Welcome to this episode of the Lawfather Podcast, hosted by William Franchi, a dedicated personal injury lawyer at Franchi Law. Join us for insightful discussions, captivating cases, and valuable tips to empower you on your legal path. In this segment of “Case or No Case,” we present intriguing car accident scenarios where listeners guess the legal outcomes. Join us as we test your legal intuition and explore the fascinating world of case analysis.
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Welcome back to the Law Father Podcast. As always, we are here in Law Father Studios, right within Law Father Headquarters. And uh, those of you who are listening to us on the podcast, please rate, review and subscribe to the podcast. And if you wanna see what this talking head looks like, you can check us out on YouTube or you can check us out when we do the live. Uh, today we’re gonna do case or no case, which, uh, we were just kind of joking as we started the show that we, uh, actually had to restart the show today because I got a little confused. Um, on the, between the live and the non-live video, uh, we realized we could start it over because we are not on live radio, but it brings me to back when I was doing daytime, back when we were doing Case or No Case, uh, the show day, the daytime show, it’s actually called Daytime, uh, on, uh, what is it on FLA?
It’s a taped show, so it’s on every day at the same time. I forget what time it’s on now, but it’s on for a few hours each day, but it’s not live, so it’s taped. But when I was doing it, I always treated it like it was live. Like we had to do one take, one take, and one take only for case or no case because I am just that much of a professional. And uh, actually what it really was, I didn’t want the actual professionals to have to redo the segment that they had brought me on to do, right? So it was, let’s do this one time and one time only and we’ll get the real pros out on their way. So, um, we’re gonna do a case for no case today. Those of you who are on the live, there will be a reward at the end.
Jason will pick one winner of whoever gets it right? Okay? So there’s gonna be three scenarios. You have to guess which one is right. The winner that Jason picks will get a law father hat branded Bills Lawfather hat. They’re pretty cool. Uh, I usually wear it when I go to the beach. I’m on the boat, walking around town. Um, I dunno, I think they’re cool. You may not, I don’t know. Jason, do you have one? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Ah, see Jason has one. Jason, wheres it around town? Jason, wheres it when, uh, when he is working in Clearwater Beach? Um, so anyway, I was gonna say something else, but I realize I probably shouldn’t. So anyway, we’re gonna continue on with case or no case. Here we go. This is going to be a scenario in which we’re going to be finding which driver made the proper left turn.
Okay? So in determining which case, which person actually has a case, we are going to need to determine who made the proper left turn. The person who made the proper left turn actually has a case. All right, case number one. David is driving east on State Road 60 in Brandon. That’s a huge road. It has seven lanes with a grass median and he wants to turn left because he really wants to go see the new movie. I don’t know what new movie I was trying to think of one, the new movie. And, uh, he moves over, he gets in the left lane, and right here at this intersection, there’s a left turn arrow for him to use.
So he turns on when that turn arrow is green, but just as he’s crossing over, okay? Just as he’s crossing over the white line, that green light, that green arrow saying he can turn left turns yellow as he’s in the middle of the intersection because he’s a really cautious, slow driver. Okay, that light turns red and then oncoming traffic going straight. Third light turns green. So David’s light when he starts is green starts his turn, crosses the stop bar is turning left oncoming traffic, third light turns green because it’s such a big intersection and David’s just driving so slow, okay? He gets t-boned by one of those cars whose light was red and then turns green. David was hurt. Does he have a case? Okay, that is case number one. That’s David. Alex is case number two. Alex is driving on a road and he comes to an intersection.
Alex wants to turn left. So he gets in the left turn lane, the traffic lane in front of Alex has a blinking yellow arrow. Alex slows down, makes his left turn as he is turning, Alex is t-boned by a car that had a green light going in the opposite direction. Alex is hurt and Alex sues the car coming in the other direction. Remember Alex turning left, blinking yellow, left turn arrow, Alex turns left, gets hit by cars coming that had a green light in the opposite direction. Case number three, Jason, Jason is driving during rush hour and he is on a road with a grass median. And it’s, and it’s something that you know, I’m sure we’ve all seen before, especially in Tampa where there’s a lot of traffic. And, and so Jason gets in the left turn lane and the opposite direction has two straight lanes.
