Pedestrian sustains personal injury after hit-and-run impact

On Behalf of | Jul 5, 2013 | Uncategorized |

One common form of pedestrian injury is the individual on a suburban road at night who is hit by a vehicle travelling in the same direction. A recent Georgia personal injury incident illustrates the problem. A 48-year-old Macon County man was hurt in an accident while walking in the middle of the south bound lane on Highway 49 South in Oglethorpe at about 2 a.m.

A vehicle struck him down and kept going. Georgia State Patrol are investigating, and requesting information from the public. Authorities reported skid marks on the road. They said that the skid marks indicated a small body car or small truck.

Hit-and-run drivers are often found when friends, acquaintances or family members notice damage to a vehicle and evidence of a car accident. The driver may attempt to cover it up. Or sometimes the driver takes the vehicle to get the damage repaired. The auto mechanics may then call the police with a tip. Occasionally, family and friends of the injured person will put up a reward for information.

The investigating trooper says that he believes that the victim was drinking prior to the personal injury. However, the mere fact of drinking doesn’t in itself prove negligence by the pedestrian nor does it relieve the driver of the inescapable duty to drive carefully and always focused on the road ahead. A driver must be in such control of the vehicle that it can be stopped in sufficient time to avoid hitting an object on the road ahead. Here, skid marks do prove that the driver saw something important and tried to stop before the collision, but was likely too close to stop in time.

The injured man was taken to the hospital, where he was treated. Initial reports of bruises and cuts do not reflect that there may be serious injuries that appear in the ensuing hours or days after the accident. In Georgia and elsewhere, personal injury practitioners commonly find that serious injuries are not always observable right after an accident. For one thing, the injured person is often in a state of shock, and his or her normal sensibilities to pain are not always in sync with the damage that has been done.

Source: 41nbc.com, “GSP Searching for Driver in Macon County Hit and Run,” Ashley Minelli, June 25, 2013