A motorist has been spared €87,000 in damages for crashing his friend’s prized sportscar after an appeals court declared that it could not be established whether the incident was caused by negligence or some defect in the vehicle.

Clint Camilleri, a 27-year old motorsports enthusiast, had lost a civil suit filed against him by the owners of the Toyota Supra, Christian Bugeja and his parents, following an incident at Ħal Far on April 30, 2017.

Bugeja subsequently testified that he allowed his friend to try out his sportscar on condition that he would drive carefully. He initially accompanied Camilleri in the car. But the situation took an unexpected twist moments after he stepped out.

Bugeja recalled hearing the engine suddenly revving and the vehicle speeding off, swerving and crashing into a parked trailer.

The first court upheld the owners’ claims, pinning responsibility upon Camilleri’s negligent driving whilst rejecting his arguments that the vehicle had undergone certain modifications that made it unsafe to drive.

A technical expert reported that the car had been in “a very good state,” and had been VRT-approved one month before the incident.

Camilleri appealed that decision on various grounds.

He argued that he should not have been held responsible because Bugeja invited him to drive his car even though he knew well enough that the insurance policy did not cover third parties.

The Court of Appeal observed that the crux of the issue was whether Camilleri’s driving was negligent.

That was to be assessed through eyewitness testimony as well as evidence linked to the history and condition of the vehicle.

Witnesses produced by Bugeja said that they noticed “a change” in Camilleri’s driving after the owner stepped out of the car.

Other witnesses produced by Camilleri said that when he put the car in gear to drive forward, it suddenly sped off and crashed into the trailer.

“We’re all shocked,” one witness recalled.

Camilleri also described those fateful moments preceding the crash.

“I got in the car, I reversed and stopped. Then when I was about to drive forward, the car literally went out of control and I ended up under the trailer.”

The court observed that the technical expert reported that the tyres were in good condition but had been fixed the wrong way around, thus changing the direction of rotation.

That fact did not make much difference on a dry surface as was the case on the day of the incident, the expert said.

The Toyota Supra got a “pass” when VRT tested a month before the incident.

It was not proved that the tyres had in some way caused the accident, observed the court.

The expert did not explain whether there was a link between the accident and the fact that the vehicle’s traction control had been switched off.

Bugeja testified that he always switched off traction control.

The court also noted a previous incident a year or so before the Ħal Far crash where Bugeja himself had lost control of the car and ploughed into three trees in Zebbuġ.

He needed to replace the body but not the chassis of the vehicle and had admitted as much to Camilleri in phone chats which the appellant produced in evidence.

“I don’t know how it swerved….because it never did that before….Yes it would have been much better with traction…had it been functioning this wouldn’t have happened,” Bugeja texted his friend after the Zebbuġ crash.

When he told his friend “now’s the chance to drive it” that day at Ħal Far, Camilleri initially turned down the offer.

But Bugeja encouraged him as long as he drove “slowly.”

Once satisfied with his friend’s “careful” driving, Bugeja got out of the car so that he could admire its sight and sound from the outside.

The Court of Appeal, presided over by Chief Justice Mark Chetcuti and Judges Robert G Mangion and Grazio Mercieca, observed that the first court attributed the incident to Camilleri’s negligence and irresponsible behaviour because there was no evidence that the car was defective.

But that court did not identify such negligence.

The appeals court observed that the car needed considerable repairs after the first crash a few months before.

The VRT certificate could not exclude possible defects. The vehicle got a “pass” even though its tyres were fixed the wrong way.

That certificate “was not quite reliable and certainly could not be taken as evidence that the sports car was in perfect condition and free of any defect,” said the judges.

Nor could it be argued that the car presented no problem in the weeks and months prior to the incident.

The owner had said that the car “went out of control” when he crashed in Zebbuġ and the same thing happened when his friend crashed at Ħal Far.

Both described the manoeuvre as “ħaditni.” (It went out of control)

Camilleri knew that it was no joke to drive that model and he would not have attempted a risky and reckless manoeuvre, the court said.

The court said it was “absolutely not convinced” that Camilleri could have foreseen that by putting the car in gear he was attempting “a potentially suicidal move.”

Since it was doubtful whether the incident was caused by the driver’s negligence, his argument was valid and thus his appeal was upheld.

The court quashed the first decision, throwing out the owners’ claims.