Personal injury law addresses the injuries you sustain due to another person’s negligence. The physical, financial, and emotional losses generated by these accidents are often considerable, and obtaining just compensation will play an essential role in your ability to recover fully. If this is the challenging position you find yourself in, reach out today for the professional legal counsel of an experienced Carrollton personal injury lawyer from Trust Guss Injury Lawyers.
We are a national law firm based in Texas with multiple offices around the country. We also work with affiliate law firms in most states that share our focus and dedication to excellence. No matter where you are located, we may be able to help you, so call or contact us now. We are open, for free, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, at 800-898-4877, or you may contact us now by clicking here to submit your case for review.
Suffering Injuries in Carrollton
Carrollton is a suburb of Dallas that sees good weather most of the year and maintains its tech and manufacturing identity. Some publications have distinguished Dallas as the most dangerous driving city in Texas, which spills over into Carrollton.
Two of the most dangerous intersections in the city include:
- Hebron Parkway and Old Denton Road
- Frankford Road and Josey Lane
Suppose you’ve suffered an injury by someone else’s negligence in a Carrollton accident. In that case, the experienced personal injury lawyers at Trust Guss Injury Lawyers, understand your difficulties and are well prepared to help.
Personal Injury Claims: From Traffic Accidents to Slip and Fall Accidents
Personal injury claims are all predicated on the negligence of the other party, but we can generally group them into a wide range of categories, including:
- Truck accidents
- Car accidents, including drunk driving accidents
- Motorcycle accidents
- Bike accidents
- Pedestrian accidents
- Premises liability accidents, including slip and fall accidents
In addition, wrongful death claims are negligence-based. They are very similar to personal injury claims.
The Elements of Personal Injury Claims
Specific elements must be present to bring a successful personal injury claim in the State of Texas.
There is a Duty of Care
To begin, the at-fault party must have owed you a duty of care—or must have had a responsibility to your safety—in the first place. For example, commercial property owners and managers owe their guests, including customers, clients, visitors, and other patrons, a duty of care that extends to maintaining their premises at the same level of safety that other reasonable property owners and managers maintain in similar situations. Further, all motorists owe everyone with whom they share the road a duty of care that includes closely adhering to the rules of the road and accommodating the safe passage of others.
They Breached a Duty of Care
This is where negligence comes into the personal injury equation. The at-fault party must have breached the duty of care owed to you or failed to live up to their responsibility in the matter.
Common examples include property owners or managers that allow slip and fall hazards to go unchecked and motorists who engage in driver negligence, such as:
- Distraction
- Exhaustion
- Impairment
- Excess speed
- Aggression
The Breach Is the Direct Cause of the Accident
The breach in the duty of care owed to you must be directly responsible for the accident that causes you to be injured. For example, if the tripping hazard that the property owner failed to adequately address caused you to trip and fall, the owner breached a duty of care and is responsible for your accident. This is similar to how a driver's impairment or distraction may cause an accident.
The Accident Leads to Losses Addressed by Personal Injury Law
Finally, the accident in question must cause you to suffer losses—or legal damages.
Some examples include:
- Property damage (such as to your car in a traffic accident)
- Medical expenses
- Lost earnings
- Physical and psychological pain and suffering
Ensuring that Your Losses Are Well Represented
You must list each loss you experience in your personal injury claim. Obtaining the compensation to which you are entitled is likely to play a primary role in your ability to regain your health and well-being, which makes carefully addressing your losses paramount.
Your Medical Costs
You have suffered an injury, and you need medical care. Even relatively minor injuries can rack up large medical bills; if your injuries are more serious, you can expect your bills to be far more considerable. Suppose the injuries you've suffered lead to secondary healthcare concerns, are ongoing, or cause severe side effects (such as chronic pain or decreased range of motion).
In that case, your medical expenses can rise exponentially. Never accept a settlement offer from the insurance company until you know you have a handle on your related healthcare needs (including the need for any future care).
Some of the most common medical expenses related to personal injury claims include:
- Emergency care at the scene of the accident
- Emergency transportation away from the accident scene
- Surgery and follow-up care
- Hospital care
- Medical tests, treatments, and procedures
- Treatment and care from doctors, medical specialists, and other medical professionals
- Pain management, including holistic techniques such as chiropractic care
- Physical therapy
- Occupational therapy
- Rehabilitation
- Adaptive physical devices
Your Lost Income
Another loss you're likely to experience due to being injured by someone else's negligence is lost income related to time off the job. A severe injury can leave you unable to work for a long time and may affect your ability to earn into the future. If your career path or earning potential are affected, the overall financial loss will increase and can contain an element of emotional loss.
Your Pain and Suffering
The pain and suffering you endure as a result of suffering an injury in a negligence-based accident can be challenging to both assess and overcome. This is not to mention that this emotional component can make your progress in the physical and financial arenas much more challenging to address successfully.
