Sold a car privately - COURT ACTION
Discussion
hondafanatic said:
SantaBarbara said:
Markbarry1977 said:
Will people stop responding until the op does. I've achieved sweet f a this morning keep checking for a result.
Dam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Do you think the whole hang has been one gigantic hoax or wind-upDam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
yellowjack said:
No jury, no dock, no stairs to the cells. Just a fairly conventional room with some tables. Usually arranged with the opposing sides facing one-another, judge at one end, and maybe some seating for 'interested persons' opposite the judge. Usually no "Your Honour" either. Judge usually tones the formality down to "Sir" when addressing him/her. Both sides get to present their case along with supporting documents. Witnesses may be called if there are any, and the judge makes his judgement "on the balance of probabilities".
When I went, my insurer's legal bloke was very confident, as I hadn't been involved in the accident I was accused of driving away from. The judge preferred to believe the claimant's version of events, I lost (but my insurer was the real loser). That was it. Done, dusted, go home and punch a wall because some lying chancer who claimed to have been "a site manager on his way to open up a site to accept deliveries" said that nowhere in his BMW cabrio, or his phone, or on his wrist there was a watch. The case stood or fell on the time that I passed a traffic camera along the route, it seemed to prove that I would have passed the collision site minutes AFTER the claimant stated as the time of the collision. But he just lied and said "no watch - time was an estimate". I had a time-stamped receipt from a petrol station that put me miles away, but because it hadn't been made available to the other side before the case (I only found it when going through receipts when selling the car a few days before the case) it was ruled "inadmissible".
What made the case worse for me was that a few months later I saw a car the same make/model/colour as mine driving in exactly the way the claimant described around his collision, on the same route. Exactly as I had told the court, it was a case of mistaken identity. The police had marked the case as "No Further Action", but the civil court requires a different (lower) standard of evidence.
I sincerely hope the OP wins because chancers deserve to be cast into the burning fires of Hell if you ask me. But until he comes back with a positive result then I would be concerned about the outcome...
Edited by yellowjack on Tuesday 22 August 12:57
Rush hour traffic & an estate agent in his X5 decides I've not pulled away quickly enough when the traffic starts moving (I've let a couple of cars out of a side turning) & overtakes half a dozen or so cars. When he's then faced with oncoming traffic he turns into the side of me, our wheels lock & I have no steering & we eventually stop diagonally across the centre line.He claims it was my fault so I take him to small claims. He claims he was directly behind me & thought I'd broken down & has a 'witness' to that effect (doesn't come to court but was a builder on his way to a meeting. The estate agent is the owner of the company & does up properties to sell on. Hmm, no link there then.). I had a witness who stopped at the scene & came to court who was behind the X5 about 6-7 cars back & stated he'd 'raced' down the road. The judge said she'd ignore his witness statement as they hadn't come to court but still found in his favour. All I took from the day was that its ok to overtake, opposite a junction with a blind brow ahead at 8.30 in the morning on a suburban road. Or is that only for the favoured few?
Markbarry1977 said:
hondafanatic said:
SantaBarbara said:
Markbarry1977 said:
Will people stop responding until the op does. I've achieved sweet f a this morning keep checking for a result.
Dam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Do you think the whole hang has been one gigantic hoax or wind-upDam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
OpulentBob said:
Markbarry1977 said:
hondafanatic said:
SantaBarbara said:
Markbarry1977 said:
Will people stop responding until the op does. I've achieved sweet f a this morning keep checking for a result.
Dam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Do you think the whole hang has been one gigantic hoax or wind-upDam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
OpulentBob said:
Markbarry1977 said:
hondafanatic said:
SantaBarbara said:
Markbarry1977 said:
Will people stop responding until the op does. I've achieved sweet f a this morning keep checking for a result.
Dam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Do you think the whole hang has been one gigantic hoax or wind-upDam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
OpulentBob said:
Markbarry1977 said:
hondafanatic said:
SantaBarbara said:
Markbarry1977 said:
Will people stop responding until the op does. I've achieved sweet f a this morning keep checking for a result.
