Who’s up for a bit more legal advice?! Disclaimer: I know better than to trust you idiots and I’m contacting a real lawyer soon.
A guy came up to our house today and said that early this morning, he’d driven past our house and clipped our trash can, because it was “out too far”. He said he damaged his wing mirror and would like us to pay for it.
The facts from my perspective: I put my trash can as far toward the side as I could. However, since there’s a snow bank of three or four feet, it’s undeniable that it was farther out than it would have been in, say, the summer. I’m always very careful, though, to put it as far out of the way as possible. Sadly, I failed to acquire photographic documentation as to the exact placement of the can last night for some odd reason. In addition, he claims he hit the can early in the morning but didn’t tell us until the afternoon. Between those two times, the garbage company came and picked up the trash, and moved the can, so we have no way of knowing exactly where the can was at the time of the incident.
So. Questions: if what he says is 100% true, would I be liable? I’m in Vermont, incidentally. Various sources I’ve seen via Google would assign the blame to me, him, the town for plowing badly, and even the trash company in varying degrees.
If I were to refuse payment and demand he take it to court, the burden of proof would be on him, no? I don’t know how he could do that, but I don’t know what would happen if it came down to “I say/you say” in small claims court. Particularly, and this is a fun bonus twist, because this guy appears to be a lawyer of some sort.
IANAL but why was he stupid enough to hit your trash can, surely he could have gone around it? WTF do you put in your trash can that would cause it to damage his mirror instead of falling over?
I clipped your trash can too. Please send me $500.
Seriously though, he can’t see a trash can in the road and stop the car and move it out of the way? What if the wind blew it into the road? He sues Boreas?
Unless he has a dashcam, I wouldn’t worry about this … and even then minus points for his two-point distance discrimination skills.
He hit a stationary object with his car when he could have avoided it. I don’t know anything about Vermont law, but it seems unlikely that you’d be liable in this case.
When a moving object hits a stationary object, the moving object is legally at fault. Regardless of property boundaries, torts, common sense, or social mores.
Them’s the breaks. It’s not very expensive a repair, either. I know, because I’ve had it done three times.
What’s the actual advice we should be offering in this instance?
My personal instincts are to say, “Well, here’s my insurance company: go ahead and file a claim.” Is that the right thing to do…or a big foolish blunder?
In my area, I don’t even own my trash cans. They’re legally property of the garbage and are put out on the street at their instructions. So I’d give the guy Waste Management’s number and let him deal with them. It’s a shame that Waste Management is no longer owned by the mob… this would be one case where that might have been a plus.
But I have a question for those saying that anything moving hitting anything stationary: wouldn’t putting something in the street be an exception to that? We expect that cars are able to drive on a street and if I’ve obstructed traffic in some way, it seems too simplistic to put all the blame on the drivers.
(This isn’t even a pure hypothetical. One of my clients owns a vacation property with an unpaved driveway shared by six owners. Two of those owners have decided that there’s a 5 mph speed limit on the driveway and are spending their entire retirement enforcing this. When screaming and video cameras didn’t work, they put out boulders and timber to constrict this driveway down to barely 8 feet across, so that you have to slow to a crawl to make sure you don’t hit the barriers on either side. The easement says says 20 feet is allowed for driveway, but that’s kind of beside the point. If someone did hit a boulder because of how tightly constricted the street is, would it really be fair to put all the blame on the driver?)
I think it would have been hard for me not to laugh in the guy’s face. Did you look at his car to see if there was even any damage? Are there pieces of his mirror still in the road? Could be this guy got his mirror knocked off some other way and is just going around the neighborhood hoping someone gives him a wad of cash to go away.
A lot of places have big, rolling, bins for city trash/recycling collection. They aren’t that heavy, but they aren’t light, either. I think hitting one, even an empty one, would probably be enough to knock your mirror off, and might knock the bin over, too.
Why is that beside the point? Where I live, an easement means that you aren’t allowed to block access. Putting obstacles within the easement would be illegal.
But in any case, a driver is responsible for his own actions. I’d tell the guy to go fix his mirror , but that you might be willing to pay for driving lessons, since he clearly needs them.
So, quick update. My wife spoke to the garbage company, a lawyer friend of ours, and the local sheriff. They all had exactly the same reaction: this guy is nuts and doesn’t have a leg to stand on. They all independently advised that he should file a claim with his insurance company and let them come after us if they think it’s worth it (it won’t be).
I emailed him our position, and he’s called me and emailed me saying he wants to speak on the phone. I emailed him back and said that I prefer to communicate via email. He hasn’t responded. Email, I’m thinking, allows everyone to think carefully before speaking, and also leaves a record of who said what when. The only reason I can think of to insist on the phone is because you don’t want a record of what you have to say, in which case I really REALLY want a record of it.
Even if it was in the middle of the road, is it your fault? The wind could have blown it. Some kid could have moved it as a prank. Stuff gets on the roads all the time. For what it’s worth, I would not pay up.
I wish I could collect money from the city when I need a tire or an alignment after drilling the unseen, water-filled pothole.
Oh, and the sheriff said that the only way we could possibly be liable is if we’d left it sitting out in the middle of the road, and even then, he would have needed to file an accident report with the police. Which he didn’t do.
QFT. Unless you’re doing it for your own amusement (and probably not even then), you need to stop responding to this person. If he insists on harassing you beyond that, you’ve already got the sheriff’s number.
Well, it’s not beside the point in terms of trying to sue the guys for blocking the driveway.
But it isn’t really an issue in terms of what happens if someone accidentally damages their car on them. That would basically be the same issue as putting a garbage bin in a normal street for pickup, I think.
Is a police report necessary? I’ve been in two little fender-bender accidents, and in neither was a police report filed.
(In one, a California Highway Patrol cruiser drove by, stopped, chatted with us, looked at the extent of the damage – some denting and broken tail-lights – and drove away without taking down any information at all!)
I don’t get this bit, that “he would have needed to file an accident report with the police.” That doesn’t match my experience.
and I’m contacting a real lawyer soon.
