LIVING BY DAMAGES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19969, 10 December 1926, Page 13

LIVING BY DAMAGES.

HOW “ACCIDENTS” OCCUR. SOME STRANGE FRAUDS. “PRAM” AND “PLUM” TRICKS. Most people have to live on the wage or salary that their work brings. Others live on damages ! Some weeks ago a man in England, following his usual custom, prepared to back his car from a garage into the road. That involved crossing t! pavement. A glance had shown him that the former was clear of traffic. The car emerged, reached the , pavement, and then there came a shriek. A perambulator was under the back wheels 1 A woman had come quickly round the corner and—“ How was Ito know you were coming out with a oar? You never sounded your horn. And suppose my little one” — pointing to a child by her side—“had been in the pram I” The man was sorry—to the extent of £3 10s. And he helped to straighten the bent wheels of the pram. A fortnight later he changed his garage and—repeated his exploit! The same women—the same pram —the same story! He paid £2 and thought the accident was one of those queei coincidences that happen occasionally—until, chatting with a motoring friend, hv discovered that the latter had also backed into a perambulator. Yes, a deliberately planned game. A car insurance company says that it is bein;' worked all over the country. Another “damage” trick is to trip “accidentally” over the rope by which barrels of beer are steadied in their descent into public-house cellars. At a recent local meeting of licensed victuallers it transpired that seven of them had paid from 15s to £2 as compensation for broken spectacles, torn trousers, snapped umbrellas, and so on—another “damage” game, and doubtless a very lucrative one, for the same old spectacles, the same umbrella, and the same trousers suffice. If, while ' pasing a fruiterer’s shop—oni with an outside display of fruit—a nersof stepped on a stray plum, slipped, fell, and hurt himself he would have a genuine claim for damages. The fruiterer would be guilty of negligence. In a London suburb every fruiterer has been caught, for various sums, by wily folk who have “planted” a plum and slipped on it What 1 is a tradesman to do when the squashed plum is there for all to see, and the injured person begins to .take the names and addresses of those who witnessed the “accident”? He say; things • . . and pays. Several restaurant proprietors were victimised recently—they are wiser now—by a man who ordered a meal, and apparently smashed one of his false teeth against a stone in the cabbage. There, was the stone; the broken tooth was in his hand. And another customer was quite willing to give evidence, if need be. A confederate, of course. The restaurant proprietors paid—£s. £5, £2—and let the matter drop. To enter a tca-slicm .-.nd sit down in some sticky mess is not pleasant. A woman was recently working that game. She planted the pat of butter or blob of jam herself. But it was the same skirt — cleaned after cverv operation. These “damage” frauds may bluster, but if they see they are “suspect” they clear off, threatening proceedings which never materialise.