Okay? Now these straight lanes coming from the opposite direction, there’s a lot of stop traffic and there’s a right turn lane on that other side that has no traffic. So there’s two stop drivers and they waved Jason on, we’ve all seen this before. You got cars backed up and one car waves another one on. And as Jason goes to make his left turn, he never sees the person in the right turn lane. Okay? So as he’s turning the car that is in the right turn lane is about to turn right, Jason’s turning left. That car turning right hits Jason’s car. Jason sues that driver. Does Jason have a case? All right, so let’s, let’s run, run through these real quick. David. Case number one, he goes really slow driver, green light, he starts, he crosses the stop bar, goes and turns left super slow. Driver, his light as he’s in the intersection turns red, other traffic turns green, that traffic comes going straight and hits him.
Number two is Alex who turns on a blinking left turn arrow, other side of the street, the oncoming traffic has a green light. Someone going straight hits Alex, or is it number three? Our buddy Jason. Not this Jason, but an entirely different Jason. So anyway, the Jason has cars on the other side. They stop because it’s rush hour and it’s really backed up and there’s a street. So they stopped to give an opening for him to turn left. They actually wave him on to turn left, okay? So he does so, but then there’s a car coming in the right lane and that car hits Jason. Does Jason have a case? All right, so I’m gonna pause those of you on the live. This is for branded Bill’s Lawfather hat. So you gotta get it right. Jason’s gonna pick one. It’s all on, not on the Jason on the paper.
The Jason that’s here in real life is going to pick a winner, uh, for those on the Instagram live. All right? So is it David? Does David have a case? Alex have a case or Jason, which one? I’m gonna give a little pause here. Let some of the comments come in. Who has a case? Let’s let it roll in. David, Alex, Jason who has a case? Is it David turning left on the green arrow? Alex, turning left on the blinking arrow or Jason after he is waved through by the stop traffic. Is it case one, case two, case three. Here we go. Drum roll please. Jason, we, uh, we good here to go. We ready to give? All right, it is not number two, Alex turned on a blinking yellow light. Now, in my personal opinion, I think these new blinking yellow lights are dumb because I think they cause too much confusion.
I think we all learned that when there’s a green, a solid green light, right? The solid circle that we have to yield, we have to stop our left turn until the, the oncoming traffic is is gone. What these blinking left arrows, they look just like essentially the left turn arrows that are the protected arrows, but they’re not because they’re blinking yellow, they’re actually not protected turns. It’s what it’s really telling you is if you’re turning left, you need to yield. Um, it’s just, I think it causes, causes confusion. I think the idea, the concept behind it’s probably solid, but in real life, I just don’t think that it does anything more than just cause people to be confused, which is what happened to Alex. Now, is it David or is it Jason? Which one? David has the case. Now here’s why David, he crossed over the stop bar while his light was green. So the stop bar is, if you’re driving, you’ll see a white line and then if it’s a big enough intersection, you’ll see a crosswalk. That white line
Is the stop bar. Once you cross over that stop bar, you own that intersection. So if you cross that stop bar on green, that intersection is yours until you’re all the way through it. So even if you’re driving really, really slow, making your left across these seven lanes of traffic, guess what? That intersection is yours. Those cars coming straight from the other direction, they have to yield because you have that intersection. Think about it like this. If you look at emergency vehicles and when you have to yield to emergency vehicles, you have to yield to emergency vehicles. If you are not in an intersection, what delineates whether or not you are in the intersection is on what side of that cross. Uh, what, what side of that stop bar are you on? Okay? So that’s what tells you whether or not you’re in the intersection.
If you’re in that intersection, you own that intersection until you get out of it. So even with an ambulance coming up behind you, right? You, you have the legal right to continue through that intersection and actually you probably should because you don’t know if that ambulance wants to turn right, um, or you just don’t know if you’re in its way. So you gotta get through that intersection and move over. Um, so keep that in mind. Um, cross that bar, you have the intersection, it’s yours, you own it. Why is number three not a case? Because just because someone waves you on doesn’t mean it’s safe for you to go that car in that third lane, that right lane, he has priority over you making the left turn you as the left, as the person turning left must yield to that person turning, right? So even though those other cars were stopped and they waved you on, you had a duty and an obligation to make sure that you were all the way through the inter or that that all of the traffic in the intersection was clear and that car turning right, that’s on you.
