Case Study 3

McKeowns' acted for a 14-year-old girl, who received £1,225, 000 for the multiple fractures and severe head injury she sustained in a road traffic accident in June 2001. 

On 16 June 2001, our client (child A) was with a group of friends after a trip to McDonalds. It began raining while she waited to cross a dual carriageway at a traffic light controlled pedestrian crossing. The lights were green for oncoming traffic, when two of her friends ran across the road. She ran after them and unfortunately running into the path of a Vauxhall Astra, which was travelling in the offside lane at just over the speed limit of 40 mph.

This was a difficult case on liability as the child had obviously contributed to the accident.  The driver had little chance to avoid child A because a van travelling in the nearside lane obscured his view of the child as she started to cross the road.   The risk of the claim failing was high, but we felt the child had suffered life-changing injuries, and so we decided to take the case on.

After a period of difficult negotiations, and action through the court, it was finally accepted by the driver that there was a risk the court could find that - having seen two children run out in front of him - he should have exercised more caution.  Liability for the accident was agreed on a 75%/25% split in favour of the driver.

The child was physically traumatised by the accident and suffered numerous fractures.  She had a substantial injury to the left side of her chest and, most significantly, a very severe head injury.  She was admitted to hospital, where she remained for 23 months. As a result of the accident, she was left with no real speech, she could not walk or stand and was reliant on a wheelchair.  Her condition was permanent and she required significant future care.