Posts Tagged ‘Personal Injury Attorney’

Each spring, as the buds burst into bloom and the air warms, we all want to get outdoors. This is a time when motorcyclists itch to get out and ride.  The excitement is unmatched and, if the bike has been in the garage all winter, worth the wait.

So it is a time for a spring warning from Hausmann-McNally, S.C. personal injury attorneys who are bikers themselves.

The laws of physics and human nature still apply.

• Solid objects traveling at high speeds are more damaged in a crash than those traveling at lesser speeds.
• Solid objects hurtling into stationary objects cause damage both to themselves and humans who are attached to them.
• Rubber spheres are more likely to skid a vehicle out of control if the pavement is wet, freshly gravelled or the tires are worn.
• People’s attention tends to wander.
• People with alcohol in their systems have impaired attention and response times to dangers.
• Individuals in enclosed solid objects [cars and trucks]—especially with radio, noisy passengers or cell phones active–are less likely to hear and see motorcycles.

All the warnings we give to bikers go double for auto and truck drivers. It has been proven that other drivers often do not see motorcycles on the road. We urge drivers to be aware that they share the road with motorcycles and scooters, just as you need to be aware of children playing in the streets in good weather.

We would rather not see our biker friends in casts or wheelchairs or hospital beds. We want to see you on the road. Bikers—like Robins and tulips and asparagus—are signs of spring.

We understand that, if we are in cars, motorcycles can be behind us, passing us, coming towards us around a blind corner or quietly creeping up next to us at a stop sign.

And, if you are so unfortunate as to have an accident while riding your motorcycle, you know you can call Hausmann-McNally, S.C. at 800-227-6699. We will send a representative to your office, home or hospital room. Our special understanding of this area of the law spans over 35 years. We want to help preserve your rights in the matter.

Experienced personal injury attorneys are very creative people when it comes to helping accident victims receive compensation for their losses and injuries. The good ones don’t take “no” for an answer. They are bird dogs when it comes to finding sources to help pay for their clients’ injuries and losses.

By pursuing all aspects of a case that was racking up huge medical bills for a five-year-old girl’s family, Indiana Attorney Rod Tucker managed to help them recover financially from a serious automobile accident and, after two years of legal proceedings, come out with a structured settlement that will yield an expected payout of $1.49 million.

Rod Tucker is a seasoned attorney who manages the Indianapolis office for Hausmann-McNally, S.C., a personal injury law firm.

In June 2008, the girl was riding in the back seat and her father was in the front seat as her uncle drove on a rural Indiana road. Their car was going through a four-way intersection where three of the corners were open fields and the fourth was the site of a house with fencing, trees and shrubs. As they went into the intersection, their car was rammed by a car from the right. Both cars flew into a field. The girl’s father was injured, but it was apparent that his daughter was critically injured. Her head and leg injuries were so severe that she was airlifted to Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis. At the hospital, doctors induced a coma and kept her “asleep” for 55 days while they did what they could to heal her brain and legs. Treatment included risky brain surgery and numerous other therapies. Although he was injured himself, her father never left his daughter’s side in those 55 days.

Tucker said it at first appeared that there was not going to be enough insurance money to cover the expensive treatment which had already cost over a half million dollars. The insurance on the cars involved in the accident amounted to $170,000. In the interest of his clients, Rod Tucker set to work to find and sue the parties that shared responsibility.

Tucker investigated the site and found that the stop sign was located 20 feet back from the corner and that the county had never ordered the property owners to maintain a clear line of sight for motorists at the intersection. Tucker asked, and Clinton County agreed in mediation, to pay $300,000 because of the poor design and maintenance of that rural intersection.

In mediation proceedings in December 2010, Tucker asked for and received $350,000 from the homeowners’ insurance because, by creating their privacy landscape, the home owners were responsible for obstructing the visibility at the intersection.

In order to maximize the benefit to his client, Tucker further convinced the hospital that treated the girl to significantly reduce the family’s medical bills so that the there would be some money left to help with her care into the future.

After being presented a case that seemed to have insufficient insurance, Tucker got five parties to share the expenses for the injuries and loss suffered by that little girl. After a two-years of legal proceedings, she will receive an estimated $1.49 million in payments over the course of the next 45 years.

Tucker, who teaches several law classes at nearby universities, tells his personal injury law students, “the easy cases are when there are lots of injuries and lots of money.” The hard ones, he says, “are those situations where there are severe injuries, a lot of potential for compensation, but insufficient insurance and assets and it appears that nobody wants to pay.” This was one of those cases. Early on, the insufficient insurance seemed to sentence the family to bankruptcy or a life of paying off huge medical bills. The services of a skilled and dedicated attorney helped shift the picture to a rosier one for the girl and her family.