Okay? So be careful when you do that. I see it all the time. Um, I have people wave me on, right? I mean, look, those of us in Tampa, we drive in traffic, it happens. Um, and you just gotta be very, very, very careful when you’re doing so because I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been that had somebody wave me on and I’m thinking, okay, maybe it’s clear and then whoop car comes through and just never saw just with the way cars are. I don’t know. I mean, my car’s pretty high, so I can see most things, but there’s, there are still times that all of a sudden there’s a car in that next lane and you can’t see it. Um, so, and, and all of these real cases, they, they really are. Um, I’ve, I’ve had, and I’ve argued this comes up, uh, David’s case, the first case with crossing the stop bar that actually comes up, I don’t wanna say often, but I’ve used it a couple of times in, in real life cases to prove to the defense that, look, my guy didn’t run the red light.
My guy’s responsibility is solely to cross that line before that light turns red. Okay? And if you do so, if you’ve crossed that line, that bar before that light turns red, that intersection is yours, you actually can’t even get a ticket for running a red light. So kinda keep that in mind, like once you’ve crossed that, that intersection is yours, you own it. Um, yeah, I, I guess, and a comment here is that in Tennessee you can get in trouble for going too slow. Um, you know, I, I don’t, I can’t remember if they, I think they were talking about it in this legislative session. I don’t remember if they passed a, a too slow thing. I think, you know, that they modified the moving over to the left lane. Um, I, I would find it hard pressed in any state that has a law about driving too slow, that you could really enforce it with somebody turning left at a, um, traffic controlled device controlled intersection, right at a red light intersection.
I you’d have a really hard pressed time I think proving that this person was going so slow that they endangered other people, right? It’s more like the people on the other side of the street need to slow down and not gun it. The second they see the moment, they see that light turn green. Um, I mean, Jace, you drive in Tampa, how often are you sitting at a light and your light turns green and you kind of give it the half a second pause because someone’s barreling through that red light, right? I mean, you know, you, you kind of gotta use some, some common sense. So, um, you know, usually, usually broad generalization, those too slow laws usually have to do with the highways. Um, and you’ll see it posted, uh, I’ve been in states, I’ve seen states, I think I’ve lived in a state that had, you’d have the speed limit, right?
So 65, and then a lot of times right underneath it you’d have minimum speed and it’s usually like 40, 45. So, uh, that’s generally where you see those slow speed things. Now, Florida, not to get off on a tangent, but Florida has, um, has a law, they passed it a couple years ago and I think they’re, they revamped it just a little bit, uh, in this legislative session that deals with, if you’re in the left lane, you gotta be driving fast, right? You the left lane’s for passing. Um, it seems a little bit weird because you’re, you’re telling people that they’re breaking the law if they’re essentially driving the speed limit, because those of you who have been on 2 75 or 75 or I four in Florida know that the left lane’s for doing 90, right? And the right lane is for doing, uh, about 75 regardless of what the speed limit actually is.
Um, so in order to not break one law, you gotta break another law. I don’t know, I don’t know who comes up with this stuff. Uh, but you know what, what we’re on on that topic, one thing to keep in mind and uh, you know, I think those of you who, who follow our social media, I think you’re gonna see this come up in a video because it’s a, it’s a really important thing. Uh, it’s a new law that’s gonna pass in July. It’s not getting a lot of press, not getting the press that the gun law is getting. Um, well, because everybody likes guns, it turns out you, you either like guns or you hate guns, right? And if you hate guns, you really dislike the people who have guns. And you both sides are really vocal, right? People are really vocal. It’s a really polarizing vocal thing that’s not, that’s not what I’m talking about though.
Um, but it is a, a really important law that is, is passing and it’s honestly going to save more lives than any gun control measure or, or concealed weapons law in Florida we’ll deal with ever, right? It’s, so you guys, you, you’ve probably heard of in Florida the move over, right? If you see an emergency vehicle, you gotta move over to the next lane, or you gotta slow, uh, to 20 miles an hour below the posted speed limit. That’s the law, right? Uh, that law is actually being expanded. So as of July 1st here in Florida, that law will cover disabled vehicles. So right now, as we stand here today, today is the 26th, I believe, of June. So for the next couple days, you only have to move over for police fire trucks, um, tow trucks, um, police, fire, ambulance, tow trucks, emergency vehicles, right?
