Personal Injury Lawyers: Their Role in Cases and the Legal Process!

A personal injury lawyer has two primary jobs. Lawyers obtain justice and compensation for personal injury victims. Each year, personal injuries, mostly the ones highlighted below, send more than twenty-five million Americans to a hospital. Usually, an attorney accomplishes both the aforementioned goals by proving negligence, or a lack of care, by a preponderance of the evidence, or more likely than not. More on these things below as well.

Justice means forcing tortfeasors (negligent parties), like negligent drivers or property owners, to accept responsibility for their mistakes. Compensation usually includes money for economic losses, such as medical bills, and noneconomic losses, such as pain and suffering.

In addition to obtaining justice and compensation, a Personal Injury Attorney California also gives victims solid legal advice throughout the long civil claims process. This advice helps cement an attorney-client partnership. These close relationships usually produce the best possible results.

What Are Some Common Personal Injuries?

Vehicle collisions and unintentional poisonings, usually drug overdoses, are the most common personal injuries in Los Angeles.

Car crashes aren’t “accidents.” Driver error, which is usually driver negligence, causes more than 98 percent of these incidents. Even in a low-speed parking lot fender-bender, car crash injuries usually include one or more kinds of head injuries, such as a concussion, an sTBI (severe traumatic brain injury), and /or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Vehicle collisions are legally complex, partially because they often involve third-party liability theories. Respondeat superior is a good example. Employers, like ridesharing companies, are legally responsible for damages their employees negligently cause during the course and scope of employment.

Drug overdoses are similarly complex. Multiple parties could be legally responsible for these injuries. Usually, the victim became addicted to the drug because a doctor wrote prescriptions without asking questions, a property owner turned a blind eye to drug use at a certain location, and/or a drug shipping company filled stores with boxes of controlled substances like they were Kit-Kat bars.

In California, property owners have a duty of care to remove possible hazards such as wet spots on floors, before they cause injuries. The extent of this duty depends on several factors, such as the owner’s knowledge of the hazard, the type of property, and the cost of removing the hazard.

How Does a Personal Injury Lawyer Build a Case?

We mentioned the two pillars of a personal injury case in California above. Now, let’s break them down a little further.

Usually, negligence is a lack of reasonable care. This legal responsibility is based on the moral story of the Good Samaritan. This man went out of his way to help an injured traveler. Similarly, doctors, property owners, motorists, and everyone else must go out of their way to avoid injuring another person.

In some cases, a higher duty of care applies. The difference between noncommercial drivers and commercial drivers is a good example. The law holds professional drivers, like truck drivers and Uber drivers, to a higher standard.

Evidence in a personal injury case usually includes the police accident report, witness statements, and medical bills.

If this evidence is insufficient, a lawyer usually supplements it with electronic evidence, such as surveillance camera footage. This evidence is very compelling in court, because a picture truly is worth a thousand words. However, this evidence is inadmissible unless a lawyer carefully lays the proper foundation.

How Does a Personal Injury Lawyer Resolve a Case?

To obtain the best possible results, a Los Angeles personal injury lawyer carefully prepares a case as if it’s going to trial. This preparation includes building a case, as outlined above, and refuting possible insurance company defenses.

Comparative fault, in one form or another, may be the most common personal injury defense. This doctrine basically shifts blame for an injury accident from the tortfeasor to the victim. For example, in a slip-and-fall case, the insurance company might argue that the victim didn’t watch where s/he was going.

California, unlike most other jurisdictions, is a pure comparative fault state. So, in most cases, comparative fault only reduces the amount of compensation in the case.

Very few personal injury cases go to trial because most judges have mandatory mediation policies. Before trial, both sides must sit down with a professional mediation and make a good faith effort to resolve the case. Good faith means being willing to compromise on some points if that’s what it takes to reach an agreement.

Contact Our Experienced Personal Injury Attorney Today!

A personal injury lawyer makes the best out of a bad situation. For a free consultation with the Best Personal Injury Lawyer, contact the Law Offices of Eslamboly Hakim. We routinely handle matters throughout the Golden State.

Credit: Photo by Midjourney