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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Legal action - kid kicked football into baby

82 replies

CreatingADream · 12/04/2017 11:50

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4403936/Baby-hit-head-ball-Chelsea-star-s-park-kickabout.html

Say what? Surely you'd just chalk this down to normal childhood accidents in a park...

OP posts:
BaggyCheeks · 12/04/2017 12:33

She wouldn't be getting badgered by the gutter press for a newsworthy quote if she hadn't contacted the gutter press with her story in the first place.

EmilyByTheRiver · 12/04/2017 12:37

That's probably true. Unless someone else did, who knows?

I just have trouble accepting anything the DM says - or any interpretation they put on things- at face value, tbh.

Batgirlspants · 12/04/2017 12:43

Considering most mumsnetters don't read the fail there's a hell of a lot of threads with links to it.

Why tread bollocks like that.

pipsqueak25 · 12/04/2017 12:46

bat Grin most mners WON'T admit to reading it that's why then will get arsey if you point out the number of thread referals, have had my arse flamed before for pointing out the obvious Grin.
[pitch forks and flaming torches ready to get pip]

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 12/04/2017 12:46

Looks like she's going after him because she knows he's very wealthy.
I hope her child IS all right, but this seems really "litigation-gorn-mad" to me - unless the baby has actually sustained life-changing brain injury, in which case, yes, go for it.

Birdsgottaf1y · 12/04/2017 12:55

It he did kick the ball, as said, it could have done a lot of damage and he has enough control over it that really it wouldn't have been an accident.

The baby had a minor head injury and concussion, that's bad enough.

She was sitting still and there is a 'no ball games' rule, so he is at fault.

The family are more than able to go somewhere were they can play football, so there isn't an excuse.

If the baby had of had a minor head injury from a dog, this thread would be completely different.

Babies in prams shouldn't have head injuries inflicted on them.

redshoeblueshoe · 12/04/2017 13:12

birds - he didn't kick the ball it was his step daughter

CreatingADream · 12/04/2017 13:13

No private hospitals in London have Accident and Emergency, only NHS hospitals - so won't have cost her anything to have the scan.

She could just use the free NHS services to check her baby is OK. No need to force Fabregras to pay for private check ups for her baby.

OP posts:
CreatingADream · 12/04/2017 13:14

I think the girl that kicked the ball is four.

OP posts:
CreatingADream · 12/04/2017 13:16

Or 11. Actually, it may be the 11 year old.

Either way, she's a child.

OP posts:
milliemolliemou · 12/04/2017 13:20

I hope the baby is okay and footballs can be heavy. But the baby's emergency treatment will be NHS as PPs have said, so the only reason the mother might be justified in asking for money is if there's permanent damage.

APlaceOnTheCouch · 12/04/2017 13:21

Taking the baby to A&E is fine. Going to the Fail and a lawyer - less so. It's money-grabbing.

SaucyJack · 12/04/2017 13:31

"Either way, she's a child."

Yes. Which is why the parents have a legal and moral duty to pay for any damages or injuries that she caused.

I double-checked, and the PP is correct. No ball games were allowed, therefore it wasn't an accident- but parental negligence.

sailorcherries · 12/04/2017 13:32

Two sides to every story.
She belives it to have been the footballer and is adamant they never contacted her to see how the baby was.

They are adamant it was the daughter and have tried to contact her with no reply.

Either way I cannot imagine a footballer kicking a ball about a park with his daughters and newborn son to hit it with the same force as on a pitch during a match.

sailorcherries · 12/04/2017 13:34

If any injuries were sustained from a child the parents do not have a legal or moral obligation to pay. Would you say the same about children playing in the park when an accident occured resulting in injuries, if those parents were not rich and famous?

kali110 · 12/04/2017 13:36

What a load of shit.
So she took him back to the gp after the hospital had discharged him?
I'd be thinking they were out to get what they could out of the footballer.

SaucyJack · 12/04/2017 13:54

I've already said I don't believe it technically constitutes an accident Sailor- so I can't answer your question.

I dunno what the parks are like where other people live, but our local rec. has goal posts and the local amateur football club house on one side of the field. If I sat in the middle of that for a picnic, then yeah- I could and should be prepared to be smacked in the head with a ball. But if was sitting on a bench in the little fenced off "rest garden" down the road then I'd be pretty fucking pissed if some idiot playing football with his kids hurt my toddler or broke my phone or whatevs.

And yes- I'd expect them to take financial responsibility for making good any damages.

sailorcherries · 12/04/2017 13:59

The way the article reads she sat herself next to them, after they were already playing.

SaucyJack · 12/04/2017 14:01

Then it was down to the parents to respect the "No ball games" rule and put the ball away.

BeyondThePage · 12/04/2017 14:02

The park signs say "no ball games",
the child was discharged from hospital with instructions to see GP in 2 days,
she has planned to take legal action for money to pay for private health check ups - nothing else,
she is from Austria, so do not know if she is entitled to free NHS care.

But let's not let any of that get in the way of the "outrage" on here.

LouisevilleLlama · 12/04/2017 14:09

Hmm it's like £260-£400 a year for the key to the garden...I don't think she's struggling for cash either this is strsnge

LouisevilleLlama · 12/04/2017 14:09

Strange*

ILookedintheWater · 12/04/2017 14:44

It's £400 a year for a key to the garden, further they are only available to those who live in Belgrave Square, where houses all have 'price on application' on them.
Based on the demographic it's presumably normal to look for specialist private medical care, and the family should expect to pay for it.

It wasn't necessary to go to the papers, but maybe as she is Austrian she doesn't realise that?

TabascoToastie · 12/04/2017 14:58

The woman sold her story to the Sun. The footballer retaliated by giving his story to the Mail. The article linked is HIS story from HIS PR. Hence why the article is so heavily biased in his favour and why fully half of it is a Hello!-style puff piece about his glamour model girlfriend and how they are a picture-perfect "besotted" family.

The Mail's article leaves out a few very pertinent facts:

  1. They were not in a public park. They were in a private garden where balls are explicitly banned.
  1. The footballer and his family started leaving the park when it first happened, without speaking to the family and at first refused to give their names.
  1. They promised to phone but didn't.
  1. The baby developed a concussion and partial paralyis and is showing signs of brain damage.
  1. The mother is only asking for £450 in total.

I'm sorry but if I was a multi-millionaire and accidentally seriously injured a baby and the mother asked me for a measly few hundred quid, I'd give it to her without question - I wouldn't try to sneak away and then sell a story to the tabloids blasting her.

coolaschmoola · 12/04/2017 15:06

Call me a cynic, but if I earned as much as him and this happened I would have INSISTED on paying for the medical care as the least I could do. I certainly wouldn't need suing for it!

And that is why I'm not convinced by the Fail version of events.