Accident caused by forklift forks left up - GIF

[IntheGroove]

This sign would have helped...

[Crusty]

In the US, the phrase "reasonable and prudent" will be the pivotal one in the trial decision in favor of the plaintiff. The operator didn't take "reasonable and prudent" precautions to ensure that even a person passing through the area on roller skates blindfolded, while juggling a butcher knife, a bowling ball and a chainsaw wasn't injured (lowest common denominator). Home Depot understands this so they barricade entire aisles when moving materials because it may prevent injury to brain dead customers and it gives their attorneys something to work with in court.

The operator may be able to shift the liability onto his employer if he wasn't given proper training in the operation of their equipment. The employer in that instance didn't take "reasonable and prudent" precautions to ensure that their equipment was operated safely, leading directly to the accident.

[neilbourjaily]

While I agree the operator has an obligation to conduct his machine safely to all in the area, the collective response in so v-e-r-y American, which is to say I am to be protected from my own stupidity. Not many other places so support the stupid litigant, maties.

[Frank S]

I was leasing a half acre and a 16,000 sq ft building for my machine and fabrication shop the guy in the building across the lot had a the 28,000 building leased from the same landlord. The landlord calls me up one day and tells me not asked me to sublease the small 1000 sq ft area behind my shop to a friend of his in the soil stabilization business. After meeting the guy I had a sublease contract drawn up by an attorney in the contract the guy was prohibited from storing any large quantity of liquid chemicals on the property without a proper EPA approved containment vessel 5 copies were made up of the agreement 1 to my landlord to sign permitting the sublease 1 for me 1 for my neighbor since he and I shared a common area and 1 to the lease the 5th was for my attorney to file everyone signed all was honkey dory for a while I made a lot of special equipment for the guy my neighbor and I called glowworm then one Friday a used fiberglass 10,000 gallon fuel tank shows up. I ask the guy what he was planning on doing. He said he was going to have a containment berm built and store a caustic soda mixture in it for his soil stabilizing business he even had a signed letter from the land lord stating that it was ok as long as the mixture was within the parameters in accordance of how glowworm's business required it for use.
Monday morning we show up to find a 5000 gallon spill of 90% caustic soda a ruptured tank with one end blown out no containment berm had been built just the tank sitting there as it had been unloaded the previous Friday morning. Richard and I both call the fire department who intern call the EPA glow worm is nowhere to be found all of his equipment is gone I call the landlord who shows up in his limo. He just says I told you not to lease to the guy so deal with it and by the way you have 90 days to vacate Next call is to my attorney My neighbor has a building filled with the stuff as he was down hill and his over 400 coke box refrigeration units that he was in the business of repairing were ruined He and I get a hazmat clean up company to remove the mess which meant hauling off 500 cubic yards of contaminated soil gravel and asphalt. My attorney advised Richard and I that we would be money ahead to just move our businesses rather than try and fight the landlord or glow worm who no one could locate anyway. after the 300,000 dollar clean up and clean EPA bill paid for mostly by Richard and in part by me we escaped the EPA fine only because of the clause I had in the sublease contract and a copy of the letter from the landlord saying it was OK for glowworm to have the 10,000 gallon tank placed on the property. Richard moved his business to his property at his home I bought a 5 acre commercial property with 2 partners a few miles away. in the end the landlord was the biggest looser as the 2 buildings remained empty for 5 years and he was hit with the EPA fine Richard's insurance covered most of his losses.

[Crusty]

I see the most fault in the act of stopping a forklift across a pathway with the forks at eye level and then sitting there, oblivious, using a cell phone.

But you're right I do view this through the lens of my local environment and prevalent attitudes, and here we understand that people make mistakes and so we expect each other to take reasonable precautions so that hazards are minimized.

[mklotz]

A number of the responses here sound as if they were written by California lawyers. Careless, unobservant, fone-fondling idiots must be protected from themselves so they can live on and further pollute the gene pool.

This is why we live in a society where automobile window sunshades have to, by law, bear a sticker advising the user to remove before driving.

[Frank S]

If criminals are presumed innocent until proven otherwise what does that make the victims presumed to be lying until the suspect is proven guilty, unless it is a case involving harassments or sexual misconduct. Then it always seems to be just the opposite the alleged victim is supposed to be believed without question while the burden of prof to the contrary rest on the accused meaning they are automatically guilty until proven innocent.
And where does the victimless crime come from if there was a crime committed wouldn't there have to be a victim somewhere?

[Crusty]

I'm not a lawyer and have never stayed at a Holiday Inn Express so I'm no legal authority but I have served on several juries and I've found the round table discussions with the jury after a trial chaired by the judge to be particularly enlightening about the law and the legal system.

In our legal system the scooter rider may not have had a reasonable expectation of obstacles in her path (Was she warned?) and it's also possible that the tines merged with the background from her viewpoint, so she gets the benefit of the doubt and is not the most responsible for the accident.

The operator was clearly negligent but the fact that he had a switched on phone with him while operating the forklift strongly suggests that he wasn't trained in its' safe operation, so he too gets the benefit of the doubt and in the worst case is only partially culpable.

The accident could have been prevented entirely by the forklift owner or lessee providing proper training which included safety measures and operating procedures (no cell phones, erect barricades, keep forks low, pay attention, etc.) which would have satisfied the prudent and reasonable precautions requirement. This viewpoint will be the legally dominant one and the forklift owner or lessee will be the one taking it in the shorts from this accident under the US legal system.

Lawyers spend a lot of time thinking about ways to mold the evidence at hand into a scenario in which they prevail (and get paid) so justice is only an occasional by-product of the legal system. To clarify, I personally think that stupidity should hurt and that fone heads are an infestation.

[mklotz]

Anyone driving a motor scooter, especially inside a building, should have a natural "reasonable expectation of obstacles" in his path. Lacking same makes him unfit for operating the vehicle.

I think it's marvelous that all this legal nit-picking over fault always seems to decide that the party with the deepest pockets is most at fault.

[jdurand]

Anyone driving a motor scooter, especially inside a building, should have a natural "reasonable expectation of obstacles" in his path. Lacking same makes him unfit for operating the vehicle.

I think it's marvelous that all this legal nit-picking over fault always seems to decide that the party with the deepest pockets is most at fault.

There was a night club fire years ago where the club had been insulated with standard foam rubber, not fire retardant foam. The band used outdoor pyro indoors. Lots died.

Building inspector who passed that foam: No charges.

Owner and band: Liable for what they could get from them.

The company that supplied beer to the club: paid the most.

I talked to one of the people on the fire commission, he said the beer company was found liable because there wasn't enough money in the band and the club owner to pay the victims families. Well, at least he was honest about ripping off the beer company.

Oh, as to the building inspector being found liable? HAHAHAHAHAHahahahahaha