I hate tailgaters. You know the kind of driver I mean, the one that is so oblivious to the fact that they are in a 5,000-pound hunk of churning metal that they think it is acceptable to drive at 60 miles per hour, six inches from your back bumper. I take a rather cro-magnon man approach to this type of driver. Slow down. I will slow down until they change lanes and then I will return to an appropriate driving speed for the road I am on.
There really is only one thing that will make my blood boil faster and stronger — the use of the all pervasive “Phone Routing System,” “please press one to lose your mind, two if you have five seconds of patience or more left, three to speak to a customer non-service technician, and four if you now never want to speak to us again.”
Seriously though, I think the tailgater is the greatest danger on the road. It is not drunk drivers (the hypocritical candy lightner aside), it is not speeding, it is not talking on the phone, it is not eating while driving. It is that insane person who thinks that their car and its ABS will be able to stop in the six inches between theirs and mine.
“... I think the tailgater is the greatest danger on the road. It is not drunk drivers (the hypocritical candy lightner aside), it is not speeding, it is not talking on the phone, it is not eating while driving.”
I have no sympathy for these people. The law says they are at fault when they hit someone else’s car and frankly I think they should lose their license for six months, and have to surrender their car for the duration of the suspension, so some traveling salesperson can use it and eat powdered sugar donuts in it all day.
I have a great deal of anger behind this issue because last year, on my birthday, a woman in a mini-van was racing to get to whatever life threatening social event was going on in her little life when to my ill luck she decided to tailgate me. I responded as I usually do, by slowing down. I know that if I have someone on my tail, and if I have to stop short, I have a much greater chance of being hit. Consequently I try to keep as much distance between me and the car in front as possible. She took this as an offensive maneuver on my part, whereas I viewed it as a solely defensive move.
Being the mature person she was, she decided to change lanes, speed up and cut me off, all the while we are in 50 mph traffic on the 405. Fine, I’ve now managed to upset her, so being the arguably more rational of the two of us, I try to avoid her and switch lanes. She cuts me off again. This happens four more times.
Finally I managed to get away from her, when much to my surprise a man in a big black truck pulls up beside me and indicates to me that he had the same problem with her, further south on the freeway. He then speeds up and goes on his merry way, but she’s not done with me yet. She has now slowed down and is alongside me and attempting to drive me into the cement divider between the freeway. I slam on my brakes and she is now flying by me. Thankfully I am now done with her.
Being the lawyer that I am though, and slightly miffed at this stupid game of freeway chicken, I rush back to my office and crank out a complaint against her. Yes, I am going to sue her, I valiantly declare. I draft this complaint in the heat of anger and forge of frustration. Luckily I had taken down her license plate and that of my erst-while co-victim in the big black pickup.
But I’m not a total idiot, I discuss it with my boyfriend, my law partner, and my spiritual advisor. All of whom think I should let it drop. I consider their words and their concern.
I mail it off to the clerk of the court to be filed.
In my haste to get it filed, I write the check for the wrong amount of money and it comes back to me. I think it might, just might, be a sign that perhaps I should reconsider this lawsuit.
I’m not ill advised. I know that a lawsuit for intentional infliction of emotional distress, assault, battery, attempted murder, vehicle code violations and negligent infliction of emotional distress, is a risky gamble even when you have a dead body. I had nothing more than some frayed nerves and an adrenaline rush. In my younger days I lived for adrenaline rushes, but I’m getting a little long in the tooth.
It’s been a year, almost, and if I'm going to sue her, I need to do it soon. I really want to, not that there is any pot of gold in it, not that there was any great damage done, but what she did was wrong, and someone needs to stand up and start calling people on being idiots when they drive. A car is not a suit of armor, it is a very dangerous, powerful tool, and improperly used it will kill someone. Tailgating is an improper use of a car.
I’ve got three weeks to decide if I’m going to sue her just to make my point. I’d love to have your input on if you think this is a frivolous lawsuit or whether someone needs to take a stand. If that screeching attorney in Beverly Hills can bring charges against Michael Jackson for “endangering the life of his baby,” why shouldn’t I sue this crazy driver? (David Pisarra is a partner in the Santa Monica law firm of Pisarra & Grist, he welcomes questions, and (310) 664-9969 or e-mailed at DPISAR-)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 2, 2003. Read the original PDF.