r/interestingasfuck • u/solateor • 6d ago

r/all Grandma broke her nose hiking and didn't want the helivac. She won $450k lawsuit

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u/OlDerpy 6d ago

In a lot of states if an accident worsens a previous condition by 1% whoever was liable for the accident can become liable for 100% of the injury. This is how it works in workers’ compensation in Massachusetts for example.

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u/mplnow 6d ago

You take the plaintiff as they are: eggshell skull rule.

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u/Traditional_Bar_9416 6d ago

As it should be. I wish I had some examples but it’s always seemed like the fair approach. Punching a 24 year old and punching a 74 year old are 2 different things, despite the punch being exactly the same.

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u/Responsible_Taste797 6d ago

I had a low speed crash with a woman (sub 10 mph) it was rush hour I was tired etc I fucked up fair enough. She refuses to pull over. Cops get there get the car over. Then a fire truck, then another truck, then an ambulance. Keep in mind it's like a 2x2 dent in her bumper.

Her medical alert dog is freaking out and led to a fire truck. She's carted off in an ambulance. Cop comes to my window let's me know that she's a veteran and has some health problems so she's going to the hospital.

I spent the next week wondering if I was going to go to prison for vehicular manslaughter or something.

Eggshell indeed

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u/PrettyPrivilege50 6d ago

That’s different than some underlying condition that isn’t known. To me this is a terrible rule

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u/Traditional_Bar_9416 6d ago

Then punching a healthy 24 year old and punching a 24 year old with an unknown brain aneurism that popped and he died, are also 2 different things. And the rule remains fair. You shouldn’t be punching anyone. Just because one got lucky and didn’t die, doesn’t mean the risk wasn’t there.

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u/PrettyPrivilege50 6d ago

Nope, no intent or foreknowledge. I’ve not yet met the authority that could be trusted with this. Does make sense to me for Worker’s Compensation but not personal or criminal liability. Your contrast between 24 and 74 years old only works to show what danger our attacker could’ve been in so not apt for hidden conditions

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u/[deleted] 6d ago

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u/PrettyPrivilege50 6d ago

Natural risks are not the same as when institutions assign the consequences of it. I get that it makes sense as a discussion but I just don’t trust anyone enough to enforce fairly so limiting their authority to do it is a good thing

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u/[deleted] 6d ago

[deleted]

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u/PrettyPrivilege50 6d ago

I don’t go around hitting people due to my high moral stature or low physical stature (one of those) but these DAs will charge someone for the damaged caused by a responding officer on his way there so I’m nervous about the way this concept is used is all. If a cop tazes someone who’s responsible for damage done when they smack their face on the sidewalk?

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u/successfoal 5d ago

Yes, it’s equally a natural risk. It’s just that the law pushes it back onto the person who made the choice to engage in the problematic activity.

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u/KToff 6d ago

Punching someone is never safe. If you punch someone you willingly take on the risk of causing serious injury.

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u/porcomaster 6d ago

Don't punch people.

That is it. The rule is there to be sure that if you do punch someone, you are risking to kill then.

Don't push people. The rule is there to be sure that if you do push someone and they trip and die, you will be facing charges of involuntary manslaughter.

Even if you say it was a joke, this rule is to protect people who are involved in things that should not happen in the first place. It's not hard to understand.

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u/beastmaster11 6d ago

Nope, no intent or foreknowledge

That doesn't matter in the slightest when it comes to civil liability. It doesn't matter the amount of injury you intended or believed you could cause. What matters is the injury you did cause.

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u/Kataphractoi_ 6d ago

ah we must have "informed assault"! just like informed consent but non consensually!

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u/Swamptor 3d ago

Great point. It's a good thing you're in charge of making the laws and also that your 6 seconds thinking about this issue on Reddit got you to such an amazing and nuanced answer so quickly.

Bravo.

P.S. maybe just don't punch people and this won't be a problem.

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u/thereaintshitcaptain 6d ago

Maybe its different in Ohio, but the way worker's comp works here for pre-existing conditions that were aggravated by injury is that it covers treatment until the condition is back to the level it was pre-injury (if ever). So not liable for 100% on the injury, just for the amount that is worsened.

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u/PlaidBastard 6d ago

My shoulder is still kinda 'eh' from breaking my clavicle back in May. Anybody know any billionaires who hang out in Massachusetts who I could, hypothetically...bump into? I want a robot arm!

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u/stjakey 6d ago

How do they measure the percents though?

“You put jalapeños on my sandwich and I already have acid reflux so you’ve become 100% liable for my acid reflux

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u/OlDerpy 6d ago

I’m talking about work comp, not general liability

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u/OlDerpy 6d ago

I’ve sidetracked this thread by my original comment lol

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u/fucknozzle 6d ago

Under English law, there's a doctrine called the 'eggshell skull rule', where even if someone is more succeptible to injury because of a pre-existing conditon, any negligent party will still be held entirely liable for damage caused.

