Accidents & Injuries
Got into an accident? Got personal injury questions about who is legally responsible to pay for medical bills and lost work caused by the accident? What is the effect of liability insurance and how does the court system work to resolve personal injury cases and which side carries the legal burden of proof in order to recover or defend against damages caused by an accident? Get answers to your personal injury questions by asking a live expert. What happens if you didn’t have insurance? Are slip and fall cases difficult to win? What is the difference between general and economic damages? Will you be entitled to receive reimbursement for lost income? How much is your case worth and how long will it take to receive your money for your accident? For more information and advice on these issues and others, contact one of the experts below.
What should I do at the scene of an accident?
The most important things are to get identifying information from the other driver(s), identify the other vehicle(s), notify the police and take photographs. Get the names, addresses, telephone numbers, driver’s license numbers and insurance information from all the drivers involved in the accident. Write down the license plate number and the make, model and color of all the vehicles involved in the accident. Be polite and try to avoid discussing how the accident occurred or arguing over who is at fault with anyone involved in the accident. If the police indicate they will investigate the accident, try to leave all vehicles at their point of rest until the police arrive. This will give the investigating officer an opportunity to document what could ultimately be important details about how the cars collided. If it is not safe to leave the cars where they are or they create too much of a traffic block, move them to the nearest point of safety. The police will probably interview each driver separately. Give the officer as accurate and complete information you can. Stick to the facts; don’t guess, speculate or assume things you don’t know. Avoid insulting or disparaging the other driver, even if you believe his or her behavior in causing the accident was outrageous. It won’t make you look any better later on if your tirade winds up on the traffic collision report.
What are the advantages of taking photographs of the accident scene?
A picture can be worth a thousand words. If you are in a car accident, photographs of your vehicle and the other vehicles involved may provide important evidence of the severity of the impact and how the accident happened. Take pictures of the vehicles involved in the accident where they came to rest after the collision. If any of the vehicles struck any other objects, take pictures of those as well. If there is a dispute over who caused the accident, an expert may be able to draw conclusions from the photographs as to how the collision occurred. Also, being able to produce photographs of the vehicles may the best evidence of the severity of the impact. If you suffer a strain/sprain type injury, an injury that typically is not accompanied by objective findings like broken bones, the other driver’s insurance company may argue that the collision was not hard enough to hurt anyone. Photographs showing the nature of the damage to the vehicles involved can help establish your case. It is not unusual for one car involved in an accident to sustain major damage, while another is virtually undamaged. This is why it is important to photograph all the vehicles involved. If you suffer visible injuries such as abrasions, lacerations or bruises, have someone take pictures that show these. Photographs showing how your injuries looked in the hours right after the accident can be more persuasive evidence of your pain and suffering than your description months or years later.
Who Can I Recover My Damages From?
The law provides that you are entitled to recover damages from the person or persons whose wrongful conduct, whether negligent or intentional, injured you. Therefore, in the case of an automobile accident, you would be able to recover your damages from the driver or drivers who caused the accident. Let’s forget about insurance for a minute. Assume you were in an accident caused by the other driver running a red light while intoxicated. You would be able to recover you economic and pain and suffering damages from her as well as, possibly, punitive damages. You could receive your compensation by settling with the other driver for a monetary payment or you could sue, go to trial and obtain a verdict that would then become a judgment.
Once you have a judgment, the only way to get your money is to execute on the other drivers assets. If the other driver has equity in real estate, money in the bank, and stock and bond portfolio and/or a good paying job, you may be able to recover most or all of your judgment. Procedures vary from state to state but you would generally employ the services of the sheriff to seize assets and you can obtain a court order garnishing wages. If the other driver has nothing, however, your judgment is worth little more than the paper it’s printed on; there is simply nothing to collect and the other driver might file for bankruptcy and wipe out the judgment debt. Keep in mind, though that, in most states, a judgment for punitive damages may not be discharged in bankruptcy. Now bring insurance into the picture. The other driver is still the one who is responsible for your damages. However, his insurance company has a contractual obligation to him to pay the damages for which he is responsible (excluding punitive damages), up to his policy limits. With insurance available you may settle directly with the insurance company. As a condition of paying the settlement, the insurance company will require you to release the other driver from all further liability. Therefore, if you are entitled to punitive damages, you will have to give them up because an insurance company can’t pay them and it won’t pay your other damages and allow you to pursue the other driver for punitive damages.
What is Partial Fault?
If I partly caused the accident can I still recover damages from the other driver? Depending on the state you live in, you can probably recover damages from the other driver even if your negligent conduct contributed to the accident. Most states use a “comparative negligence” system. In some states the jury simply assigns a percentage of negligence to each driver and this governs the amount of recovery. For example, the other driver ran a red light but you were speeding and this preventing you from stopping in time to avoid the other car. The jury might find that the other driver was 75% responsible for the accident and you were 25%. The result would be that you would be entitled to recover 75% of your damages from the other driver. This is called “pure comparative negligence.” Other states prohibit any recovery if you are 51% or more at fault. In the red light example, you would still be able to recover 75% of your damages. But if the percentages were reversed (the jury found you 75% at fault) you would recover nothing. Contrast this with a “pure comparative negligence” state where you would be able to recover 25% of your damages.
