Contrary to what some might say, accidents do not just come out of nowhere. Even seemingly inexplicable accidents often have the same explanation: negligence. The person who negligently caused your accident should be brought to justice. Additionally, you deserve financial compensation to help you pay for the various expenses of your injuries and losses.
Personal injury cases may involve a broad assortment of claims and injuries. Our office has worked on cases involving construction-related accidents, injuries from nursing home abuse, and injuries caused by negligent doctors. Your lawyer can assist you in getting started by evaluating your damages, developing the most effective legal strategies for your specific situation, and collecting evidence needed to support your case. Such evidence may include, but is not necessarily limited to, photos, videos, physical objects, witness testimony, and certain records related to the accident. What your claims might be worth depends on your specific circumstances.
Call the Rhatigan Law Offices at (312) 578-8502 and ask our Chicago personal injury attorneys for a free, confidential case review to get started.
Possible Personal Injury Claims in Addison
Personal injury law involves more accidents, injuries, and legal claims than can be listed here. This particular field of law is so vast that it is highly unlikely that one attorney can handle every type of personal injury case. As such, you need a lawyer with a skill set that matches the needs of your specific case. Below are a few examples of injury claims our team can assist you with.
Construction Accidents and Injuries
Construction workers are at a high risk of accidents and injuries. Even so, employers and contractors in charge of construction work are usually obligated to make the work environment as safe as possible. Depending on the circumstances, this might include adequate safety training, safety gear, and inspections of the property to minimize risks and hopefully avoid accidents. Your employer might be responsible if you were injured in an accident while working on a construction site.
Nursing Home Abuse
Nursing homes are supposed to care for older or infirm people when their families are not equipped to provide the necessary care. Unfortunately, people living in nursing homes are often highly vulnerable to abuse and neglect, and injuries are not uncommon. Maybe your loved one was physically abused by a staff member. Maybe someone working in the nursing home mismanaged or even stole medication from your loved one, causing their health to decline. Our personal injury lawyers can review nursing home records and other evidence to determine who is to blame and how to get your family justice.
Medical Injuries
While we trust doctors to help us when we need it the most, things do not always pan out how we want them to. Medicine can be unpredictable, and treatments that work for some might not work for others. While doctors do not need to be perfect, they must not be negligent. Medical negligence consists of treatment that falls below the standard of care. Examples may include surgical errors, misdiagnoses, and failures to warn or advise patients of risks. If you were injured or your condition worsened because of a doctor’s negligent treatment, speak to an attorney as soon as possible.
Car Accident Lawyers in Addison
Car crashes are perhaps some of the most frequently filed personal injury claims in the state and possibly the country. Most people are on the road every day, driving to work, school, or running errands. Accidents are a regular occurrence. While some drivers are fortunate enough to have minimal damages with only minor injuries, others are less lucky. Whether your damages are minor or massive, you deserve fair compensation if the other driver caused the crash.
Evidence in truck accident cases often comes right from the accident scene. Drivers may take photos of the accident site to send to insurance companies as part of an insurance claim. If insurance does not pan out as you hoped, you may also use those photos as evidence in a lawsuit. Similarly, video footage of the crash, such as from security cameras or dashcams, may also be very useful in a personal injury lawsuit.
To prove your claims, we need to understand how the defendant caused the accident so we can gather the right evidence to prove it. A very common example of driver negligence is distracted driving. Phones are everywhere nowadays, including in our vehicles. If the other driver was texting or making a phone call while driving, they may have been too distracted to drive safely. Another possibility is that the other driver was speeding. Even when speed is not the primary cause of a crash, it can make a crash go from bad to worse very quickly.
Truck Accident Lawsuits in Addison
While any vehicle accident can be serious, accidents involving large trucks can be especially frightening and dangerous. Trucks like eighteen-wheelers are so large that most other cars on the road cannot possibly stand up to them in an accident. Drivers are often severely injured. Some do not survive the accident. Your injuries might be so severe that you must live with medical complications or disabilities for the rest of your life.
If you file a personal injury claim for a truck accident, talk to your attorney about whom to hold responsible. Truck drivers are often responsible for crashes. They might be distracted by GPS devices giving them instructions or by their phone when they call their employers. A big problem within the trucking industry is fatigued drivers. Truckers are often on the road for hours and hours at a time. While federal regulations require that truckers get rest at specific times, some disregard these rules. If a trucker dozes off on the road, they might be responsible for a major accident.
We should also consider suing the trucking company that employs the trucker who caused the accident. Under the legal doctrine known as respondeat superior, an employer may be held vicariously liable for injuries caused by negligent employees if those employees were acting within the normal scope of their duties.
Attorneys in Addison for Slip-and-Fall Injuries
Falling accidents tend to get a bad reputation. Slip-and-fall accidents are often seen as more embarrassing than dangerous, and plaintiffs are often looked at as if they are overly litigious and want a fast buck for a minor injury. In reality, slip-and-fall accidents are severe, and victims may be very badly hurt. People could break bones, hit their heads, suffer brain injuries, or injure their backs in a bad fall. As such, damages might be much higher than you initially think.
