When one gets involved in an accident, the nightmare just doesn’t end once you’re safely out of harm’s way. Stress and suffering is prolonged when filing an auto accident lawsuit, but without the necessary know-how you might get dragged into a mentally and financially exhausting legal battle. For your ease, we have made a brief list of the different types of litigation for different types of circumstances in a vehicular accident:
Damages
In an auto accident lawsuit, the plaintiff usually pursues acquiring monetary compensation for any damages to their vehicle or any injuries they incurred during the accident. The former is easy to settle since one can estimate the extent of repair costs against the market value of the damaged car or its components. Bodily harm on the other hand is a totally different case. There are two types of receivable damages for personal injuries, the first being “hard” damages. There involve all your medical expenses and the income you might have missed out due to you being unable to work as a result of the accident. The second type are “soft” damages and are harder to quantify as they include the pain and suffering caused to the plaintiff during the accident.
Auto-Auto Accident
This refers to an accident between two or more passenger vehicles, but also includes the unique circumstances which are listed as follows:
Head-on Collision
This happens when one driver crosses the centre line of a road and collides into a vehicle head-on. A head-on collision case will be argued on the basis of the defendant illegally or suddenly swerving into another lane, whether the plaintiff was keeping to their lane and their perceived inability to avoid moving out of the way of the swerving car to avoid the impact.
Rear-end Collision
This occurs when the front of a car crashes into the rear-end of another car. Different circumstances will result in the collision, but in most cases the plaintiff will assert that the defendant is responsible as they did not keep the required distance or were negligent in applying the brakes, resulting in their car hitting the rear-end of the plaintiff’s vehicle. The defendant however would defer responsibility to road conditions, a third party or the plaintiff themselves. Taking down notes of the sequence of events including number plates, locations and names of witnesses can help to argue your case.
Intersectional Collision
Such a collision occurs when a driver fails to obey a traffic signal or sign, causing an accident and resulting in injuries to the plaintiff, who will argue that they were driving responsibly on their part.
Drunk Driving
In such auto accident lawsuits, the defendant will be subject to criminal charges and perhaps punitive damages for driving while intoxicated and risking the lives of other drivers, pedestrians as well as their own. A third party might also be charged if there is evidence that they had served the defendant excessive amounts of alcohol, which led to them being intoxicated. The more offenses a defendant has for driving while under the influence in the past, the higher will be the punitive damages awarded to them.
Accidents in a Construction Zone
These usually occur when the defendant driver becomes confused by the signs and detours in a construction zone and accidentally collides with the plaintiff’s automobile. The defendant may bring the company responsible for setting up those signs as the responsible third party. In these situations, it helps to take pictures of the location and where the accident occurred and the signs posted about to give weight to your case.
There are multiple other kinds of cases and their special sets of circumstances that affect the proceedings which we’ll cover in the next part. In the meanwhile, you can get professional legal guidance from US Rehabilitation & Health Service’s specialists. Whether you’re planning on making an insurance claim or filing a lawsuit, or even looking for excellent treatment for your post-accident injuries, we can help. Contact us today for a free consultation.