08 March 2013

Flat-Out Friday: Q&A, Take 1

I'm going to keep it as vague as possible for privacy and legal reasons, but today I'll answer the non-health-related questions everyone asks after I tell them about the accident.

Yes, there is legal action pending.

I originally engaged a lawyer in Medicine Hat, but quickly realized that he was not interested in helping me get better, only in getting paid. I sat through an entire half-hour meeting in his office telling him that I was currently not seeing a doctor and needed help getting one only to have him say several times, "Well, you should just be doing whatever your doctor recommends". Listen, much? My second attempt was met with much better results. I went to Calgary and engaged a large firm, and I now have every confidence in my representation.

Yes, I am currently receiving disability payments.

But these won't last forever. In fact, the policy runs out after 104 weeks, so come August, I won't be receiving anything else, including payments for weekly physiotherapy and monthly loss-of-income payments. That means whatever comes from the aforementioned legal action, it has to be enough to live on for the rest of ever, pay for my continued physiotherapy, pay for things like a pool membership to keep muscle tone and avoid causing more injury to my bones, and generally make up for the fact that I was run over by an armoured truck.

But, when you say armoured truck, what you really mean is...

No, when I say armoured truck, I mean that I can sit and watch documentaries on machines used by the Canadian Forces and compare tonnage to them. I mean that the truck weighed 10 tons. That's 10,000 pounds. One of the fuzzy memories I have of the immediate aftermath is the police officer calling dispatch and having to repeat the weight of the truck three times to the person on the other end because they just didn't believe it.

Yes, the police were actively involved. But no, the driver was not criminally charged.

There is a on-the-scene report (which I have read), an official report (which I have not), a CSI report which documented all my injuries in full glorious technicolour photography, and many witness reports. I had a police escort to the hospital, police officers present while I was being assessed in the ER, and the police were the ones to contact Matt and let him know what happened before he was allowed to see me.

The driver was given a "failing to yield to a pedestrian" ticket and fined. I imagine that his career as a driver was over and I heard through the grapevine that he was dismissed from the company. But there is no criminal charge for almost killing someone; it's only if you actually do.

Wow, it seems pretty cut and dried, then.

It does, doesn't it? But the legal system works in mysterious ways and between inconsistent medical attention and moving and all the rest of that stuff, it really has needed to take this long to get things sorted out. However, I will also say that if the company decides to contest it, they will have a long and expensive battle on their hands.

---
Any other questions? Send them along via email or Facebook PM. I'm sure I'll have another Q&A in a few weeks, as I have some sensitive topics planned for upcoming posts. If I were you, I'd get the Kleenex handy.

0 comments:

Post a Comment