Dead Teen Sued - Guess Why

[Tank]

Make a note ladies/females/women (take your pick or add your own collective nown) do not get into a long term relationship with males under 26!

According to 96% of father figures, the correct phrase would be don't get into a relationship until you're 50.

I think I just got owned!

[Buddy]

Make a note ladies/females/women (take your pick or add your own collective nown) do not get into a long term relationship with males under 26!

According to 96% of father figures, the correct phrase would be don't get into a relationship until you're 50.

I think I just got owned!

Just speaking from experience! 

[DeterminedJuliet]

So, hypothetically, unless this 18 year old was independently wealthy, the person suing would be pretty out of luck.

I was thinking about this and I think I get the logic behind suing an 18 yr old's estate.  They can't sue him because he's dead, and presumably they can't sue his parents because he was a legal adult and they're no longer liable for him.  But I think if they sue his estate, and it can't pay, then the debt has to be paid by his next of kin -- i.e., the parents.  Maybe the forum's lawyer can give us his take on it when he comes back from Costa Rica.

Yeah, interesting point!
And for all of my googling skills, I couldn't find a reasonable answer on the internet. We'll have to wait to see what someone who actually knows about this sort of thing has to say.

[Sandra Craft]

  If this kid was so stupid as to get himself run over by a freakin' train

Just a note that I'm surprised that most men make it to 25 with all the dumb stuff they do 

Make a note ladies/females/women (take your pick or add your own collective nown) do not get into a long term relationship with males under 26!

There is a reason why the vast majority of Darwin Awards go to men.

[The Magic Pudding]

So, hypothetically, unless this 18 year old was independently wealthy, the person suing would be pretty out of luck.

I was thinking about this and I think I get the logic behind suing an 18 yr old's estate.  They can't sue him because he's dead, and presumably they can't sue his parents because he was a legal adult and they're no longer liable for him.  But I think if they sue his estate, and it can't pay, then the debt has to be paid by his next of kin -- i.e., the parents.  Maybe the forum's lawyer can give us his take on it when he comes back from Costa Rica.

Yeah, interesting point!
And for all of my googling skills, I couldn't find a reasonable answer on the internet. We'll have to wait to see what someone who actually knows about this sort of thing has to say.

Maybe the imposing of responsibility for the dead is possible in a sharia court.

[Sandra Craft]

Maybe the imposing of responsibility for the dead is possible in a sharia court.

This is another thing we need to ask Bruce -- are the debts of the dead automatically forgiven, or do they pass to the next of kin for payment? 

[Tank]

  If this kid was so stupid as to get himself run over by a freakin' train

Just a note that I'm surprised that most men make it to 25 with all the dumb stuff they do 

Make a note ladies/females/women (take your pick or add your own collective nown) do not get into a long term relationship with males under 26!

There is a reason why the vast majority of Darwin Awards go to men.

What? Apart from the fact that they're men?

[The Magic Pudding]

[ThinkAnarchy]

Seeing as it was the boy's negligence that caused her to be hit by his flying bloody limb, I say it's a legitimate case as well.

[Sweetdeath]

Seeing as it was the boy's negligence that caused her to be hit by his flying bloody limb, I say it's a legitimate case as well.

Whoa! O_O welcome back, Anarchy! <3

[ThinkAnarchy]

Seeing as it was the boy's negligence that caused her to be hit by his flying bloody limb, I say it's a legitimate case as well.

Whoa! O_O welcome back, Anarchy! <3

Thanks for the welcome back. I randomly take long hiatuses from forums.

[Ali]

Maybe the imposing of responsibility for the dead is possible in a sharia court.

This is another thing we need to ask Bruce -- are the debts of the dead automatically forgiven, or do they pass to the next of kin for payment?  

I'm not a lawyer, but I'm reasonably sure that you can't hold the next of kin liable for the deceased's debts.  The estate will pay out whatever it can, so that means that they may not get any life insurance money or whatever, but then anything leftover that the estate doesn't pay isn't the legal responsibility of the family.  The reason I think this is that a coworker of mine recently ran into this situation.  Her mother-in-law died, and her husband was the executor of the estate.  A collection agency tried to come after the husband for his mother's credit card debt since there wasn't enough in the estate to pay it off, but their lawyer advised them that they aren't legally liable for it.  So far as I know, that was the end of it.

Maybe the parents had a life insurance policy on the 18 year old that may have paid out some small amount to the estate which would then go to the lady that got hurt?  I doubt it would have been a big policy, but a lot of people carry just enough on their kids to pay for a funeral should the unthinkable happen.  Of course, if it was the parents' insurance policy, I don't know that it would be considered part of the estate.

As for my reaction to the story....I don't know.  I can see her point, but....I just feel like we've become so freaking litigious in this country.  Like we can't ever just accept it that accidents and random bad stuff happens - it's always got to be someone's fault and someone has to pay.  I know that's totally an emotional reaction, but that's the way I felt when I first read it.  I can definitely see what everyone else is saying though too.  I wonder if she had health insurance?

[Sandra Craft]

Seeing as it was the boy's negligence that caused her to be hit by his flying bloody limb, I say it's a legitimate case as well.

It was worse than a flying limb -- it was a large chunk of torso.  I did some more reading up on this and, to my surprise, once the deceased's estate (both cash on hand and anything that can be converted to cash) is zero'd out all debts that remain unpaid are forgiven.  I thought for sure somebody would get stuck with the tab.  Anyway, I have to assume now that the kid killed by the train he lost a game of chicken with did have some money of his own, perhaps a small inheritance or a savings account set aside for college.

There is a reason why the vast majority of Darwin Awards go to men.

What? Apart from the fact that they're men?

And men do the things they do.  I think I'll create a Darwin's Award thread, seeing as the 2011 winners have been announced.

As for my reaction to the story....I don't know.  I can see her point, but....I just feel like we've become so freaking litigious in this country.  Like we can't ever just accept it that accidents and random bad stuff happens - it's always got to be someone's fault and someone has to pay.  I know that's totally an emotional reaction, but that's the way I felt when I first read it.  I can definitely see what everyone else is saying though too.  I wonder if she had health insurance?

Well, in this case it actually is somebody's fault -- granted the kid paid the ultimate price but that outcome was really easy to call.  Her insurance is the turning point for my opinion on this.  If she's uninsured, or underinsured, the medical bills for the injuries she suffered are going to pile up in a hurry and I feel that even if the kid's family isn't legally obligated to help her pay them, they are ethically obligated.  On the other hand, if she's got insurance that will pay everything, then she's just being greedy and I lose sympathy for her.

[xSilverPhinx]

This topic is so bizarre that I really don't know what to say. O_o

[DeterminedJuliet]

I found this little tidbit:

Recklessness is usually described as a 'malfeasance' where the defendant knowingly exposes another to the risk of injury. The fault lies in being willing to run the risk. But criminal negligence is a 'misfeasance or 'nonfeasance' (see omission), where the fault lies in the failure to foresee and so allow otherwise avoidable dangers to manifest. In some cases this failure can rise to the level of willful blindness where the individual intentionally avoids adverting to the reality of a situation. (In the United States, there may sometimes be a slightly different interpretation for willful blindness.) The degree of culpability is determined by applying a reasonable person standard. Criminal negligence becomes "gross" when the failure to foresee involves a "wanton disregard for human life" (see the discussion in corporate manslaughter).

So, I guess the question would be, how reasonable is it to assume that the person jumping in front of the train should have considered that he might injure another person?