Cyclist awarded €1,900 in two claims against motorists after multiple crashes in Dublin

A professional rapper, who has had five crashes on her bicycle while cycling in Dublin, has received minimal personal injury damages of €1,900 in two claims for up to €120,000 against motorists.

Judge James O’Donohue said 33-year-old entertainer Arezu Tabarsi, of Millbrook Court, Mount Brown, Kilmainham, Dublin, had not helped herself to any degree by her inconsistency and failure to remember some matters.

She told defence barrister Conor Kearney she had five cycling accidents and had brought four claims having been awarded €20,000 in one of them.

Two of the “overlapping” accidents in May and September 2019 were heard together on Wednesday. In one, at Drumcondra, she lost control of her bike and crashed into a shop doorway when a van marginally entered a cycle lane and startled her. In the other, in Thomas Street, she grazed her elbow against the wing mirror on a taxi as it pulled in to let off a passenger.

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Mr Kearney, who appeared with Nathaniel Lacy Solicitors for both the van driver and the taximan and their insurers, told the Circuit Civil Court there had been no collision with the van in the first incident and minimal elbow contact with the taxi in the second.

He said Ms Tabarsi, a lone parent, had claimed for damage to her phone, speaker and bike in the second accident despite not having fallen after her brush with the wing mirror.

Judge O’Donohue said she was 80 per cent to blame in the Drumcondra incident and awarded her €4,000 damages, reduced to €800 (due to the extent of her own negligence) against van driver Denis McLaughlin, c/o AXA Insurance, together with €500 for replacement of her bicycle (cut to €100).

He awarded her a straight €1,000 damages in the second incident in which he held Ballivor Co Meath, taximan Edmond O’Connor fully to blame for her elbow injury and awarded District Court costs in both cases.

He refused to grant Ms Tabarsi any special damages for her phone, speaker and bike against Mr O’Connor who told the court he had heard a bang and then saw her standing by his passenger window with her bike between her legs and rubbing her elbow.

In an observation at the start of the hearings, Judge O’Donohue said he knew that cyclists habitually go through red lights and habitually cycle down the wrong side of the road although no such evidence had been levelled against Ms Tabarsi.

He said that in both cases she had been wearing headphones over her beanie cap and listening to music and in the first incident had not being giving full attention to what was ahead of her.