VICTIMS TELL OF ROAD RAGE TERROR AS CASES SURGE
TWO men who were hit by cars are becoming the reluctant faces of road-rage victims, with their solicitor Jeremy Roche claiming the incidents are becoming an increasing problem on the Gold Coast.
Mr Roche’s Attwood Marshall firm has had 50 road-rage clients in the past five years; the previous five years it had just two.
Clients Bruce Pinkerton and Kent Umstad were hit by cars on the Gold Coast last year, as a pedestrian and on a motorbike respectively.
Mr Pinkerton ended up with a broken leg after the driver of a four-wheel-drive ran him over following a dispute at Coomera.
The taxi driver missed six months of work after surgery on his leg.
Mr Umstad was cleaned up by a motorist while he waited at a red light on his motorbike on the Gold Coast Highway at Palm Beach.
He was stationary at the traffic light at 19th Ave when the car drove into the back of him, knocking him into the air, before he bounced off the car. The driver then left the scene.
Mr Umstad was left to fend for himself, suffering physical injuries and severe psychological injuries.
Mr Pinkerton’s compensation claim settled last month. Despite being happy about the sum, he said he would still prefer the incident had never happened.
“A friend of mine was showing me his go kart that he had just built and started it up at 8.30 on a Saturday night,” Mr Pinkerton said.
“A neighbour started yelling out he would kill my friend in the go kart and get in his car and run over him.
“I walked up the gutter and he started reversing back and I said don’t be silly take the car home before somebody gets hurt. He put it in drive and ran me over.”
Mr Roche said people were too often using their vehicles as weapons without thinking about the consequences.
“Our personal injury team has noticed quite a big increase in the past five years,” he said.
“Whatever the reason is for it, we are seeing more and more cases where people are intentionally being run over and hit by people.”
He said road-rage incidents used to involve someone smashing into the back of another car.
“What we are getting now is a lot of people running over a person on purpose,” he said.
“People will drive onto a sidewalk to take somebody out.
“They will go into a crowd to hit the one person they are after despite there being two people who have nothing to do with it next to them.”