This is one crash the SAPS may want to forget, authorities having to fork over more than R1,2 million to an Umhlanga dealership after they destroyed a brand new Jaguar.

Not just any Jaguar mind you, a Jaguar F type V8 SC which had just been introduced in South Africa. Valued at over R1,3 million the car was scrapped and sold for R112 000, with the dealership suing the police to recover the rest. IOL with this:

…the driver, Trevor Clack, employed as the dealership’s brand manager, said he was taking the car on a test drive before the launch in the coming week.

“The sky was blue and the visibility was clear,” he said.

As he passed The Pavilion Shopping Centre, he changed lanes from the extreme right-hand one to the middle one. He noticed a car in front of him, a Mercedes-Benz, slowing down, so he released the accelerator and applied the brakes.

As he did that, the car came to standstill in front of him and, with cars in both lanes on either side, he was forced to stop dead to avoid hitting it. Moments later he heard a bang from behind as a minibus taxi crashed into the back of him.

The airbags activated and the Jaguar was propelled into the rear of the Mercedes, which was still stationary. Clack, who sustained head injuries, said he saw the taxi lying on its side and people “were scattered all over the road”.

The driver of the taxi eventually died from injuries sustained in the accident, and it is the police-driven Mercedes-Benz in front of the Jaguar that has been deemed responsible for the crash:

SAPS Colonel Samuel Koopman testified that the Mercedes was his but was being driven by a colleague, Constable Alan Titus.

The two were coming from Upington in the Northern Cape. They were on duty and on their way to rugby championships in Margate.

He said he had not been concentrating on the road but looked up as Titus applied the brakes and saw a white motor vehicle partly in front of his left-hand side.

[Judge Sishi said] “There is no evidence to support the existence of the white car … and anyway, the presence of this car was never put to Clack in cross-examination.

“Why he stopped remains unanswered. Even Koopman was evasive. Titus even mentioned that he was not used to driving on a road with three lanes and there were no freeways in the Northern Cape.”

Ruling that Clack was not negligent because he had been faced with a “sudden emergency”, the judge found the minister and Titus liable to compensate the dealership.

A rather expensive folly then by those SAPS officers, and you can’t put a price on the death of the man driving the taxi either.

[source:iol]