A thing I haven't seen mentioned is that there are two thresholds of compensation. There's the amount you pay them so that they'll stop prosecuting. Having bee

A thing I haven't seen mentioned is that there are two thresholds of compensation. There's the amount you pay them so that they'll stop prosecuting. Having been hurt, they'd rather take the money than pursue justice, but it would have been better not to get hurt in the first place. Then there's the amount you pay them so that they consider themselves lucky that you accidentally ran into them and then gave them a lot of money to shut up. They may no longer have a leg, but the boatloads of cash more than make up for it. The second amount is a lot more defensible, but it's probably also a lot higher.