Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnnyCanuck
Must be a jurisdictional thing. Back in my days as an insurance adjuster, I did in fact pursue subrogation against a homeowner's insurance for the damage caused by his jaywalking teenager to an insured's vehicle. The third-party insurer called the two witnesses, paid our subrogated interest, and reimbursed our insured's deductible.
OP, when you ask a question like this, you do need to account for differences in jurisdiction that may impact the answer. Generally speaking, when an accident involves two vehicles, one is considered the dominant one and liability is presumed to rest with the other creating an onus on the servient driver to prove negligence (full or contributory) on the dominant vehicle. For example, the vehicle with the stop sign is considered servient. All insurers use the same rough fault chart to determine liability. The vehicle with the stop sign is assumed 100% at fault unless evidence establishes that the dominant vehicle was speeding. That would create 75/25 split in favour of the dominant driver. If reckless/excessive speed was established, that might flip the liability.
The same generally holds true of non-vehicular combatants (cyclists are considered vehicles). A pedestrian jaywalking mid-block at night would be presumed liable unless your negligence can be established. Well-lit street, the pedestrian wearing bright clothes with reflective strips, and there to be seen from a block away ... that might do it. The circumstances you describe ... not so much.
All that said, I haven't touched a claim file in 20 years so there might be more current knowledge on this board ... but liability is liability.
|
In my situation, the person was a foreign tourist from Ireland visiting the USA. I don't think they have homeowners insurance in the USA... or if they do I don't know if their insurance will cover a US claim from overseas?