That’s how the law is written now. And, and tow truck falls within that for that purpose. And, and look, I’ve done those stops. Like I’ve, I’ve stopped people on the side of a highway when I was a deputy and, and man, it’s true, everybody’s doing 75 in the right lane and you’re like, oh my God, how am I gonna get outta this car and not absolutely get destroyed? God forbid if someone goes off the road. I mean, I know two deputies who were one exit from our district that had, I think they stopped to, to help. I don’t know if it was a traffic stop or if they stopped to help a disabled vehicle and got absolutely plowed and demolished, uh, really seriously hurt. I think it, it may have ended one or both of their careers. Um, both of ’em were pretty close to retirement.
So I think, uh, I think one or one or both of them, um, did retire great guys though. Um, they’re doing okay now. This was, this was a long time ago. Um, but anyway, keep in mind that as of July 1st, if you see a disabled vehicle on the side of the road, you have to move over. Okay? So left side, right side, doesn’t matter. You have to change lanes, move over or slow your speed down 20 miles an hour. Now, uh, I got a story that goes along with this, Jason, of course. So my wife and I, and I saw her on the live, hi, um, we were, we were going, this was a long time, this was before kids, right? We’re getting off on the exit to downtown, you know, 2 75, right? It’s nighttime, you see all the lights, and there was, then you could see there was an accident up ahead of us on the right side.
We need to get off the downtown exit, right? And I’m slowing down. I I’m, I’m maybe doing 15 miles an hour, right? That’s how backed up traffic was. And, and there’s that curve and you can’t really see right? Where, where the emergency lights are, where you’re, that, that apex of the curve to get off into downtown. And then that’s curving to the right, then to the left. It’s breaking off to go towards I four. And, and it’s like that curve is apexing. And so as you’re coming up, so you really can’t tell and you got a steady, you know, steady stream of cars on your left side. So I go, I see the tow truck, I finally get up close enough to it, and I’m not trying to wash it, I’m just trying to get off the exit. Well, they’re on the right side. I need to be on the right side of the exit. There’s a steady stream of cars in front of me and behind me and I’m in one. And then on the left side, there’s a steady stream of cars because,
Oh, I don’t know, it’s rush hour and everybody’s doing 15 miles an hour on 2 75, which is a highway. So it’s what, 55 in that area. The cop stepped, it was a trooper of all things. He steps out from the road, from the, from the shoulder, right? Puts his hand up, stands right in front of my car. Now I’m going slow enough. Mind you, I I just pushed the brakes down. Like I didn’t have to slam on the brakes. There was, it was not dramatic whatsoever. He runs over, makes me put my window down, he goes, you know what the move over law is? I go, yeah, I do. I didn’t tell him I was a lawyer. I didn’t tell him I had been a cop. I just was like, I’m not really feeling like dealing with this nonsense. And I go, yeah, you either gotta move over for emergency vehicles or if it’s not safe to do, so slow your speed down 20 miles bra, 20 miles per hour below the posted speed limit.
You got all huffy puffy and ran off <laugh>. So, um, you know, there you go. Just do the right thing, right? Because look, I know, I know how bad it is to be on the side of the road, move over and if you see a disabled vehicle, you should be probably moving over and I think most of us move over anyway when we see a disabled vehicle. Um, but you gotta do so safely. So do, do, keep that in mind, do it safely. Um, and when, if you’re gonna hit your brakes right to, to slow down to 20 miles an hour under their posted speed limit, just do it safely. Because we all see those drivers on I four that they’re right on your backside and if you slam on the brakes, they’re gonna be joining you in your car whether you like it or not.
And then well they do that, call me and we’ll take care of it. All right? Simple, simple, simple, simple. Um, Jason, do we have a winner for, uh, I kind of forgot about that. Julie Jr. 11, Julie Jr. 11, you won Case, you’re okay. So Julie Jr 11, um, I got off, got off on a tangent, and um, so if you can drop me a DM and we’ll get, we’ll get your address and stuff taken care of, get you got a branded Bill’s hat, uh, courtesy of the law father, and, uh, what does Bar stand for? B a r. Um, anyway, I’ll get right back to that. Those of you on the podcast, thanks for hanging out and listening to Case or No Case. As always, rate review and subscribe to the podcast. Check out all my friends on Radio, influence and check out all law Father, social Media law, father Out.