Slip-and-falls fall under the umbrella of premises liability claims. These kinds of cases are based on the conditions of the property or land where the accident happened, and the property owner may be held liable. Generally, property owners have a legal duty to make the premises safe for guests. This means removing or repairing known hazardous conditions and making reasonable inspections for unknown hazards. However, trespassers are typically owed no such legal duty and might not be able to file legal claims.
Addison Lawyers for Accidents and Injuries in the Workplace
Your workplace is supposed to be clean, safe, and reliable. Employees cannot be expected to do their jobs when the conditions of the workplace are dangerous or unpredictable. While some jobs are inherently riskier than others, all workplaces should be at least reasonably and adequately safe. Unfortunately, employers sometimes neglect things like maintenance or safety training, and employees get hurt.
Accidents at work might involve seemingly mundane accidents or terrible catastrophes. You might fall down the stairs in your office building because the handrail was broken or not properly installed. You might be crushed by heavy machinery at a factory job or on a construction site. Whatever the case may be, your employer might be responsible, as they are obligated to take care of the workplace for employees.
In some cases, other people or parties are implicated. For example, suppose you were hurt while working your construction job using a defective circular saw. Our personal injury lawyers might help you sue the manufacturer of the saw for producing a faulty product. You might also sue your employer for negligently failing to inspect the saw they provided before allowing you to use it for work.
Talk about your job with your attorney. Whether you are an employee or an independent contractor might determine what kind of legal options you have. Employees may be covered by Workers’ Compensation, while independent contractors typically are not. Your attorney can help you if your employer threatens retaliation, like firing you or having you blacklisted.
What Your Damages Are Worth in an Addison Personal Injury Case
Damages available in your case depend on how your accident happened and the extent of your injuries and losses. Some cases involve extremely high damages, while others are not quite as staggering. Even so, all plaintiffs deserve fair compensation, and your attorney can help you get it.
Economic Costs
Accidents and injuries are infamously expensive. You might incur any number of financial costs as a direct result of the accident, and these costs should be considered when we calculate your damages. For example, hospital bills from when you receive medical treatment may be a big source of economic damages. If you need more extensive care or long-term treatment, these bills might be higher than you realize. We should also think about how your injuries have impacted your ability to work. If you are losing income because working is harder after your accident, your lost wages may also be considered in your damages. Additionally, if your property or personal belongings were damaged or destroyed, the cost of repairs or replacements should be considered.
Non-Economic Injuries
Non-economic damages are more subjective. They involve personal experiences that may or may not come with monetary costs. Non-economic damages usually cannot be proven through bills or receipts. Instead, they are often based on how they impact your overall life and well-being. For example, you can claim pain, emotional suffering, psychological injuries, humiliation, and more. If your injuries come with long-term complications, you might claim damages for your reduced quality of life or your inability to enjoy your life as you once did.
How Your Attorney Can Help Your Addison Personal Injury Case
Many people experience injuries, but not everyone has proof of their claims. Filing a civil case is incredibly difficult without proof. Courts are often unwilling even to entertain cases that lack evidence, and they are often dismissed for a lack of evidence that fails to establish a valid cause of action. If you currently lack evidence, your attorney might be able to help you find what you need to get your case into a courtroom.
Next, your attorney can help you work on effective legal strategies. Maybe you have lots of evidence, and success in court is more likely. Your attorney can work on legal arguments to highlight your evidence and persuade a jury. If you do not have a lot of evidence, other options or strategies might be worth looking into.
Whether you are coming to your lawyer with a lot of evidence or very little, you probably need more. Your attorney should have the skills and experience to help you find additional evidence. Are there witnesses out there who might know something? Maybe someone has hidden away photos or videos of the accident. If there is a way we can get more evidence, we absolutely should.
Proof and Evidence to Back Up Your Personal Injury Claims in Addison
Speaking of evidence, it might take various forms and be found in numerous locations. While much evidence often comes straight from the accident scene, other evidence might come from elsewhere. The best way to find what you need to prove your claims is to ask your attorney.
Evidence From the Accident
Evidence from the accident scene itself might include photos or videos recorded right after you were injured. This is not unusual, as people often take pictures or record videos of accidents to send to insurance companies. However, insurance does not always work in our favor, and your photos or videos might make for powerful evidence in a courtroom. We should also get any important physical objects that played a role in the accident. Photos may suffice if the objects are too large to enter a courtroom.
Witnesses
Another great source of evidence is witnesses. Did your accident happen where others could see it? If so, others may testify about what they saw when the accident occurred. For example, after a car accident, other drivers or even pedestrians who were near the accident or stopped to render aid may be called upon to testify. In some cases, accidents are so complex that accident reconstruction experts may be called in to scientifically recreate the scene to determine who is responsible.
Records
In certain cases, records might shed light on important details surrounding your case. For example, medical records may be necessary to prove the extent and severity of your injuries and medical costs. If you are suing a business, certain business records might reveal how the business is responsible for your injuries. If the police investigated the accident, police reports might help us find evidence. Police reports are generally inadmissible as evidence because of the hearsay rule. However, there may be exceptions. Alternatively, we can use the police report as a guide to find other evidence that is admissible.
Call Our Addison Personal Injury Attorneys for Legal Support
Call the Rhatigan Law Offices at (312) 578-8502 and ask our personal injury attorneys for a free, confidential case review to get started.
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