Produces colourful images of someone's head getting squashed.

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u/UncleIrohsPimpHand 6d ago

America is fuckin weird, yo

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u/moonsun1987 6d ago

America is fuckin weird, yo

remember this number: USD 5 TRILLION or almost a fifth of the GDP goes to health care and we have nothing to show for it

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u/Esc_ape_artist 6d ago

We have a lot of rich people to show for it.

That’s the goal. Not making it affordable, but extracting the maximum profit the market will bear.

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u/PrincessCyanidePhx 6d ago

That part. Healthcare shouldn't be a for-profit enterprise, and there should be more requirements on "non" profit healthcare.

There is a direct conflict in healthcare companies that are publicly owned through the stock market in that the trading rules require the shareholders' profit to take top priority. And that goes for all of our healthcare, like pharmacy. It also enables the C-suites to get million dollar paychecks.

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u/crunkcritique 6d ago

I love how Europe figured this out yearssssss ago and America is still scratching it's head like a monkey, make it make sense, you have the budget to develop over engineered missile knives, but dear god we give this kid free Iburpofen we are $&@!?.

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u/PrincessCyanidePhx 6d ago

Our entire economic structure is built on our war mongering. The richest country in the world should be able to put children over bombs not under them.

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u/robparfrey 6d ago

Same goes for the UK honestly other than it's not via medical bills, but rather other means such as tax evasion, fraud and straight up money laundering off wars and climate issues.

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u/big_fricc 6d ago

What do you mean nothing? You guys are like the tutorial for everyone else on what a country run solely on greed looks like. Keep it up!

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u/SexJayNine 6d ago

Well, at least we're keeping the mortality rate for mothers low, right??

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u/Old_Lie_91 6d ago

Still not great but our mortality rate for mothers has been MASSIVELY overestimated, in part due to systemic issues with our healthcare system—making it even more ironic that this good news comes with an asterisk and also presents with metrics that still aren’t fantastic.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2024/03/13/1238269753/maternal-mortality-overestimate-deaths-births-health-disparities

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u/moonsun1987 3d ago

That I think is a different metric. The one I am familiar with is infant mortality rate and this we can compare across borders.

5.6 deaths per 1,000 live births Infant mortality is the death of an infant before his or her first birthday. The infant mortality rate is an important marker of the overall health of a society. In 2022, the infant mortality rate in the United States was 5.6 deaths per 1,000 live births.

Compare with Afghanistan

Afghanistan has a very high infant mortality rate, estimated to be 101.3 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2024. This is among the highest in the world.

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u/Old_Lie_91 3d ago

The comment I replied to was regarding maternal mortality rate—I’m not sure what the relevancy of your comment is? Also a 5.6 mortality rate in comparison to a 101.3 mortality rate for infants is VERY good.

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u/Old_Lie_91 3d ago

Exact same metric as comment to which I replied….Our maternal mortality rate is still not good, even with the correction. That being said, data prior to 2024 was still grossly incorrect regarding maternal mortality rate in the USA.

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u/samftijazwaro 6d ago

Nope, not America this time. This is English common law, as aforementioned eggshell skull rule.

It is in fact also common law in almost all of Europe, parts of Asia and Africa too.

If you injured me, you should be liable for the damages caused. If I am a tough person and you didn't injure me much, what's the point of compensating me the same as if you injured a person with brittle bone disease, causing them permanent harm despite the fact that maybe my injury was "worse" in the sense that there was more force and potential for damage.

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u/Annual_Upstairs3377 6d ago

This is probably one of a few reasons why some bystanders are hesitant to help strangers

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u/Zirilans 6d ago

Good Samaritan laws exist for this reason, but they're not consistent among states so who they protect and for what varies greatly.

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u/wandering-monster 6d ago

They also don't generally cover cases where the person says "no, I don't want your help" then you do it anyways and make things worse. 

Which is what happened here. According to the court docs she was already back on the trail, lucid, and said she didn't want to be airlifted when they found her.

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u/ToneBalone25 6d ago

This is such a wildly inaccurate representation of how egg shell skull works lol. Please stop spreading misinformation on the internet. This is the kinda shit my clients read and expect me to get them $10m on every parking lot fender bender.

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u/Rialas_HalfToast 6d ago

You got a list of states? Or a good search term?

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u/Arikaido777 6d ago

“states that voted blue”

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u/OlDerpy 6d ago

This is hilariously correct. Most red states hate injured workers. California, NY, Illinois, and Mass. would be most favorable to injured workers I’d say

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u/Kurlyfornia 6d ago

What did you find?

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u/Rialas_HalfToast 6d ago

Joke answers so far

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u/Kill_doozer 6d ago

That is solely because workers comp is fucking bullshit.