The High Court awarded Thomas Neville €171,633 after finding that a collision involving a JCB and his car aggravated previously symptomless degenerative changes in his left knee.
Mr Justice Barr delivered judgment on 9 July 2015. The defendants, C.O.D. Plant and Civil Engineering Limited and Conor Hughes, admitted liability for causing the accident. The dispute at trial concerned whether the impact was capable of causing injury and the extent of the plaintiff’s injuries.
The collision happened on 26 April 2012 on the Belgard Road. Mr Neville’s Ford Fiesta was stopped in traffic waiting to turn right onto the N7 Naas Road when pallets in the bucket of a JCB driven by Mr Hughes struck and shattered the car’s rear windscreen. The road was wet after rain. The court found that no pallet had fallen onto the windscreen, despite an earlier statement in the defence to that effect, which the judge considered a drafting error.
The defendants’ engineer argued that the glass shattered on impact and transmitted no significant force to the car or its occupant. The plaintiff’s engineer disagreed, saying the windscreen could transmit force before breaking and that the collision’s duration could not be assumed to match a conventional bumper-to-bumper crash. The judge preferred the plaintiff’s engineer on those points. He found the JCB was likely moving at about walking speed, approximately 5 km/h, and that a significant collision had occurred. He concluded that whiplash was possible, while noting it was only one of the injuries claimed.
Mr Neville said he developed neck pain after the crash, which cleared after three to four months. His main complaint was his left knee, which became swollen and painful and sometimes locked. His orthopaedic surgeon, Tom McCarthy, considered the knee’s degenerative changes likely to have been present before the accident but asymptomatic. The judge accepted that the accident made them symptomatic and that they seriously affected Mr Neville’s life. The evidence included a prognosis that a total knee replacement was probable within eight to ten years, partly due to changes attributed to the accident.
The court awarded €75,000 in general damages to date, €95,000 in future general damages and €1,633 in agreed special damages, for a total of €171,633. The judgment records the damages award; the source does not set out any further order.