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The most important things are to get identifying information from the other driver(s), identify the other vehicle(s), notify the police and take photographs. Get the names, addresses, telephone numbers, driver’s license numbers and insurance information from all the drivers involved in the accident. Write down the license plate number and the make, model and color of all the vehicles involved in the accident. Be polite and try to avoid discussing how the accident occurred or arguing over who is at fault with anyone involved in the accident. If the police indicate they will investigate the accident, try to leave all vehicles at their point of rest until the police arrive. This will give the investigating officer an opportunity to document what could ultimately be important details about how the cars collided. If it is not safe to leave the cars where they are or they create too much of a traffic block, move them to the nearest point of safety. The police will probably interview each driver separately. Give the officer as accurate and complete information you can. Stick to the facts; don’t guess, speculate or assume things you don’t know. Avoid insulting or disparaging the other driver, even if you believe his or her behavior in causing the accident was outrageous. It won’t make you look any better later on if your tirade winds up on the traffic collision report.
What are the advantages of taking photographs of the accident scene?
A picture can be worth a thousand words. If you are in a car accident, photographs of your vehicle and the other vehicles involved may provide important evidence of the severity of the impact and how the accident happened. Take pictures of the vehicles involved in the accident where they came to rest after the collision. If any of the vehicles struck any other objects, take pictures of those as well. If there is a dispute over who caused the accident, an expert may be able to draw conclusions from the photographs as to how the collision occurred. Also, being able to produce photographs of the vehicles may the best evidence of the severity of the impact. If you suffer a strain/sprain type injury, an injury that typically is not accompanied by objective findings like broken bones, the other driver’s insurance company may argue that the collision was not hard enough to hurt anyone. Photographs showing the nature of the damage to the vehicles involved can help establish your case. It is not unusual for one car involved in an accident to sustain major damage, while another is virtually undamaged. This is why it is important to photograph all the vehicles involved. If you suffer visible injuries such as abrasions, lacerations or bruises, have someone take pictures that show these. Photographs showing how your injuries looked in the hours right after the accident can be more persuasive evidence of your pain and suffering than your description months or years later.
Who Can I Recover My Damages From?
The law provides that you are entitled to recover damages from the person or persons whose wrongful conduct, whether negligent or intentional, injured you. Therefore, in the case of an automobile accident, you would be able to recover your damages from the driver or drivers who caused the accident. Let’s forget about insurance for a minute. Assume you were in an accident caused by the other driver running a red light while intoxicated. You would be able to recover you economic and pain and suffering damages from her as well as, possibly, punitive damages. You could receive your compensation by settling with the other driver for a monetary payment or you could sue, go to trial and obtain a verdict that would then become a judgment.
Once you have a judgment, the only way to get your money is to execute on the other drivers assets. If the other driver has equity in real estate, money in the bank, and stock and bond portfolio and/or a good paying job, you may be able to recover most or all of your judgment. Procedures vary from state to state but you would generally employ the services of the sheriff to seize assets and you can obtain a court order garnishing wages. If the other driver has nothing, however, your judgment is worth little more than the paper it’s printed on; there is simply nothing to collect and the other driver might file for bankruptcy and wipe out the judgment debt. Keep in mind, though that, in most states, a judgment for punitive damages may not be discharged in bankruptcy. Now bring insurance into the picture. The other driver is still the one who is responsible for your damages. However, his insurance company has a contractual obligation to him to pay the damages for which he is responsible (excluding punitive damages), up to his policy limits. With insurance available you may settle directly with the insurance company. As a condition of paying the settlement, the insurance company will require you to release the other driver from all further liability. Therefore, if you are entitled to punitive damages, you will have to give them up because an insurance company can’t pay them and it won’t pay your other damages and allow you to pursue the other driver for punitive damages.
What is Partial Fault?
If I partly caused the accident can I still recover damages from the other driver? Depending on the state you live in, you can probably recover damages from the other driver even if your negligent conduct contributed to the accident. Most states use a “comparative negligence” system. In some states the jury simply assigns a percentage of negligence to each driver and this governs the amount of recovery. For example, the other driver ran a red light but you were speeding and this preventing you from stopping in time to avoid the other car. The jury might find that the other driver was 75% responsible for the accident and you were 25%. The result would be that you would be entitled to recover 75% of your damages from the other driver. This is called “pure comparative negligence.” Other states prohibit any recovery if you are 51% or more at fault. In the red light example, you would still be able to recover 75% of your damages. But if the percentages were reversed (the jury found you 75% at fault) you would recover nothing. Contrast this with a “pure comparative negligence” state where you would be able to recover 25% of your damages.
Got more questions? Get more answers on Personal Injury and Accidents.
Learn and Grow With Our Community
Join the discussion and get new insights and tips on solving life’s troubles with our community. Make a difference; share what you know and join today.