Damages awarded to plaintiff following minimal impact car collision

The High Court recently awarded damages of €8,000 plus special damages for injuries sustained by a lady when another driver reversed into her car in a forecourt of a petrol station. The defendant driver accepted liability but claimed that the impact was so low that it could not have caused any real injury. The plaintiff’s medical records noted that she was involved in a road accident 8 years previous and had suffered back and neck pain as a result. During the hearing, conflicting medical evidence was put before the Court. The Court accepted that the continuing symptoms that the plaintiff encountered had no connection with the very minor impact in the petrol station. Furthermore, the defendant’s medical expert was strongly of the view that the opinion of the plaintiff’s medical expert could only be based on the information that the plaintiff herself communicated rather than on objective findings. The defendant’s legal team asked the Court to apply the provisions of section 26 of the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004 and to strike out the claim on the basis that it was fraudulent and/or exaggerated. The Court refused to do so and adopted the phrase of Feeney J, in Ahern v Bus Eireann [2011] IESC 44 stating that if the plaintiff had overstated the connection between her symptoms and the accident, this could be just "an understandable exaggeration". The Court noted that the plaintiff damaged her credibility by attributing symptoms to the road accident which had nothing to do with it. Nonetheless, she was awarded €8,000 plus special damages. Hamill -v- O'Callaghan [2015] IEHC 542 The complete judgment can be viewed here.