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Pedal to the mettle

Suing was painful, but this accident victim found that standing up for herself made her grow.

As I lay in a hospital bed for two days after a Chevy Blazer had plowed into me and my bicycle, the idea of a lawsuit never crossed my mind. I was alive and mendable, and that was what mattered. I had some stitches, a broken nose, a banged-up face, a serious concussion (despite my helmet), a hole in my left shin, and a watermelon-shaped right knee - but I was thankful it hadn't been worse. And I had insurance for me and my bike.

It was only when I was back home, gathering facts about that September day in 1998, that I began to feel enraged and helpless. According to the police report, I had been going straight through a green light, and the driver was turning left from the opposite direction. Clearly, I had had the right of way, but I remembered nothing about the accident. George, the driver, hadn't been ticketed. When I called the police to question why, I was told he claimed I had swerved into his path, which seemed unlikely to me. George was off the hook, and I was wondering if I'd ever again have the nerve to ride my bike. In a post-concussion fog, I cried every day for weeks.

Then I discovered that insurance wouldn't cover all my expenses, including some lost wages and about $8,000 in dental work. My four front teeth had been cracked, and I needed root canals and crowns. My only recourse was to file a claim against George's insurance company and perhaps end up suing. I'd thought of personal injury lawyers as the stereotypical ambulance-chasers. Now I needed to hire one.

The idea of suing, of "going after" the driver, seemed wrong, and some of my friends implied as much, even though this is what liability insurance is for, and I'd certainly paid my fair share of it. The plaintiffs in movies like A Civil Action and Erin Brockovich are painted as noble, while those who seek retribution one-on-one seem tainted by greed. Did I want to become yet another plaintiff in a litigious society? If my case went to trial, would the jury think I was just out to make a fast buck? All I wanted were my expenses and some compensation for the time I spent going to doctors, the dentist, the physical therapist, and doing the hours and hours of calling and paperwork it took to help prove my case.

I was able to find a lawyer who is both a cyclist and a cycling advocate, who donates a percentage of his bike-related settlements to a bike advocacy group. He made the idea of pursuing the case more palatable. We filed a lawsuit after George's insurance adjuster said that, because we had no proof of who did what to whom, the company would offer a big fat zero.

Thanks to police photos and an accident reconstruction, it became indisputable that George had broadsided me. Last year, I met George at his deposition. I didn't need to be there, but I wanted to see him, and he me, to remind us that we were two people whose lives had become linked forever, not just plaintiff and de fend ant. In private, I told him I forgave him emotionally but not legally; he said he was relieved to see I seemed like a caring person, not someone out to make a killing. That meant a lot. Over the months, his insurance company's "final offer" increased from $20,000 to, finally, $75,000, the limit on George's policy, which they pronounced a month before we were to get a trial date.

It felt fair. My lawyer received a third of the settlement, and I had to pay some bills. Both my lawyer and I made donations to the Massachusetts Bicycle Coalition.

I did start cycling again, but it was traumatic. Even now, I occasionally get debilitating waves of panic when cars come close or pull out in front of me, and in my mind I replay the accident as I was told it happened, where I fly off my bike, bounce onto George's hood, and then slam face down onto the road. It's a lousy way to start a retirement fund.