5. Gary and John, both aged 15, decided to go cycling one afternoon in the countryside surrounding Moldhaven. After cycling for a few miles, they decided to stop for a drink
. They entered an off-licence, where they were served by Filipe. Gary asked for a six-pack of Headbangers Extra Strength Lager for each of them. Gary told Filipe that “cycling up those hills will be much easier after we’ve drunk that lot”.
Filipe sold the six-packs to Gary. The two boys returned to their bikes and cycled several more miles, drinking from the cans of lager as they did so. After each of them had consumed three cans of lager, they decided that they should start a “Mexican wave”, which involved each of them in turn standing up on the bike pedals and waving his hands in the air.
As they were doing this, Gary lost control of his bike and crashed into the back of John’s bike, pushing him into the path of an oncoming car, driven by Didier. Both John and Gary were seriously injured in the subsequent collision with the car. The car was severely dented in the collision and one of the front tyres was punctured.
Despite realising that the tyre was damaged, Didier decided to drive Gary and John to Moldhaven County Hospital for treatment. Anxious to get them to the hospital as soon as possible, Didier exceeded the speed limit of 30 mph.
On the way to the hospital, he lost control of the car because of the puncture. The car crashed into a ditch, causing extensive damage to the bodywork of the car, but no further injury to those in the car. Didier then used his mobile phone to call an emergency ambulance. Ten minutes after he had made the phone call, the ambulance arrived at the scene of the crash and took Gary and John to Moldhaven County Hospital for emergency treatment.
Unfortunately, Gary suffered from the rare blood disorder Haemophilia (a hereditary, genetic disorder that impairs the body’s natural ability to control blood-clotting), and despite the best efforts of the surgical team, he died on the operating table. One week later, Didier asked his neighbour Oscar, who is a keen amateur car-repairer, if he would repair the damaged bodywork on his car.
Oscar replied: “Yeah, I’ll give it a go”. Oscar made a mess of the repairs and Didier had to have the car repaired professionally at considerably greater cost than would have been necessary before Oscar had done any work on it.
Advise all parties as to any possible claims and liabilities in Tort.
