Personal injury sheriff finds Edinburgh car accident was staged for insurance fraud

About this case:

• Citation:
  [2024] SC EDIN 18
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  Sheriff Court
• Judge:
  Sheriff Iain W Nicol

Pursuer Arif Khan raised the action against Mohammad Arshad and his insurer, AXA Insurance plc, which alleged that the collision was staged and the pursuer and others were participants in a fraud. Quantum was agreed at £4,000 should the liability question be determined in favour of the pursuer.

The case was heard by Sheriff Iain Nicol in the All-Scotland Sheriff Personal Injury Court. Bergin, advocate, appeared for the pursuer, and Marney, advocate, for AXA. Mr Arshad was not present and was unrepresented.

Differences in evidence

The pursuer’s position was that, in June 2020, while he was a passenger in a car being driven by his employer Mahmut Tas, the second defender’s vehicle pulled out of a side street without giving way and collided with the passenger side of Mr Tas’ car. The pursuer did not seek medical help after the accident and did not make a claim until around seven months afterwards.

Mr Tas gave evidence through a Turkish interpreter that he was going to a cash & carry with the pursuer to get stock for his shop, and after the collision he called a company who had left flyers in his shop, Kwik Claims, located two doors down from his own shop, to recover his now undriveable vehicle. He stated that the police were not called nor was the accident reported as he did not think they would deem the accident to be serious enough.

It was found that the director of Kwik Claims, Mohamad Irfan, knew all the occupants of the vehicles involved in the collision prior to its occurrence, and in fact had known a passenger in the second defender’s vehicle who did not respond to his citation, Mr Shah, for over 20 years. On 20 June 2023 AXA withdrew indemnity under the second defender’s policy on the basis that they believed the accident was not genuine. However, the pursuer argued that there were no clear and cogent reasons from the facts to make an inference of fraud.

Counsel for the pursuer submitted that AXA had admitted liability and there was no credible evidence to suggest that anyone had gotten into Mr Arshad’s vehicle at the behest of Kwik Claims to perpetrate a fraud. For AXA it was submitted that there were significant differences between what certain witnesses had said when interviewed or when forms were filled in at earlier stages compared to their parole evidence that permitted an inference of fraud.

Inescapable conclusion

In his decision, Sheriff Nicol said of particular witnesses: “The evidence of Mr Tas was in parts credible and reliable and in other parts incredible or unreliable. It was, in significant and material respects, inconsistent when compared to other evidence, leading to inferences that he was involved in a fraudulent scheme. It is notable for what he failed to say as well as what he did say.”

He continued: “I did not find the pursuer’s evidence regarding the decision to delay making the claim because he was busy at university to be credible. The accident was in July 2020 during university holidays and the claim was intimated in February 2021 when a) the University academic year would be well advanced and b) Mr Tas’ claim was nearing completion. The clear impression which I formed was that the pursuer was waiting to make sure Mr Tas’ claim was successful before pursuing his own claim.”

Describing the evidence of Mr Arshad as “riddled with inconsistencies and lies”, the sheriff highlighted: “If the second defender had been driving in the manner he stated it is debatable whether a collision would have occurred at all as he says he was cognisant of the danger the parked vehicles posed and was edging forward. If a collision was inevitable, it was certainly not one that would have led to the level of damage which is evident from the photographs and engineer’s report. This whole line of evidence is more consistent with a staged collision and fraudulent insurance claim than a simple road accident due to the negligence of one driver.”

He concluded: “I am satisfied having regard to all the oral and documentary evidence led in this case that the inescapable conclusion to be reached is that the pursuer along with the others who took part in the road collision on 9 July 2020, as well as Mr Irfan, are complicit in an insurance fraud. The circumstantial evidence, looked at as a whole, strongly favours that inference being drawn.”

Decree of absolvitor was therefore granted in favour of the first defender, and the action against the second defender was dismissed in terms of the summary cause rules.