Car hit me from behind. He said it was my fault

BOWFER

Looks like there's still plenty on here perfectly happy with the person behind always being the guilty party.
Attention any accident scammers, you have the green light (snigger) to continue.

born_again

Forget it's a roundabout. It is a traffic light controlled junction.
So why was the following car looking to their right, as there is no need, you look at the lights & traffic in front.. Unless they saw the lights changing and made the poorly calculated risk that.
A. driver in front would go through. (opps they did not)
B. That there was enough of a gap for them to get through before the traffic on the right got to them.

Jenni_D

born_again said:

Forget it's a roundabout. It is a traffic light controlled junction.
So why was the following car looking to their right, as there is no need, you look at the lights & traffic in front.. Unless they saw the lights changing and made the poorly calculated risk that.
A. driver in front would go through. (opps they did not)
B. That there was enough of a gap for them to get through before the traffic on the right got to them.

Precisely ... whilst you always need to check, to ensure some other idiot isn't trying to jump their lights, you only need to do so after your lights have changed to signal that you can proceed - not on approach to the lights.

Jumblebumble

Grumpy_chap said:

Clive_Woody said:

Mickey666 said:

It's difficult to envisage a situation where driving in to the rear of another vehicle can be the fault of the driver in front.

Have you not read about the crash for cash scams? Apparently removing bulbs from brake lights is a common part of this along with random emergency stops.

Those scams only work because the person behind is always liable irrespective of contributory action by the person Infront.  

There are a number of people enjoying prison life at the moment who somewhat foolishly understood this to be true
eg
Mohammed Azam, 47, Husnain Ahmed, 22, and Sufyan Lone, 24, all from Birmingham, each pleaded guilty to fraud by false representation and were jailed.
The force's Insurance Fraud Enforcement Department (IFED), which investigates such scams around the country, said the vehicle directly in front then carried out an emergency stop, which caused the collision.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-coventry-warwickshire-48584360

BOWFER

Jenni_D said:

born_again said:

Forget it's a roundabout. It is a traffic light controlled junction.
So why was the following car looking to their right, as there is no need, you look at the lights & traffic in front.. Unless they saw the lights changing and made the poorly calculated risk that.
A. driver in front would go through. (opps they did not)
B. That there was enough of a gap for them to get through before the traffic on the right got to them.

Precisely ... whilst you always need to check, to ensure some other idiot isn't trying to jump their lights, you only need to do so after your lights have changed to signal that you can proceed - not on approach to the lights.

I'm not getting either point here.
If I'm approaching a junction and my lights are green, I'm not looking ahead only - that seems like very bad advice!
I'm also checking the stationary traffic to the right in case there's an emergency vehicle or a nutter, I'm not just sailing through them without a care.
If I'm approaching my lights and they're red, I'm not giving a damn about what's happening to my right.

Mickey666

BOWFER said:

Looks like there's still plenty on here perfectly happy with the person behind always being the guilty party.
Attention any accident scammers, you have the green light (snigger) to continue.

I suspect the scammers get away with such things because people rarely leave sufficient space to stop their own car when the car in front slams on the brakes for an emergency stop. 

An emergency stop is a perfectly standard occurrence and is explicitly tested for in the driving test, so if someone did fall prey to such scammers it would have to be proved that there was no reason for the scammers to do an emergency stop.  Did you not see that dog that ran out in front of the car you just rear-ended? 

Fact is, emergency stops can happen and a following car would be at fault for not leaving sufficient space to stop.  What other defence is there?

Mickey666

Sandtree said:

Mickey666 said:

It's difficult to envisage a situation where driving in to the rear of another vehicle can be the fault of the driver in front.

Namely when the car in front is reversing at the same time

If the car in front is reversing and the car behind manages to stop before contact, then it cannot have driven into anything and so cannot be at fault.  I can see there might be some difficulty in proving such an incident, but that's another issue.

BOWFER

Mickey666 said:

BOWFER said:

Looks like there's still plenty on here perfectly happy with the person behind always being the guilty party.
Attention any accident scammers, you have the green light (snigger) to continue.

I suspect the scammers get away with such things because people rarely leave sufficient space to stop their own car when the car in front slams on the brakes for an emergency stop. 

An emergency stop is a perfectly standard occurrence and is explicitly tested for in the driving test, so if someone did fall prey to such scammers it would have to be proved that there was no reason for the scammers to do an emergency stop.  Did you not see that dog that ran out in front of the car you just rear-ended? 

Fact is, emergency stops can happen and a following car would be at fault for not leaving sufficient space to stop.  What other defence is there?

Try watching some of the rear-end accident scam videos on youtube.
And people have been convicted for doing it.
So as much as you think it should always be the person behind's fault, the law (thankfully) now disagrees with you.
I would suggest your 'phantom dog' scenario is dealt with by cameras and that's how the scammers get convicted, when it's clear they slammed the brakes on for nothing.

Aretnap

A couple of other oft-cited examples...

https://www.true.co.uk/case-studies/common-scenarios-for-split-liability-contributory-negligence/

Gusman v Gratton-Storey (1968). The defendant was driving on a country road in daylight and applied her brakes violently in order to avoid hitting a pheasant. The claimant was driving close behind and ran into the back to the defendant’s car. The judge found the defendant 100% to blame for braking and swerving to avoid a pheasant when there was a car behind.

Elixabeth v Motor Insurer s Bureau (1981). A motorcyclist struck the rear of a van that had braked suddenly for no apparent reason. The court found that sudden braking for no apparent reason was evidence of negligence and, on that basis, found the van driver 100% at fault for the accident

Herzlos

BOWFER said:

Jenni_D said:

born_again said:

Forget it's a roundabout. It is a traffic light controlled junction.
So why was the following car looking to their right, as there is no need, you look at the lights & traffic in front.. Unless they saw the lights changing and made the poorly calculated risk that.
A. driver in front would go through. (opps they did not)
B. That there was enough of a gap for them to get through before the traffic on the right got to them.

Precisely ... whilst you always need to check, to ensure some other idiot isn't trying to jump their lights, you only need to do so after your lights have changed to signal that you can proceed - not on approach to the lights.

I'm not getting either point here.
If I'm approaching a junction and my lights are green, I'm not looking ahead only - that seems like very bad advice!
I'm also checking the stationary traffic to the right in case there's an emergency vehicle or a nutter, I'm not just sailing through them without a care.
If I'm approaching my lights and they're red, I'm not giving a damn about what's happening to my right.

I think you are both making the same point, though I think Jenni is phrasing it from the perspective of someone approaching a red that turns green rather than a green that turns red.
No matter what the state of traffic was like, the light turning to red means the following driver should have stopped.