As a personal injury lawyer, I see a lot of police reports. The majority of the police reports which my law firm sees deal with car accident cases. And as you know, car accidents happen for a lot of reasons. Some are honest mistake driving errors. People were simply not paying proper attention to the road, or made a mistake while driving.
Some car accidents happen for more serious reasons like driving while distracted on a cell phone, or drunk driving.
Regardless of how the car accident happened, the police are responsible for investigating these car accidents, reporting them accurately, and charging the at fault driver when it’s appropriate to do so.
In recent years, Goldfinger Injury Lawyers has seen the trend of police officers asking drivers who have been involved in car accidents to “self report” the accidents to a self reporting collision centre.
We saw this sort of thing years ago when the damage to the vehicles was minimal, and there were no personal injuries to report. This made sense in the vein of no harm, no foul.
But, nowadays we are seeing a more disturbing trend. More serious accidents; ie; accidents where there is serious property damage along with personal injuries are also being self reported because the police aren’t taking the time to report these accidents themselves.
When these accidents aren’t reported by the police, personal injury lawyers and insurers see a drop in quality of the details from the accident scene itself. Witnesses are not being interviewed by the police; or if they are; those interviews are not being taken at the scene of the accident. Rather, if any such witness interviews take place, they are being done well after the accident took place such that the quality of the information is not as fresh as it would be had the interview taken place at the scene of the car accident.
At the self collision reporting centre, it becomes a s/he said vs s/he said. Nobody can get their stories straight; and nobody will admit to any wrongdoing. Instead, it’s always the other driver’s fault, and the officer behind the desk doesn’t know who is to blame. The dynamics of the reporting completely changes in the day(s) following the car accident; particularly when the reporting is not done at the scene of the accident. There’s no way for the police officer to get a sense of any of the factors which may have contributed to the car accident such as:
- The Weather
- The Flow of Traffic
- The sunlight, darkness, fog or glare at the time of the accident which may have impacted visibility. How can you possibly recreate or understand this without seeing it for yourself at the scene of the accident?
- The landscape of the intersection or accident scene
- The slope of the roadway
- Any hazards, signage or road obstacles which may have impacted the drivers
- The traction, or lack thereof, on the road at the time of the collision or caused by the tires on the vehicles at the time of the accident. How can an officer make any sort of determination on the tread of the tire(s) without seeing it for themselves at the scene of the accident?
- The mechanical condition of the vehicle(s) at the time of the accident. Was one of the vehicles in a state of disrepair making it unfit and unsafe to drive?
- Was the visibility of one of the drivers impacted by any other factor(s)? You would be amazed by the number of incidents we see when people are travelling with big boxes in the front or back seats which impact visibility, or a large dog which makes sight lines hard to see; or perhaps children getting out of their seats and distracting the driver.
- Do we even have the right drivers here; or has one of the drivers pulled a switcharoo with another person at the collision reporting centre because:
a) the actual at fault driver was driving with a suspended license
b) the actual at fault driver did not have a valid driver’s license
c) the actual at fault driver was drunk, or driving under the influence
d) the actual at fault driver did not have insurance, or was an excluded driver under the policy of insurance covering the vehicle
e) the actual at fault driver was on bail with a driving restriction, or was evading authorities at the time
f) the actual at fault driver has a long history of car accidents and does not want another car accident on his/her record, so they sent another person to stand in their place and take the blame
People will go to great lengths to avoid liability and the potential repercussions which come with it. Our lawyers have learned not to underestimate the creative schemes people will come up with so that the litigation finger does not point in their direction, or to avoid getting fined or ticketed by the police.
These are just some scenarios where people attempt to skirt the blame. It creates errors and inaccuracies in reporting these collisions. Police seem not to mind so long as the collision gets reported; and then it’s on to the next task. It has become an exercise in managing the volume of accidents and incidents, rather than getting to the truth and getting things right. Quality and accuracy have taken a toll; when these things should be of primary importance.
Does inaccurate police reporting have any impact on a personal injury case?
Absolutely! At trial, a Plaintiff will give his/her version of events. The Defendant will give their version of events. The Judge will know that each party stands something to gain. This is why they will put more weight into the evidence from the police, given that they are a neutral party to the litigation with no skin in the game so to say. If the police don’t get it right at first instance, and the Judge puts a lot of weight in their evidence; the the Judge is relying on bad evidence to render their decision. When bad or inaccurate evidence is relied on at trial and given weight; it will produce a result which does not reflect the truth of what transpired.