Moral Damage In Traffic Accidents: A View From Forensic Psychology
The traffic accident, one of the most common traumatic events, hides a silent and devastating damage that many are aware of, but few demand the compensation to which they are entitled.
After a traumatic event (traffic accident, assault, domestic violence, harassment, etc.) with injuries, the action protocol is more or less known and can even be initiated, ex officio, by security forces and other professionals. One of the clearest and most common examples of a traumatic event is the traffic accident, and we are going to focus on it in this article.
In these cases, the physical consequences are evident, they have a predetermined and stipulated form of assessment, and are usually assessed and compensated, without much discussion or complexity, by the responsible insurance company. But what happens to the psychological or moral damage ? The truth is that addressing this damage is, to say the least, delicate. But, it is the obligation of certain professionals, including forensic psychologists, to address it and do so correctly when our intervention is requested.
The causes of moral damage They can be multiple and complex, but they are a key pillar when addressing its forensic evaluation and assessment. On the one hand, it involves a psychological study for evaluation and, on the other, the legal translation of the psychological damages observed and their assessment for the purposes of compensating the victim. In any case, it is necessary to know that the condition of victim and the moral damage They not only come from the suffering or direct experience of the accident, but the possible triggers extend to a considerable list that can include situations, such as a close loss of a victim, being a direct witness of the event, having knowledge that the traumatic event has occurred to a close family member or close friend (“rebound injury”), or repeated or extreme exposure to repulsive details of the traumatic event (e.g., first responders collecting human remains; police officers exposed to details of the event, etc.) (DSM-5 Spanish version, APA, 2013).
From a clinical point of view, moral damage is known and called as psychological damage It is an experience that the victim lives every day, 24 hours a day, that is known to be there, and that can bury a person alive in a slow but constant way, protected by its silence and devastating invisibility. However, despite having its origin in a known traumatic event and with a person responsible, normally identified by the public order forces who attended the accident, there are few people who make the decision to request its repair and financial compensation that could correspond to it and, if it does, the consensus among professionals when it comes to its assessment is complex.
In the legal field, Law 35/2015, of September 22, on the Reform of the System for the Assessment of Damage and Loss Caused to People in Traffic Accidents, establishes the fundamental principles of the assessment system, among which are finds full repair of the damage, which is intended to ensure the total indemnity of the damages suffered, including moral damage according to its intensity (Arce and Fariña, 2020). However, it is important to keep in mind that moral damage is the most debated, the one that generates the most controversy and the most complex to demonstrate and assess in the judicial forum, hence the reluctance of many professionals to present it for evaluation.
Where does the complexity of moral damage lie?
The difficulty in addressing this type of damage in victims it covers many variables, starting with the fact that there is no specific and complete list that limits the number of concepts in this area, followed by the complexity of its forensic demonstration, the lack of professional consensus when assessing it, etc. However, the fact that there is no specific and complete list of concepts leaves the list open to a multitude of possibilities, including honor, including privacy and image, physical integrity, sexual harm or any other personal harm due to the traumatic event. or stressful, until the development of psychoaffective disorders (López, 2022).
What is the role of the forensic psychologist in these cases?
But, although all the elements and processes mentioned here are significant when it comes to identifying moral damage, they would not make sense in isolation when requesting its compensation. compensation As in any legal process made up of multiple and complex variables, in which different interests may mediate for some or all of the parties, a figure with legal capacity who knows how to integrate and give meaning to all the elements and procedures discussed is necessary; We talk about the forensic psychologist.
As already noted, the psychological damages or moral are measurable and evaluable, but it must be done based on science, the objectivity and impartiality of an expert report. A standard clinical psychological report reports findings obtained in the medical/psychological evaluation, but a forensic expert technical report made by a forensic psychologist will be necessary if the consequences of psychopathology are to be evaluated and related to that specific traumatic event, in this case. , with the traffic accident; That is, it is necessary to inform in the legal context of the link between the effect and the cause. However, it must be clear that “Forensic psychology collaborates and describes, but does not judge” (Bertand 2016).