Dam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Do you think the whole hang has been one gigantic hoax or wind-upDam it now you have me doing it. Come on OP, I have to go flying later and won't be able to check the outcome for ages. Assuming the engineers have fixed the bloody plane that is.
I'm secretly hoping they don't so I can find the outcome out asap.
Bennet said:
yellowjack said:
Done, dusted, go home and punch a wall because some lying chancer who claimed to have been "a site manager on his way to open up a site to accept deliveries" said that nowhere in his BMW cabrio, or his phone, or on his wrist there was a watch.
Whilst we're all waiting, how would you feel about entertaining us with the full story behind whatever went on with this?It was a few years ago now, so I'll try to be broad and not quote the actual dates and times, although I have the file somewhere in a box. I'll also do it (as best I can) in order of how it occurred for me...
1. I'm at a football match. Tuesday night, non-league, Farnborough FC away in East Anglia somewhere in an FA Cup qualifying round I think. I get a call from my wife. She sounds worried. Her: "You've been in an accident!" Me: "Nope. I'm pretty sure I'm absolutely fine - I'm at the footie." So she reads me a letter from the police. (For background I was in the army serving away in Essex at the time).
2. There was a collision between two cars, one reported to be mine, at the traffic lights on the A30 near Virginia Water. By the description, it sounds like two drivers acting like dicks where two lanes merge into one. Seems neither backed off and they hit each other. "I" then drove away. "He" says he saw "my" number plate, and reports "my" failure to stop to Surrey Police who send out this letter (received 8 days, I think, after the reported collision).
3. I go home and respond to the letter the following weekend. Police letter details the time the collision was reported, where, when, etc. I respond by denying the collision, or at least if there was one, I wasn't involved in it. I didn't even witness one. So I then contact my insurer, as I'm worried that they think I've had a crash and failed to report it to them.
4. Police respond to my reply saying that they don't plan to take any further action. At this point, to be clear, there is evidence that I was on the same road as the claimant, at a different point on that road, some miles away on a busy Monday morning. The evidence is from a fixed traffic monitoring camera. At no time did I deny being on this road - it's my regular Monday journey after all, far better than fighting M3 traffic and the bunfight that is the M3/M25 junction.
5. I get some fairly threatening letters from "his" insurer, and from an engineer wanting to inspect my car. As requested I do not respond to these, but pass them to my insurer for their action. They are more than happy with my version of events that morning, and are defending the case as a not involved/not at fault response to the claim.
6. The other side start to get snotty, and more and more aggressive. The claimant seems more and more like a nasty, conniving, lying piece of work. Every time we refute his claim based on the distance between the traffic camera and the incident, relative to the reported time of the collision, he changes his mind about the time. This leads my insurer's legal bloke (no qualified lawyers on either side, to my surprise) to being quite confident as the claimant "comes across as an unreliable witness". Time has passed, and an independent automotive engineer is commissioned by MY insurer to inspect the car and report on any damage. There is, of course, none that corresponds to the type of damage claimed by the other side, although it's a >10 year old Vectra which was bought second-hand, so there's plenty of minor scuffing and scratches from car parks and day-to-day life.
7. The claimants insurer starts court action. Again I'm told to "don't worry, this is going nowhere, we've got this" by my insurer. They're pretty confident of my honesty because I spent three evenings knocking on doors when I was run off the road in Essex a year prior, and damaged a farmer's gate. That was not witnessed, and I could have denied all knowledge, but I made sure I tracked the gate's owner down so he didn't have to pay to repair it out of his own pocket.
8. I leave the army, and the Vectra is becoming expensive to keep on the road. Repairs, wear and tear, worries at MOT time, etc. The army pay me a tidy lump sum so I spend some of it on a new (used, ~6 months old) car. I can't keep two cars, so the Vectra gets punted on. This turns out to be a mistake. So does not bringing up my previous honesty re: the farmer's gate, and so does not bringing up any character witnesses from the army. After all, I had a job where you're vetted to 'N'th' degree (accounting for explosives and ammunition in an operational EOD unit) and it's a job in which you cannot afford even a hint of dishonesty.
