Good people should not be punished for rendering good aid. The stupid and clueless, however should be no where near an emergency, especially when intoxicated; as it looks like was the case here.

1. she had possibly been drinking (the defendant was coming home from a night of revelry)

2. The car crashed into a light pole going 45 miles an hour (aka, the crash was not a “horrific” crash as those things go)

3. The defendant imagined she saw smoke (no one else did, btw), and perhaps due to her “night of revelry” panicked. Again, probably due to impaired judgment.

4. She couldn’t have been that afraid that the car would explode because after pulling the injured woman out of the car, the defendant dropped her RIGHT BY THE CAR so that if indeed there was going to be an explosion, the poor woman would still be dead.

This is not about good samaritans being punished or liberal California laws (not that liberal btw).

It’s rather a warning that, if you’ve been drinking (aka engaging in a night of revelry), be aware that you’re probably not the best person to respond to an emergency. You may overreact, read symptoms wrong, imagine that things are happening, panic, and could make injuries worse.

Unless they desperately need you, or you’re the only one there, leave the saving of lives up to sober people.

As temperatures dropped in the PNW, he went with a small group and distributed thermal sleeping bags to the Seattle homeless population. Surely, when people asked for his name, he gave it. He is very compassionate and probably carried on conversations with many of them. Well, as it turns out, one of the homeless men decided to use his sleeping bag to hide the fact that he was sexually abusing a child with down’s syndrome. Guess who got a visit from a police detective? Guess who went under legal investigation for being complicit in a felonious act?

Things like this sicken me. Perhaps the woman who pulled her friend out did overreact, and perhaps it complicated an injury which was already sustained from the accident. But suing your friend for dragging you out of a wrecked car that she (allegedly) thought was going up in flames? Well, you find out who your friends really are, I guess. I’ll just stay away from that cesspool we call California, thank you very much.

My point? People that want to help someone will do it and not let this court case change the way they are.

Before some get upset my comment is not about this particular case. Simply a general comment. I didn’t read the entire article so it wouldn’t be fair to comment on it.

If my car is on fire and I’m unable to get out, please help, and I’ll thank you for it.

If I get in a fender bender and I’m OK, but some fool breaks the window, drags me out of the car through broken glass and dislocates my shoulder when I was otherwise fine, yeah, they should have left me alone.

Of course it will probably be hard to prove that the spinal cord injury was caused by being pulled out the car and not by the crash itself. (Luckily she’s suing the driver as well)

1) Stab me in the throat in an attempt to perform a trachectomy during a *mild* asthma attack.

2) Force-feed me boiling-hot water during a catastrophic asthma attack.

3) Purposefully flick that SAME boiling water in my face, in the hope that some of the magic boiling water would fall into my mouth and cure everything, BLINDING ME, during a MAJOR ASTHMA ATTACK.

If that woman is now a paraplegic due to some idiot rushing in and doing exactly what’s wrong? SUE THAT IDIOT.

Maybe people will think harder about WHAT to do and educate themselves rather than rushing in to be “helpful” without having a clue.

Unfortunately, not all good intentions have good results.

Stories like this sicken me.
We look the other way too much as it is, and things like this are only going to make it worse.

In Hollywood movies, crashed cars explode about 95% of the time. In reality, they explode about 0.01% of the time – after all, they’re designed not to. So moving someone who’s been in a car accident usually just makes the situation worse. This case is unfortunate, but hopefully it will draw attention to the miseducation people are getting.

I was legally liable if I had tried to help him beyond that.