No charges filed against driver filmed purposely hitting a cyclist

[7rider]

Video can be seen here on WABA's blog.

WashCycle had some discussion of it, too. Linked right to WABA's blog...

One of the WC commenters had an interesting take on it:

"It's a tough call. While I don't necessarily agree,
I suspect the reason was along these lines: After the exchange, the driver pulls ahead and starts to gradually move over. There is no sudden movement. The truck is almost past the bike when the collision occurs. The bike makes no effort to avoid the truck visibly moving into its lane.

This adds up to a more-likely-than-not case, but that's not good enough for a conviction. A defense attorney would argue that the gradual move over while pulling forward, and the fact that the collision was with the rear of the truck, is plausibly just an instance of a driver passing and then misjudging where they were in relation to the cyclist. And they would bring up the lack of any effort by the cyclist to avoid a crash. Yes, he had no legal obligation to move out of the lane, but all vehicles are obligated to avoid accidents where it is in their power to do so. Same for assaults. It would be like someone intentionally pushing a heavy object at you gradually, and your not moving out of the way. In an assault case, it's tough to win when the victim could have avoided being assaulted and visibly did not do so."

[OakLeaf]

I just ran across the Campaign for Global Road Safety.

I haven't been all the way through the website, but I thought I'd throw it out here.

I think it's about time to renew my LAB membership anyway, which I re-joined a couple of years ago in response to another one of these incidents...

[Cataboo]

"It's a tough call. While I don't necessarily agree,
I suspect the reason was along these lines: After the exchange, the driver pulls ahead and starts to gradually move over. There is no sudden movement. The truck is almost past the bike when the collision occurs. The bike makes no effort to avoid the truck visibly moving into its lane.

This adds up to a more-likely-than-not case, but that's not good enough for a conviction. A defense attorney would argue that the gradual move over while pulling forward, and the fact that the collision was with the rear of the truck, is plausibly just an instance of a driver passing and then misjudging where they were in relation to the cyclist. And they would bring up the lack of any effort by the cyclist to avoid a crash. Yes, he had no legal obligation to move out of the lane, but all vehicles are obligated to avoid accidents where it is in their power to do so. Same for assaults. It would be like someone intentionally pushing a heavy object at you gradually, and your not moving out of the way. In an assault case, it's tough to win when the victim could have avoided being assaulted and visibly did not do so."

I'm not entirely certain how it matters that the bike didn't take evasive maneuvers. It's like saying if you didn't try to evade getting hit in a car to car accident that the car that didn't get out of the way of the car trying to hit it is at fault.

Or the pedestrian who didn't jump out of the cross walk to avoid being runover is at fault.

[7rider]

I'm not entirely certain how it matters that the bike didn't take evasive maneuvers. It's like saying if you didn't try to evade getting hit in a car to car accident that the car that didn't get out of the way of the car trying to hit it is at fault.

Or the pedestrian who didn't jump out of the cross walk to avoid being runover is at fault.

I think his point is that not evading a imminent accident does not make it assault. The pedestrian in your scenario is not the victim of assault, but the victim of a collision. "Fault" is a separate issue.

[Cataboo]

I think his point is that not evading a imminent accident does not make it assault. The pedestrian in your scenario is not the victim of assault, but the victim of a collision. "Fault" is a separate issue.

If you look at the video - the guy is yelling at him around 1 min 14-15 seconds, the cyclist is on the ground at 1 min 16-17 second.

So... The cyclist has maybe 1 second to avoid a collision while being yelled at and to realize... that the guy who is yelling at him is going to clip him. The cyclist had just passed a line of parked cars on his right, so may very well have still thought there was cars there.

I don't think that's slow motion at all.

And if you're shouting at someone you clip & responding when they say "what's that?" - it's hard to see how it can be claimed that you just misjudged the passing distance, because you're definitely completely aware of where the cyclist is...

[7rider]

I'm not saying I agree - with the ruling or the comment I posted. I'm just offering it up as a possible scenario. This case got a lot of local attention and was actually praised for the aggressive follow-up by police (who normally DON'T follow up on such things). I imagine there are a whole lot of facts (and law) we don't know and that's one of the reasons why WABA is pushing for the anti-harassment civil cause of action where criminal cases such as this fail.

[WindingRoad]

I don't see how there's any confusion as to this being intentional??? The driver drives up and basically tells the rider he's gonna hit him, rider has a WTF did he 'really' say that moment, and the driver proceeds to hit him with the back of his truck. How is that confusing to anyone? The a$$ driving the truck needs to never see a drivers license again! Inexcusable!

[goldfinch]

This isn't necessarily all bad if the bicyclist was hurt and wanted to sue the driver. Most liability insurance policies deny liability insurance coverage for intentionally perpetrated harm. So, if the driver intentionally hit the biker the driver's insurance may not provide any coverage. But if the driver was negligent (and maybe even reckless) there should be coverage.

If, of course, the driver was insured.

[aicabsolut]

I think his point is that not evading a imminent accident does not make it assault. The pedestrian in your scenario is not the victim of assault, but the victim of a collision. "Fault" is a separate issue.

It is most certainly assault. Physical contact (i.e., battery) is not a required element of assault. Assault under Maryland law for example also includes "Attempting to cause serious physical injury to another." So, if the cyclist had used effective evasive maneuvers to avoid being struck, the driver could have still committed assault by intentionally moving over before the pass was complete. All that is required is that the victim had reasonable fear of imminent bodily harm.

Because the weapon was a car, I'd also say this could qualify as reckless endangerment if you can't prove intent on the part of the driver for assault.

*disclaimer: I am an attorney and this is more or less first year law student stuff, but I am not licensed in Maryland (or Virginia) and this is not to be taken as professional legal advice. I am licensed in DC but haven't done research on the exact language under DC law.