What is the impact of a sudden stop by a driver at a busy shopping centre?

MacDonald v. Hemminger was a case where the sudden stop was not necessitated by any emergency or by conditions of heavy traffic. It was simply the choice of the defendant to make a sudden and unexpected stop. The court noted that there was a more appropriate entrance to the shopping centre that did not require a sudden stop. While the court acknowledged the plaintiff’s submission that under most circumstances drivers are entitled to assume that traffic will continue to flow as it had immediately prior to the accident, that is not always the case as “… emergencies constantly arise and for those emergencies all drivers must be prepared.”