those things

is lacking, like are missing.

487

So I would imagine in that case, the

issue, the thing that was like, you know,

488

the biggest fight was probably liability.

489

So like a lot of people just go, nah,

you know, we'll settle this real cheap

490

or be like, we're not going to take

this case or take a deposition, but like

491

not go that extra step that Stephanie

went and by getting those records

492

again, like, ladies and gentlemen,

the jury, my client pulled out and the

493

defendant was speeding and hit her.

494

Okay.

495

Like, whatever, like says you,

you're trying to get my ladies and

496

gentlemen, my client look both ways.

497

So no one was coming.

498

The defendant who works

at a school, she's late.

499

She's rushing.

500

She's going downhill, you know,

comes out of nowhere, slams into

501

her, you know, slams into the client.

502

Like that's way more compelling.

503

And that's, again, I imagine probably

a huge reason why the defense in

504

that case settled, that's awesome.

505

I remember that case.

506

All right.

507

Cause he was a doll, a nice guy.

508

Which again, that matters too.

509

Absolutely.

510

Yeah.

511

The, the insurance companies

are assessing everything.

512

Like we tell our clients when

they go to a deposition, number

513

one, just tell the truth.

514

That's the most important thing.

515

You have to be honest.

516

There's good facts, bad facts.

517

In any case we can deal with

it, but just don't lie because

518

that will ruin the entire case.

519

So we always tell the clients not to lie.

520

And then we explained to the deposition

is as much about seeing how they present

521

and like what kind of person they are.

522

As it is about finding out like

what they recall and what happened.

523

So like, it goes into every analysis

that the insurance companies do, like.

524

You know, if we settle a case

or a defense attorney calls up,

525

look, now your client's real nice.

526

They presented really

well at your deposition.

527

Like that matters.

528

That adds value to the case.

529

Like the guy that's just like,

you know, this, I can't believe

530

this jerk slammed into me.

531

Like, that's not, you don't want that.

532

And you can only prepare people so much.

533

Like it's organically going to come out,

what type of person that they are and that

534

will add or take value away from a case.

535

You can tell we've had a few

of these crosswalk cases.

536

If I have this, like.

537

Children's book looking diagram of

like what is and isn't the crosswalk,

538

but you can see here and a lot of

Mark and I were talking about it.

539

It's called the stop and say stopped.

540

It's basically the if you're halfway

into the crosswalk, like Mark

541

showing you that you got to stop.

542

Yes, I had the case actually this guy

who's a retired postal worker and like

543

every day he went on the same route

did the exact same walk every day for

544

I forget how many years so his career

was spent walking around neighborhoods

545

as a postal worker and then like and

his retirement his favorite activity

546

was going for like these morning walks.

547

And he stepped out in an area like

here where my mouse is where there's

548

not necessarily like a white line

crosswalk or crosswalk that looks

549

like what's shown there and he stepped

out from behind a telephone pole.

550

The defendant said and started

crossing here and he got hit

551

and he got hurt really bad.

552

I think he was in a coma like for a

couple of days and it was only 100, 000

553

insurance policy, but they were like

fighting on that and fighting on that.

554

And I yeah.

555

Got this little diagram,

I'm pretty positive.

556

This is from the New Jersey department

of transportation or website.

557

So this is actually

like a legitimate thing.

558

I think I used it as a deposition

exhibit and they ended up tendering

559

the full policy in the case.

560

We've talked about the last

episode, how awesome it is when

561

you have like dash cam footage.

562

Pictures and all that.

563

It's one thing to stand up there and

say, ladies and gentlemen, you don't need

564

white lines for it to be a crosswalk.

565

Even if you're just crossing at the end

of the street, that counts as a crosswalk.

566

It's one thing to say that it's another

thing to put up this illustration

567

and be like, here you go, guys,

people go to movies, like they love

568

looking at pictures, all that stuff.

569

There's a reason they're very effective.

570

That's a great example, Mark.

571

Yeah, thanks for sharing that

because it just lays it out

572

visually for everyone to see.

573

Stephanie, is there anything

else that you wanted to share?

574

Sometimes it's just a matter of digging

in and finding the little nuances and

575

finding the inconsistencies in somebody's

statement or examining a picture.

576

And then you, you take it from there.

577

Yeah, I would agree.

578

I would say I can probably count

on one hand, maybe two, like the

579

amount of times we've had to get

like a crash reconstructionist

580

or reconstruction expert.

581

If it's like a rear end hit,

there's no reason to do that.

582

So I don't want people listening to think

like, Oh, you know, I was rear ended.

583

Why reconstructionist?

584

Because usually it's a lot of money.

585

And if it's not going to tip the needle

one way or the other, it's just, it's

586

a waste of everyone's time and time

and money, because that's a lot of

587

times of balancing in a case like this.

588

If it's a close call and if it's like

a, he said, she said, it's not even

589

guaranteed that a crash reconstruction

is going to make a difference.

590

So you just got to be selective

on, on the case you use them.

591

And yeah, I think Stephanie spoke to that.

592

Yeah, that makes sense.

593

That makes sense.

594

Well, this has been a great episode.

595

Thank you so much.

596

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do have questions for us, you can

597

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598

Jerseyjusticepodcast.

599

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600

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601

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602

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610

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