The little girl, now seven, is still receiving physical therapy for her leg injuries.  The brace on her right leg may be part of her life for a long time. Doctors continue to monitor her for delayed symptoms related to the brain injuries. Nonetheless, her family is grateful to have her with them. And grateful that the medical bills have not bankrupted them. The settlement achieved by Hausmann-McNally helps ensure their daughter a brighter future than was originally thought possible.

The attorneys at Hausmann-McNally know that one of the foundations of the firm’s success is that they work relentlessly to ferret out the ways to get compensation for their clients.

Effective management of the legal case and subsequent negotiations with the medical providers mean that, for this client, there will likely be over $1.4 million for her to use for her college education or other things that will assure a secure future.

There is never a totally happy ending to a story that begins with a tragic accident, but in these unfortunate circumstances, it illustrates many facets of the services provided by personal injury attorneys.

Hausmann-McNally, S.C. personal injury attorneys often hire expert witnesses to give their evaluation of a situation—especially when the causes and effects of an incident are being debated in court. These expert witnesses are often able to swing a law case one way or another.

In traffic accidents, police reports often document who is at fault. In other types of cases the personal injury attorney must first establish the malfeasance, neglect or negligence of a third party.

In our experience, insurance companies try to minimize the injuries and consequences, using all sorts of tactics. Often they claim that a pre-existing condition was responsible for the client’s pain and loss. They bring in their own experts and responsible law firms have to counteract them. So we often hire doctors and other medical experts to testify as to extent, causes and effects of the client’s injuries.

In one case, we represented a tool-and-die maker who suffered hand injuries in an accident that was not his fault. Initially, it was felt that his damage wasn’t that bad, but after a medical expert pointed out he had to abandon his lucrative profession, the picture changed. A vocational expert was called in to determine what kind of training he needed to begin a new profession, now that his hand was damaged. An economic expert proved useful in calculating the amount of money the client lost over the course of his working life because of his new situation. With the help of these experts, Hausmann-McNally asked for, and obtained, a larger settlement for the client.

Because civil law is able only to “punish” by assessing money damages, judges and juries need specific numbers, facts and projections to help them determine how much money to award an injured party.

In over 35 years fighting for clients’ rights in personal injury cases, Hausmann-McNally, S.C. has learned some critical facts about retaining expert witnesses.

The witness has to be a real expert, one with deep knowledge and passion about the subject. This is not a business for amateurs as the opposing attorneys will tear them to shreds in court if they don’t know their stuff. The expert witnesses are going to be cross-examined in great detail they have to be able to show how they came to their conclusion, show their methodology as well as say when and how they arrived at their decisions. Ideally, their testimony should be so convincing and credible that the opposing attorney will only say, “No further questions, your honor.”

Personal injury law firms have to take the time to interview the prospective expert witness. Although you can contact “experts” via the Web, we have learned there is nothing more important than meeting the individual face to face. We need to make sure the person is personable, articulate, keeps a cool head under close questioning and, most of all, gives a clear, credible explanation for the point(s) we want to make with the jury or judge.

Expert witnesses often come with a high price tag. Hausmann-McNally has made it a policy to hire the most qualified people when necessary. This is a point to consider when hiring a law firm. Some firms simply do not have the resources to hire quality expert witnesses.

The best witnesses are not involved in the case other than to give their testimony. Certainly the firm seeks the best expertise to bolster a client’s case, but we expect the expert witness to evaluate the situation as he or she sees it. A jury or judge would be able to tell if there was something fishy about the testimony. And because expert witnesses have nothing but their reputations to “sell,” they have to be as professional as the attorneys in the case.

Some areas that Hausmann-McNally has retained expert witnesses in areas include:

• car safety
• crash worthiness
• ladders
• appliances
• building construction and safety
• premise security
• accident reconstruction
• speed and braking distance
• seat belts
• economists
• life care planners
• vocational experts

As we become more involved in inadequate security cases , we learned from security experts who were able to demonstrate in court that proper security is a complex process that takes constant monitoring. In one bar shooting case, defendants claimed they had adequate security in their tavern. But they hired people who lacked training or aptitude (as evidenced by the guard shooting one of the patrons in the parking lot).  The expert witness retained by Hausmann-McNally helped convince the court that this tavern’s “security” was not adequate or professional. Our client was awarded a $1.7 million judgment in that case.

There are other examples where we learned much from these people who specialize in details of engineering, safety, economic loss, construction, and psychology.

It takes time and money to interview experts, and we are diligent in vetting their credentials and checking their references. We have found that the right experts with the right knowledge can be a huge asset in a court of law. Although expensive, we find they are worth every penny.

Charles Hausmann
President
Hausmann-McNally, S.C.