NY Driver...

[Gravekeeper]

Dug up the actual court decision from the court documents:

Under the emergency doctrine, as was instructed to the jury in this matter, when an actor is faced with a sudden and unexpected circumstance which leaves little or no time for thought, deliberation, or consideration, or causes the actor to be reasonably so disturbed that the actor must make a speedy decision without weighing the alternative courses of conduct, the actor may not be negligent if the actions taken are reasonable and prudent in the emergency context.

Although Plaintiff's counsel repeatedly asked this Court, and continues to ask this Court, to find that a woman's bikini top being removed suddenly and exposing her breasts with three males sitting in the car was not a qualifying emergency as a matter of law, this Court cannot and will not make that blanket and bright line rule.

Counsel for Plaintiff repeatedly argued, and continues to argue, that a woman's mere embarrassment at the sudden and unwanted exposure of her breasts to her male passengers does not rise to the level of "danger." However, the majority of the cases regarding the use of the emergency charge, if not all of the cases, do not use the term "danger" to label the qualifying emergencies; in fact, the cases speak of a "sudden and unforeseen occurrence," which was clearly present in this case. Therefore, this Court finds that it was properly left to the jury to decide whether a qualifying emergency existed.

And the jury unanimously sided with the driver.

[Greenday]

Also, again, the reason the idiot is dead is because he had no seat belt on so he was ejected from the car when it flipped. The idiot that sued her also did not have his seat belt on.

Not sure about NY, but NJ law states that passengers who are 18 years old or older are responsible for their own seatbelts, not the driver.

[TheHuckster]

What this all boils down to is, as far as I'm aware, there's nothing in the lawbooks prohibiting driving with this kind of top. There are laws, at least where I'm from, regarding driving with bare feet and flip flops due to the potential of losing your footing on the pedals and creating a hazard, but unless someone can provide a link, there's no law in NJ against driving with tops that are simply "tied on."

To say that someone is negligent for wearing such a top and getting into an accident after someone else carelessly unties it is among the most ridiculous arguments I've ever read on this site. Unless these kinds of incidents are, unbeknownst to me, common on the road, it would take a clairvoyant to know such a choice of outfit would result in a fatal accident. Such incidents are very rare and one of those things that I know would never cross my mind when driving a car. I wouldn't expect anyone else to, and in fact I'd consider someone who thought of such a possibility to be a bit paranoid. There's a concept of reasonably unpredictable or improbable here where one should not be expected to look ahead and realize that something as innocuous as a top could cause a driving hazard because some idiot behind her might untie it. To me that's on the same level of predictability as getting into an accident because some moron passenger decided to suddenly get the driver into a very passionate game of "Slug Bug."

The OP's argument was so ridiculous I seriously thought it was a clever use of sarcasm or even trolling. The how-dare-she-wear-an-outfit-that-caused-this-accident seemed so tongue in cheek it wasn't until further down the thread I realized it was a serious statement.

Let me ask the OP: Do you blame yourself for things that happen out of your control? And don't say that she was in control of the situation because she chose her outfit. That's like saying if her car blew up due to some flawed design in the gas tank she's to blame for choosing the car. Someone else caused this accident, and as tragic as it is that he died of his injuries, had he survived, I wouldn't be surprised if he were tried for manslaughter.

[bex1218]

Even wearing a t-shirt, that guy would probably still be a jerk. I live in Florida where people wear bikini tops like that all the time while driving. Never heard of an accident caused by things being untied. Its usually cell phones or friends being the culprit.

This is sexualy harrassment gone bad. Why would you even risk everyone's life trying to distract the driver? Seriously!

[s_stabeler]

there is actually a very simple reason why the lawsuit falls flat: intervening action. basically, the way the argument goes, it was the guy untying the driver's bikini that caused the accident, not the fact she was wearing the bikini in the first place. ( which is also why someone wearing a loose bra that is distracting them is different- there, there is no intervening action)

[hinakiba777]

By that logic, me being able to undo a bra one handed in about 1-2 seconds means that its the drivers fault for wearing a bra if I undo it and we crash... wanna go driving some time?

EXACTLY,
I mean, I once had a backseat passenger, when I was the front seat passenger SNAP my bra through two layers of clothing. Not only was it very painful, but the action caused my bra to BREAK which caused me a great deal of shock. So, according to Aethian, had I been driving, it would have been my fault had we crashed. Since I wore that bra?

I personally have been in a situation where pulling over would be impossible due to the kind of highway I was on, so I can easily see why they young woman in the story did not pull over and set the deceased straight before things escalated. Plus, from what I get from the article, that guy was just being a minor annoyance up until that point.

It's wrong to blame the woman just because of her clothing choice, how could she know that the deceased would untie her top why she drove? I mean, that is just a stupid thing to do.

[Stone]

I don't know why you guys are so hung up over her top, it was obviously her breasts that were the problem here. She should have known better than to drive while female.

[Canarr]

I don't know why you guys are so hung up over her top, it was obviously her breasts that were the problem here. She should have known better than to drive while female.

Obviously. If women spent more time in the kitchen, and less time driving, there wouldn't be as many accidents.

[HYHYBT]

If they spent their time topless on the sidewalk, there'd be more accidents.