Fiery Crash on I-275
Two cars burned in a fire after an accident on I-275 near Tampa on Saturday morning. The accident happened when a police officer stopped to assist a driver whose vehicle had a break down in the northbound lane of I-275. Thereafter, another vehicle crashed into the broken down car causing an impact with the police vehicle. From the image, there is a Chevy pickup truck and a Mercedes C-Class involved in this crash.
This crash potentially involves more than one layer of legal liability. First, the driver who struck the broken down vehicle has some legal liability (if not the majority of legal liability) because that driver should have been able to see and avoid a broken down vehicle in the roadway, even if it it blocking a lane of travel. This is particularly true after police officers had responded to the scene and had their lights engaged. Second, the driver who stopped in the lane of travel may also share to some degree in the legal liability for this accident because that driver likely had an opportunity to pull off the roadway before coming to a stop after becoming disabled. In other words, unless the wheels of the vehicle locked up forcing an abrupt stop, the reasonable and prudent thing for this driver to do would have been to pull off onto the shoulder as the vehicle coasted to a stop.
With that being said, Florida case law has adopted a concept of legal liability that attorneys refer to as the "rescue doctrine." Under such circumstances, a person who responds to an emergency and gets injured has a legal right to sue the person who caused the original emergency. This doctrine was stated in Reeves v. North Broward Hospital District, 821 So. 2d 319 (Fla. 4th DCA 2002) and in New Hampshire Insurance Company v. Oliver, 730 So. 2d 700 (Fla. 4th DCA 1999). In these cases, it was discussed that a basic concept of the law is that a person who creates a peril can be legally responsible not only to a victim but also to a rescuer unless the injury suffered by the rescuer was unforeseeable. Likewise, in the face of imminent harm, it is foreseeable that someone will make a reasonable attempt to rescue another but will not do something utterly stupid.
If you or someone you know has been injured in a Polk County, Florida car accident, please contact a Polk County, Florida car accident lawyer for a free consultation.
