Ex-Nomads bikie boss Dylan Brittliffe loses appeal over 2013 crash

Brittliffe claimed he was not driving his bike, a Harley-Davidson V-Rod motorcycle, when it crashed on December 7, 2013, leaving him with a severely broken leg, fractured heel bone, and dislocated finger.

It occurred towards the end of a charity 'poker run' organised by the Newcastle chapter of the Nomads Motorcycle Club, of which he was once the national president. At that time he was a Sergeant at Arms.

The run involved visiting five different hotels, the last being the Brewery Hotel at Queens Wharf, and it was traditional for the bikers to be led by the highest-ranking member present, putting Brittliffe at the front, court documents say.

Soon after a crew of between 30 and 50 bikers left The Brewery for the Nomads club house, Brittliffe's bike slipped on a piece of carpet on a sweeping left-hand bend on the two-lane Pacific Highway in Islington.

The bike capsized and slid on its left side at a speed of about 45 km/h before hitting a concrete barrier in the centre of the road, court documents say.

Brittliffe claimed for damages against Maurice James Brown, nominating him as the driver, saying he himself was a pillion passenger. However, at the end of a nine-day hearing in 2020, Justice Elizabeth Olsson SC found against him, and Brittliffe was ordered to pay for indemnity costs in favour of the NRMA. Brittliffe took it to the Supreme Court of Appeal where three judges agreed with Justice Olsson and dismissed the appeal, saying the evidence did not support it.

Brittliffe had good reason to point the finger at someone else, because he had been drinking and considered that he had drunk "too much", and "shouldn't have been riding" his own bike, in circumstances where he had been convicted of drink driving ten years earlier, the judges said in their written judgement handed down last week (December 14).

Mr Brown, "for whatever reason", identified himself as the rider of the bike to police at the scene, despite the fact he had no injuries and his clothes showed no sign of him being thrown from the bike, the judgement said.

The independent eyewitness evidence "overwhelmingly" supported the primary judge's finding, including a transcript of a Triple 0 emergency call made within five minutes of the accident, who saw the crash from her car while driving in the other direction.

The two eyewitnesses said the accident "literally happened in front of (them)" and were definite there was only one person on the bike.

The three experts consulted were unanimous in their evidence that if there had been two people on the bike, they would have been separated from it at about the same time, at roughly the same velocity, and in the same direction, and both would have hit the concrete barrier with "considerable force" and suffered a similar level of injuries and damage to outer clothing.

"It was also their evidence that the left little finger injury sustained by Mr Brittliffe was highly consistent with what would be expected of the rider of a bike with short handlebars in a left-sided capsize; and that any rider of the bike would have sustained such an injury, or at least abrasions down the palm and on the outside of the left hand," the three judges determined.

Five riders who participated in the ride gave evidence at the hearing which was held some six years later, saying they saw Brittliffe get on the back of his bike, and all five gave varying versions of the aftermath, Justice Olsson found in her judgement.

Their evidence was inconsistent with incontrovertible facts, and could not be explained "other than as having been fabricated", the appeal judges found.

It was not necessary, the judges said, to search for reasons or speculate" why they lied.

"All of them other than (one) were friends of Mr Brittliffe, and (the fifth) was a business connection with the motorcycle club as a motorcycle mechanic."

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