4 year old can be sued!!!

[masonco]

I posted this in the other place...It will be interesting to see how it gets twisted into personal attacks over there but I already said I do not have time to monitor it since I am scheduled for more surgery next week.

 I read this in NY times online today and in case the link does not work the article follows..

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/nyregion/29young.html

4-Year-Old Can Be Sued, Judge Rules in Bike Case

By ALAN FEUER

Published: October 28, 2010

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Citing cases dating back as far as 1928, a judge has ruled that a young girl accused of running down an elderly woman while racing a bicycle with
training wheels on a Manhattan sidewalk two years ago can be sued for
negligence.

The ruling by the judge, Justice Paul Wooten of State Supreme Court in Manhattan, did not find that the girl was liable, but merely permitted a
lawsuit brought against her, another boy and their parents to move
forward.

The suit that Justice Wooten allowed to proceed claims that in April 2009, Juliet Breitman and Jacob Kohn, who were both 4, were racing their
bicycles, under the supervision of their mothers, Dana
Breitman and Rachel Kohn, on the sidewalk of a building on East 52nd
Street. At some point in the race, they struck an 87-year-old woman
named Claire Menagh, who was walking in front of the building and,
according to the complaint, was “seriously and severely injured,”
suffering a hip fracture that required surgery. She died three months
later of unrelated causes.

Her estate sued the children and their mothers, claiming they had acted negligently during the accident. In a response, Juliet’s lawyer, James
P. Tyrie, argued that the girl was not
“engaged in an adult activity” at the time of the accident — “She was
riding her bicycle with training wheels under the supervision of her
mother” — and was too young to be held liable for negligence.

In legal papers, Mr. Tyrie added, “Courts have held that an infant under the age of 4 is conclusively presumed to be incapable of negligence.”
(Rachel and Jacob Kohn did not seek to dismiss the case against them.)

But Justice Wooten declined to stretch that rule to children over 4. On Oct. 1, he rejected a motion to dismiss the case because of Juliet’s
age, noting that she was three months shy of turning 5 when Ms. Menagh
was struck, and thus old enough to be sued.

Mr. Tyrie “correctly notes that infants under the age of 4 are conclusively presumed incapable of negligence,” Justice Wooten wrote in his
decision,
referring to the 1928 case. “Juliet Breitman, however, was over the age
of 4 at the time of the subject incident. For infants above the age of
4, there is no bright-line rule.”

The New York Law Journal reported the decision on Thursday.

Mr. Tyrie had also argued that Juliet should not be held liable because her mother was present; Justice Wooten disagreed.

“A parent’s presence alone does not give a reasonable child carte blanche to engage in risky behavior such as running across a street,” the judge
wrote. He added that any “reasonably prudent child,” who presumably has
been told to look both ways before crossing a street, should know that
dashing out without looking is dangerous, with or without a parent
there. The crucial factor is whether the parent encourages the risky
behavior; if so, the child should not be held accountable.

In Ms. Menagh’s case, however, there was nothing to indicate that Juliet’s mother “had any active role in the alleged incident, only that the
mother was ‘supervising,’ a term that is too vague to hold meaning
here,” he wrote. He concluded that there was no evidence of Juliet’s
“lack of intelligence or maturity” or anything to “indicate that another
child of similar age and capacity under the circumstances could not
have reasonably appreciated the danger of riding a bicycle into an
elderly woman.”

Mr. Tyrie, Dana Breitman and Rachel Kohn did not respond to messages seeking comment.

[Sweater Cows!]

REally? How ridiculous. Not just the age but the fact that people can be sued over every little thing. Accidents happen. Unless someone is seriously injured or worse lawsuits are just a good way for attorneys to make money and our tax payers money to be wasted.

How the hell is a little kid even going to know that she was likely to cause injury. She probably expected the old woman to move and the lady just stood there in the way of an oncoming kid on a bike.

The childs parents should sue the old lady's estate for the lady not getting out of the way of the kids on the bikes.

[masonco]

Did she even see the lady?

[XLFD]

This is pretty sad when a four year old bicyclist can be sued for negligence when they may have caused an elderly lady to get injured (the article leaves me wondering where the negligence was). Yet a grown up bicyclist who is riding lawfully on a street can have his right-of-way stolen (and likely his life) by an unlicensed motorist who doesn't yield at a stop sign, has the law blame him for going fast (though well under the 'speed limit') and doesn't ticket the motorist (as in the Spokane thread). I think that if these kids were just running around like kids do and caused her to fall, you can bet this would have been thrown out.

[Willy]

The real question here is the competence of the judge. There will always be goofy cases brought before the courts but it's up to the judges to weed them out. 4 year old children have not reached the age of reason and it appears this judge has yet to reach his age of reason.