9. Evidence on "our" side is limited to my statement, the time stamp on the police traffic camera evidence, and "our" engineer's report. Theirs is based entirely on "his" statement and the damage to "his" car. My legal advisor tells me he'd be surprised if the other side actually turns up on the day.
10. With a few weeks to the case, the Vectra gets cleaned out to go off to a new owner, and any irrelevant (to the new owner) paperwork is ditched. I'm obsessive about numbers and data, and keep a running tally of the fuel costs on top of servicing receipts etc. It helps to work out exact MPG and can be useful in getting an early indication of problems if it's using too much fuel. That's an aside, to explain how I come to unearth a fuel receipt for the morning of "his" collision. A receipt that puts me about 8 miles away on a petrol station forecourt topping up with a tenner to get me to Watford (where, at the time, fuel was significantly cheaper than either near work or near home) at the time he claims (and reported to police) that I "deliberately rammed his car with mine".
11. In preparation for the court case I check with my legal advisor. No, we won't need to bring up the 'farmer's gate' thing, nor the receipt. It's only a receipt, so we'll introduce it on the day and the judge can rule on it there and then.
12. Court day. We file in, sit down, the judge explains things, claimant's advisor presents their case, we present our defence. Questions are asked about the time of the collision, which is the basis of our defence. This is when the lie about not having a watch/clock appears. It's also when, for the first time, the claimant says that following the collision he pulled over to check damage/exchange details, then when "I" didn't stop he followed me through heavy traffic to the next traffic lights where he noted my registration number. Also claiming to have "never lost sight of me". This is clearly horlicks as he was 8 miles ahead of me at the time he first claimed the collision occured. The judge is reluctant to include the receipt. It's suspicious that it arises now, close to the case. I agree. I have the book with me though, the book from which the receipt came. It contains meticulously noted fuel consumption figures for the Vectra, two previous cars and the new car. That ought to be enough to convince the judge that it's not some random receipt that I've created myself. Nope. The book wasn't disclosed to the other side, therefore not admissible. The judge has to have stern words with both sides' legal idiots, because they've gone all "Law & Order" on us, adversarial and trying to wrap each other up in legalese. The judge wants brevity and plain language. I'm beginning to wish we'd got a statement from the farmer who's gate I broke now. Claimant states that he's set up his dashboard display to not show a clock, and that there's no clock in his car stereo. That he hadn't got a mobile phone (a site manager with no phone? Yeah. And monkeys might fly out of my butt...), and that he doesn't wear a watch. My 'team' asks if we can go to inspect his car. Another lie - he's come by train. Anyway, the judge says no, as the case will be decided on the evidence we've already declared and presented to the court.
13. We finish presenting our case, there are some questions from the judge to clarify a few things, I'm confident that "justice will be done". Judgement goes against me (and/or my insurer, not sure who the judgement named as my insurer told me not to worry about it).
14. Go home and punch a wall, because it's infinitely preferable to getting a conviction for assault (or worse) because what I really want to do at this point is stomp this lying little weasel under the ground.
Nothing I can do about it either. I've been called a liar in court and I'm told I can't appeal the decision. It is what it is, a judge preferred to believe this scrote over me, and evidence I provided to my legal adviser but wasn't submitted to the claimant's team could have turned out to be vital (possibly?) in swinging the decision in our favour.
To anyone called to court by a chancer I say "swamp them with every kind of evidence you can lay your hands on". Insist your lawyer/solicitor/legal adviser submits absolutely everything that even has a hint of relevance. You can always decide not to rely on it on the day, but anything you fail to disclose could be ruled out. And remember that just because something is true, doesn't mean a judge will necessarily believe it to be so.
I apologise for any holes in the narrative, or stuff appearing out of chronological order, but *ahem* "in my defence, it was a few years ago now..."
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