How an Experienced Carrollton Personal Injury Lawyer Can Help
You are watching your losses mount but may not know where to turn for the help you need. Personal injury claims are legally complex, and the insurance company has the resources and the savvy to walk right over vulnerable claimants like you. Fortunately, you do not have to face the insurance company alone. A dedicated personal injury lawyer can help in many important ways.
Communicating with the Insurance Company
The most important thing to understand about the insurance company is that it is a massive profit-making machine that is highly motivated to continue generating immense profits. As such, you can rely upon the insurance company being adept at eliciting statements from claimants like you that go on to harm their personal injury claims. It is in your best interest not to give them a chance. The less you say to the insurance company, the better off you'll be, and your personal injury lawyer is well prepared to communicate with the insurance company on your behalf.
Gathering the Evidence
To bring a successful personal injury claim, you need to support it with evidence that demonstrates the other party’s fault in the matter and highlights the extent of your losses.
Your personal injury lawyer will get to work compiling all the evidence that applies to your claim, which can include:
- Physical evidence gathered at the accident scene
- The testimony of eyewitnesses at the scene
- The testimony of expert witnesses that supports your claim
- Accident recreation models that help demonstrate the mechanics of your accident
Solid evidence can be challenging for the insurance company to refute.
Negotiating With the Insurance Company
Your personal injury lawyer will negotiate with the insurance company for a fair settlement that addresses your losses. Insurance companies have many techniques at their disposal that help them keep settlements low, but savvy personal injury lawyers are all too familiar with these techniques and have the legal skill to help quash them.
Consider:
Early Settlement Offers
The insurance company may offer you an early settlement in the hopes that they can tempt you out of financial desperation. These early offers are typically far too low to cover claimants' complete losses, but insurance companies are not above taking advantage of their claimants' vulnerability. Never accept a settlement offer before you discuss the matter with your trusted personal injury lawyer.
Claim Denials
The insurance company may deny your claim right from the start. This does not necessarily mean you don't have a valid personal injury claim. Instead, the insurance company is likely preying on your frustration and is hoping you'll simply give up. If the insurance company is unwilling to negotiate in good faith, your personal injury lawyer will be well prepared to take your case to trial.
Fault Shift
The insurance company may attempt to push fault in your claim away from its policyholder and toward you. This is where all that evidence gathering comes in, and your personal injury lawyer can demonstrate the other party's fault in your claim. We stand up to insurance companies and fight for the maximum compensation you deserve from the at-fault party.
Denial of Your Losses
The insurance company may attempt to deny the extent of the losses you’ve experienced.
While your lawyer will fight to cover your entire range of physical, financial, and emotional losses, you can:
- Make it your policy to let your personal injury lawyer communicate with the insurance company on your behalf (the insurance rep will actively attempt to trip you up).
- Turn a cold shoulder on social media—the insurance company can read a lot more into your posts than you can imagine, and if you don’t give them anything to work with, it becomes a nonissue.
- Follow your doctor’s orders and instructions very carefully—it supports your health and recovery and helps to demonstrate that your injuries are just as serious as you maintain in your claim.
A Prolonged Claims Process
The insurance company may artificially prolong or complicate the already challenging claims process in the hope that you will give up. There are laws in place that are supposed to halt these bad faith practices, and your personal injury lawyer will be all too happy to help the insurance company see the error of its ways.
Preparing for Trial
While it is unlikely that your claim will end up in court, your personal injury lawyer will proceed with preparing to file a lawsuit and addressing the matter in court. The fact is that most claims don’t make it to court, which is a good thing for most people.
A trial can be a long and expensive affair. The insurance company likely doesn't want a claim to go to a trial. Juries can often be unsympathetic to large corporations. Still, the insurance company must know that your lawyer will take the case to court. Sometimes, this is all the insurance company needs to drop their posturing and enter into fair negotiations.
You Need an Experienced Carrollton Personal Injury Lawyer in Your Corner
While it is your choice to hire an attorney or not, it is almost an invariably better choice to do you. It’s vital to remember that insurance companies are often sizable organizations that have a lot of resources. It’s no heartache to them to delay your claim process and fight you every step of the way.
They often have teams of adjusters and litigators whose interests do not align with yours. They are there to make the company profitable, not to take care of you. If you are asking yourself if you should hire a lawyer or not, remember that the insurance company does not want you to.
The veteran Carrollton personal injury lawyers at Trust Guss Injury Lawyers understand the gravity of your losses and are committed to harnessing the full power of their 20 years of experience in pursuit of the compensation you deserve. If an accident injured you in Carrollton, call our office right now for a free consultation! Because we take all of our personal injury cases on a contingency fee basis, you will not owe us a dime unless we win your case. We are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so call us today at 800-898-4877 or contact us now by clicking here.