On 19/2, Ms. Trinh, the mother of the female student operating the electric bicycle, posted a video of the incident on social media, attracting significant attention.
The incident occurred in March 2025 in Fujian province, according to Ms. Trinh. While riding an electric bicycle with a friend, Ms. Trinh’s daughter saw an elderly woman fall off her bicycle on the road. After a moment of hesitation, the two students proactively stopped to help the elderly woman up.
Ms. Trinh described that the elderly woman tried to avoid a white car, lost balance, and fell. However, during the subsequent liability assessment, traffic police determined that Ms. Trinh's daughter, who was operating the electric bicycle, contributed to the accident and bore secondary responsibility.
The elderly woman claimed she fell because the two girls on the electric bicycle startled her. She sued, demanding the student's family pay 220,000 yuan (approximately 830 million dong) in compensation.
Ms. Trinh stated she could not accept this outcome. She explained that her daughter, despite her good intentions to help, was now facing legal responsibility, which created a financial burden for the family and caused severe "psychological trauma" to her child.
Two female students helping the fallen elderly woman. *Video: Qilu News*
According to a lawyer, the traffic police's determination that the student bore secondary responsibility was not related to "the act of helping." Instead, it was based on a legal causal relationship between the operation of the electric bicycle and the elderly woman's fall due to fright, even though there was no physical contact between the parties.
A contentious point in this case is that the surveillance video shows the elderly woman falling first, and only then do the two students appear. This raises doubts about the connection between the primary cause of the fall and the student's operation of the vehicle.
To verify the causal relationship between the elderly woman's fall due to fright and the student's operation of the electric bicycle, objective factors such as speed and distance need to be considered. Responsibility would be determined proportionally based on the degree of fault and impact from the student, the white car (if at fault), and the elderly woman.
The lawsuit was scheduled to go to trial on 26/2. However, after drawing significant attention on social media, on 21/2, Ms. Trinh announced that the plaintiff had withdrawn the lawsuit. The matter was settled to avoid impacting the student's mental well-being and studies.
Tue Anh (according to Fengmang News, Dahe Daily)
