JA'AFAR BIN ABDUL SAMAD v LIM ZHEN XIANG

Facts

Ja'afar Bin Abdul Samad v Lim Zhen Xiang was a District Court trial in Originating Claim No 1518 of 2023 arising from a road accident on 19 January 2022 at a junction of Yishun Avenue 5, when the defendant's car struck the rear of the claimant's car while it was stopped at a red light. On the first day of trial the defendant conceded full responsibility and the parties agreed sums of S$972.88 for repairs and S$420 for loss of use, leaving only causation and the amount of the personal injury claim.

The claimant, who worked full time as a technical officer with SMRT on night shift and drove for Grab by day, claimed he suffered right shoulder injuries, including rotator cuff tears found on an MRI in April 2022 and a possible small avulsion fracture, a neck and upper back strain, and vertigo. He sought general damages, loss of earning capacity, future surgery costs and special damages, including lost overtime allowances and lost Grab earnings. The defendant said the collision was minor, relied on an accident investigator, Mr Hunter, and an orthopaedic expert, Dr Chang, and argued that the claimant's ongoing problems were not caused by the accident.

Issues

1. Whether the accident investigator's opinion could be relied on for whether injuries were caused
2. Whether the accident caused the shoulder injuries, neck and back strain and vertigo, and what general damages were due
3. Whether the claimant should receive loss of earning capacity and future medical expenses
4. What special damages, including pre-trial loss of earnings, were proved

Holding

The court allowed the personal injury claim in part and ordered final judgment for S$5,500 in general damages with interest at 5.33% and S$6703.59 in special damages with interest at 2.67%, both from the date of the originating claim to judgment. The claims for vertigo, loss of earning capacity, future medical expenses and lost Grab earnings failed. Costs were to be dealt with on written submissions.

Reasoning

The court accepted Mr Hunter's view of the collision mechanics, which matched photographs showing no obvious damage, the low agreed repair costs and the uninjured back-seat passenger, and found it a low-impact accident that did not push the claimant's car forward. But he had no medical training, so it was for the doctors to say whether the accident caused injury.

The claimant's treating doctors said only that the shoulder tears could possibly have been caused by the accident, without asking how he was positioned, and accepted that degeneration was likely given his age and job and that it was hard to tell if the tears were pre-existing. The court preferred Dr Chang's evidence that the very small tears were most likely degenerative and that the accident caused a minor shoulder strain that brought on symptoms. Treatment had been conservative and regular consultations ended around July 2022. It awarded S$4000 for the shoulder and S$1,500 for the neck and back strain, which had resolved by about 28 February 2022. Vertigo was a subjective complaint recorded only once, with no objective signs, so it was not proved.

No loss of earning capacity was awarded: the claimant agreed on the stand that he had suffered none, he kept both jobs with raises and bonuses, and all doctors said he could carry on working. Future surgery was not shown to be necessary, as the reports only gave estimates of potential costs and his condition was improving.

On special damages the court allowed S$1012.23 in medical expenses, counting a Medisave payment, and S$340 in transport. It adopted the defendant's averaging method for lost SMRT allowances, awarding S$5,351.36. The Grab claim failed because two weeks of statements could not support it and it was inconsistent with the much lower income he had declared to IRAS.

From the judgment