A judge has dismissed a claim for a back injury in a car park accident after photos were presented to the Court from the plaintiff´s Facebook page.
On 5th April 2014, Rita Milinovic (29) from Citywest in Dublin was looking for a parking space when she was reversed into by a van driven by Paul Ferris. Despite the car park accident being described as “minor collision”, Rita claimed that she had suffered a back injury as a result of the accident that prevented her from working as a waitress for six months.
Rita made a claim for a back injury in a car park accident and asked for a €60,000 compensation settlement. Paul Ferris and his employer – O´Dwyer Property Management Limited – contested the value of the claim and the case went to the Circuit Civil Court, where it was heard by Court President Mr Justice Raymond Groarke.
At the hearing, Rita winced in the witness stand as she recounted the extent of the injury she had suffered. However, her claim for a back injury in a car park accident collapsed when barristers representing Ferris and O´Dwyer Property Management Limited presented photos to the court taken from Rita´s Facebook page.
The photos showed Rita at the top of Bray Head six weeks after her accident and of her working out in a gym. Other photos showed the bikini-clad Rita competing at an international body sculptor competition. The barristers told the court that Rita´s claim for a back injury in a car park accident was a lie from beginning to end.
Judge Groarke said: “Trying to be as politically correct as one can be in this situation, it doesn’t look like a person with such a fine physical physique as Ms Milinovic could have been suffering a great deal of pain”. He accepted that some of the pictures may have taken at photo-shoots, but others showed her doing physical exercises “which somebody with a bad back would certainly not be engaging in”.
The judge dismissed Rita´s claim for a back injury in a car park accident and made an order for costs against her. In summing up, Judge Groarke commented that, while Rita may have suffered some degree of injury, the law demanded that people came to court in total honesty. The failure to do so, the judge said, would attract the penalty of dismissal.