Automobile Lawyers and Avoiding Road Hazards

Automobile lawyers who handle personal injury cases know all about road obstacles. That’s because the law, in New Jersey, New York, and elsewhere, mandates how drivers must respond to such obstacles. If a driver violates the law, automobile lawyers can sue the driver for anyone hurt as a result.

For example, say a driver is proceeding on Fair Lawn Avenue in Bergen County. He or she sees an obstacle in the road. For instance, a broken-down car. What must the driver do?

Or say someone makes a left turn onto Paterson Plank Road in Wallington, heading towards Passaic or Clifton. They fail to observe an unconscious person lying on the road. They strike the unfortunate individual. Can an automobile lawyer representing the victim sue such a driver?

When Automobile Lawyers Can Sue

Here is what New Jersey law, for example, has to say: The law does not impose on a motorist an absolute duty to observe and avoid obstacles and defects in the street. A driver has the right to assume that a road is in safe condition.

But where a defect or obstacle is obvious, a driver is liable for failure to exercise reasonable care to avoid it.

Similarly, a driver must consider the lack of capacity of persons in his or her way to care for their own safety. For instance, the unconscious pedestrian in my above example. This applies so long as the driver knows, or should have known if he drove carefully, about the condition of the person in question.

Indeed, where the driver of a vehicle actually observes that a person is under a disability, the driver must have the incapacity in mind. He or she must use reasonable care to avoid injuring that person.

This rule applies to pedestrians who are rendered helpless or whose capacity for self-protection is limited, due to age, intoxication, illness or other cause. A driver in such a situation must exercise a degree of care commensurate with the risk of danger.

In other words, the mere fact that a pedestrian is unconscious, drunk or otherwise helpless does not give a driver the right to mow them down.

Perhaps you were hurt by a careless driver, whether as a pedestrian or otherwise, and are searching for automobile lawyers. If so, feel free to contact me for a no-charge case evaluation.