Someone that has filed a lawsuit, with the help of a personal injury lawyer in Hollister after being involved in a car accident, wants the responsible motorist to pay for the damages. What evidence supports or refutes the plaintiff’s claim, regarding the extent of the reported damages?
The plaintiff’s claim usually focuses on compensatory damages.
• Cost of medical treatment
• Cost of any rehabilitation strategies
• Lost income
• Lost future earning opportunities
• Pain and suffering
• Vehicle damage
Questions that arose during a determination of the damages’ value
• What was the total for all of the charges on the collected medical bills?
• Has the treating physician spoken about the plaintiff’s possible need for future medical care?
• What was the value of the income that the plaintiff lost, while recovering from the sustained injuries?
• Does it appear that the injured victim could find it hard to find and keep a job in the future?
• Was the plaintiff disabled by the accident-related injuries? Did he or she become disfigured by any of the same injuries?
• Did the plaintiff suffer any emotional problems, such as sleeplessness, PTSD, distress or development of a phobia?
Questions that should be asked and answered, in any effort to determine the damages’ true value
• Has each of the persons involved in the accident been seen by a physician?
• Do the medical reports rule-out the possible existence of unobserved or unreported medical problems?
• Has anyone involved in the accident noted any late-appearing symptoms?
• Has an investigator eliminated the chance that some part in either vehicle had malfunctioned?
• Has an investigator looked for any mention of a similar accident at the same spot? That would suggest a problem with the methods used to control traffic.
The damages’ value could fall below the accident’s value
If an accident with minor damages were to take place repeatedly, in very similar situations, then that would suggest the introduction of some specific factor that caused all of the accidents. For instance, it could be that a traffic light has failed to work properly during each of the earlier reported incidents.
By the same token, a pedestrian that has suffered only minor injuries, after getting hit by a moving vehicle, could call attention to the need for clearer directions for passengers. Alternatively, repeated pedestrian accidents could signal the need for every pedestrian to pay attention when crossing the street.
Not all pedestrians have chosen to heed those words of warning. Some of them make a habit of staring at a hand-held device, while crossing the street. In fact, some viewers of hand-held devices do not make an effort to stay highly visible, even when they are walking about at a time of day when the sun has been known to get into drivers’ eyes.