lawyer friend says "best not to say you installed a dash cam to capture crashes"

[Tony G]

He said: "best not to say you installed a dash cam to capture crashes"

His advice? (against, this is NOT legal advice) "I installed the dash cam in my car because I wanted to capture that giant meteor like the one in Russia...."

I think the best answer to “Why did you install a dashcam?” is something along these lines:
“Because I care about safety”.
“Because safety is the most important part of operating any vehicle”.
“I review the footage of my own driving to make myself a better driver”.

Let's see a slimy defense lawyer make hay out of that.

 

[Tomas]

If an officer asks I hope to say something like this, and refer him to my YouTube page... "I installed a dashcam to, uh, record my trips and for the cruises my car club goes on, sir. Why do you have one?"

(The lawyers suggestion is a good one. The idea is to protect yourself from the other guy's lawyer...)

 

[Johny]

Just simply answer "Hey, I have a jealous wife/girlfriend, this is her idea to monitor me or she will take my keys away!!!"

 

[KvR]

I have a lawyer friend and I was chatting with him about the dash cam in my car. A little background: he is one of the best personal injury lawyers in the state, so he knows his stuff about these things. I'm just repeating what he said in a casual conversation and none of this should be taken as legal advice.

He said: "best not to say you installed a dash cam to capture crashes" In some jurisdictions, the judges, district attorneys, and of course, insurance companies, will imply that you installed the dash cam in your personal vehicle hoping/waiting for a big crash and fat payday. Unless you are active police, fire, public safety, or drive a commercial company vehicle. This is America, not Russia or Asia and dash cams are not yet a part of car culture.

His advice? (against, this is NOT legal advice) "I installed the dash cam in my car because I wanted to capture that giant meteor like the one in Russia...." or something like that. (substitute meteor with bigfoot hitchhiking, 500-pound alligator crossing the interstate, escaped zoo/circus tigers, etc, etc, etc)

I actually installed the dash cam because I'm hoping to capture that unicorn....

SandraWIhan, is your lawyer friend American or Austrian? For Austria or Luxemburg his advice might be appropriate, for countries like Norway, Germany, the Netherlands or the USA it is superfluous since they consider public space literally as public. Best advice for all countries: remain silent (""You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.")

It is advisable to forward video footage of an incident/accident to a lawyer in case your are victim or an involved party, not to the police or an insurance company. Police, courts and insurances have an armada of well-educated juridical personnel being very happy to deal with parties without legal aid. This includes your own insurer.

 

[Johny]

I think you do need to notify the officer of "video evidence" for it to be included in the report. If it was not reported in official report then it did not exist. At least that's how Eastern Europe does it and I want to say U.S too.

 

[Tony G]

If an officer asks I hope to say something like this, and refer him to my YouTube page... "I installed a dashcam to, uh, record my trips and for the cruises my car club goes on, sir. Why do you have one?"

(The lawyers suggestion is a good one. The idea is to protect yourself from the other guy's lawyer...)

Just my non-lawyer opinion, although it was humorous I didn't like the meteor recording device suggestion very much. People aren't fools, and that includes Judges and Jurors. It seems to me they would know a nonsensical answer when they hear one. Rather than an evasive answer, I think invoking safety says that you're a person that cares about safety, rather than someone who hopes to turn a minor accident into a faked injury lawsuit.

Car clubs and jealous wives are great, but you would need to actually have one of those (I don't) to invoke them.

 

[throrope]

it's a very sad state of affairs your legal system, glad it's not something I have to deal with

Admittedly subjective, our legal system is one price for enjoying the best place on the planet.

 

[singlespeed]

I also don't plan on telling the police immediately if I witness an accident, I don't want them to confiscate my camera. This is another reason I carry a spare card, just in case I need to give one away. If I have my laptop with me I can make a quick copy of the video.

 

[Tomas]

Good point, singlespeed, but there would be no advantage to them having more than just the memory card since my DR500GW-HD can't play back the videos anyway. I'd be happy to provide them with the MicroSD card after I copy the vid via my smartphone, but I'd prefer to keep my evidence in my possession... I wonder what the law is on that?

(I do have four pre-formatted cards in a small holder in the car.)

 

[sludgeguts]

I have witnesses a couple of bumps during my working day. As I don't really have time to hang around, I simply offer my services as a witness by handing over a slip of paper with my name & mobile number. If they need me then they call me & I give them my address & tell them that I also have video. In one instance, all I got was a letter from insurance asking for my witness statement (It was the usual claim form), in another, I got a letter from local plod asking for a statement - the offender denied even being anywhere near the scene!). In both cases, I simply dropped the relevant bit of footage onto disk and included it with the written/signed statement (in which I referred to specific times of the clip).

 

[sludgeguts]

Not sure if this applies to the rest of the world - BUT, in the UK, insurers ask you to declare any modifications.

For the innocent amongst us, I always assumed this meant

But these days, this is not the case. ANY / ALL modifications MUST be declared.
And this means even...

(it could be a distraction!)
Although insurance websites give many examples of mods, they also (often) say - anything that didn't come as standard from the manufacturer.
Now, bearing in mind that you might expect your insurer to pay out big sums of money at some point, insurers tend to employ pedants who will nitpick over the trivial.
"why do you have a sticker on the car that says "GTi" when your car clearly isn't?

So, you must declare the addition of a dashcam to your insurance company. mine has said it doesn't affect my premiums (they allow up to three small priced mods).
If you were in a prang & suddenly declared video footage, an insurance company might not like the fact that this 'mod' has suddenly come to light.
If your car is broken into and one of the items you are claiming for is a dashcam - they might tell you it wasn't declared therefore not covered.

Just saying.

 

[KvR]

If your car is broken into and one of the items you are claiming for is a dashcam - they might tell you it wasn't declared therefore not covered.

In Germany only integral parts are covered by car insurance, e.g. a car pc or car radio. Dascams or GPS systems on the windshield, or sunglasses, or a noteboook pc are not covered.

 

[sludgeguts]

In Germany only integral parts are covered by car insurance, e.g. a car pc or car radio. Dascams or GPS systems on the windshield, or sunglasses, or a noteboook pc are not covered.

It's probably got something to do with "my £500 car was stolen, I had a £3000 stereo, a £200 satnav, £800 alloys..."etc.
To insure a vehicle, the insurer HAS to know the full value of the item they are insuring. If it is involved in a prang, they have to know the value of items they might need to replace. Original steelies are far cheaper than pepperpot alloys (or whatever it is they are). A car that has been highly modded might be driven like it's in 2fast 2 furious (loads of kids do little mods then believe they are the world's best stunt racer).

 

[KvR]

To insure a vehicle, the insurer HAS to know the full value of the item they are insuring. If it is involved in a prang, they have to know the value of items they might need to replace.

Normally it is a question on the insurance form, but often forgotten if something valuable is mounted later.