[kwflatbed]

BOSTON -
A Team 5 investigation is raising serious questions about the Massachusetts State Police accident reconstruction team, a unit trusted to investigate and assign blame in serious and fatal crashes.But what happens when victims' families believe that unit's conclusions are wrong? NewsCenter 5's Sean Kelly reported Wednesday they're sometimes left with no place to turn.
Helen Cadden, 87, died after being hit in the middle of a Mattapoisett crosswalk five years ago.
Her son, Peter, a mechanical engineer, has measured it dozens of times after state police concluded Helen's death was her own fault, not the elderly driver who hit her.
"Victims are being blamed," said Cadden. "They're botching these reports."

Read more: http://www.wcvb.com/news/investigative/Critics-say-accident-reconstruction-can-t-always-be-trusted/-/12520878/17499280/-/ykk266/-/index.html#ixzz2CxJYn5Y0

 

[Guest]

Klane has been doing reconstruction since Christ was a corporal. He is fully capable of doing his job correctly.

Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF700T using Tapatalk 2

 

[Pvt. Cowboy]

Klane has been doing reconstruction since Christ was a corporal. He is fully capable of doing his job correctly.

Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF700T using Tapatalk 2

But of course the mechanical engineer who has ZERO experience in accident recon, thinks his ideas are correct. Go back to drawing buildings guy...

I'm an expert in automotive lending and finance, but that doesn't qualify me to dictate what the Feds determine as prime.

 

[justanotherparatrooper]

"Critics" = family members in denial looking for their payday.
.

THIS sums it up nicely

 

[Mr Scribbles]

Got to laugh when these guys say "biases"-like measuring something can be biased? The same mentality that says a promotional test is biased. What-the MSP use a different colored tape measure than your average engineer?? I wholeheartedly agree with mtc- and feel sorry for the victim, but sometimes an accident is just that-an accident.
I know a guy who struck and killed a woman who was crossing the street-circumstances: older woman, wearing all dark clothing, poor lighting conditions, and from between parked cars. Recon team found her at fault, and the family went wild, got the reverends involved, but all for naught. In the end, it boiled down to the family not being able to pursue a lawsuit against the guy or his insurance co., not saying this is always the case but usually an underlying factor...

 

[7costanza]

I thought the word "accident" was dropped and replaced with negligent? ? As with unnintentional firearms discharges someone's always to blame.

 

[Guest]

I thought the word "accident" was dropped and replaced with negligent? ? As with unnintentional firearms discharges someone's always to blame.

"Accidents" are now officially "crashes", but I still call them accidents and will to the day I retire. Some things get so ingrained in your head, it's not going to change.

 

[Goose]

"Accidents" are now officially "crashes", but I still call them accidents and will to the day I retire. Some things get so ingrained in your head, it's not going to change.

The reasoning explained to me was that if someone gets drunk and crashes a car or commits an intentional act (crime), it can be considered a crash...not an "accident".

To me, it's similar to referring to illegal aliens as "undocumented migrants" or whatever the hell some people want to call them this week.

 

[Pvt. Cowboy]

Drunk, stupid, negligent = crashes.

Bambi with a death wish, black ice, tree falling = accidents.

Kids drilled while running across a 4 lane highway.... Frogger.

10 points for making me LOL literally with the Frogger comment.