Car, Motorcycle and Truck Accidents
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, motor vehicle accidents resulted in over 40,000 fatalities and approximately 2,500,000 injuries in 2007. Death and catastrophic injuries such as quadriplegia or paraplegia, amputations, fractures or burns readily happen when vehicles weighing thousands of pounds crash into one another or even strike unprotected pedestrians. When an accident happens, it is important to know your legal rights and get answers to questions such as:
- Who will pay my medical expenses?
- Who will pay my lost wages?
- Who will pay any future medical claims?
- Am I entitled to monetary compensation for my pain and suffering?
- What recovery can I obtain if a family member or I were injured by a drunk driver?
- What recovery can I obtain if a family member or I were injured by an uninsured driver?
- What recovery can I obtain if a family member or I were injured by an underinsured driver?
- Can I recover monetary compensation even if the other driver is from another state?
Quite often, a victim injured as a result of negligent, careless or reckless driving may find himself at the mercy of the other driver’s insurance company as well as his own insurance company. For over forty years, we have taken on the insurance companies and obtained fair and just compensation for injured accident victims. We have fought our clients’ own insurance companies when they have unreasonably denied necessary medical benefits or disability benefits despite the fact that premiums have been paid for years. Motor vehicle accidents can involve not only automobile insurance companies but also health insurance companies, HMO’s, disability plans, as well as Medicare and Medical Assistance. We know and understand the legal issues and have successfully directed our clients through these multiple layers of insurance in obtaining medical, wage and salary, and disability benefits on behalf of our injured clients.
Your right to insurance benefits and to a fair and just recovery may depend on your legal status at the time of the accident. For example, your rights to recover benefits from your own insurance company or the negligent driver’s company may depend on whether you are the named insured on a policy; whether you are the driver or occupant of your own vehicle, a vehicle belonging to a member of your household, or another’s vehicle; or whether you are a pedestrian, on a bicycle, motorcycle, pedal cycle or traveling in a taxi cab, or bus. We will explain to you the difference between full tort rights and limited tort rights and how that impacts on your ability to obtain monetary compensation for pain and suffering. We will analyze the insurance policies of you and members of your household to determine whether you can “stack” benefits in order to receive maximum recovery.
In representing accident victims, we investigate why the collision occurred and how the crash resulted in injury to our client. We address issues such as:
- Reconstruction of the accident
- Driver/operator actions and the role of human factors
- Highway/road conditions including negligent design or maintenance
- Non-functioning, malfunctioning or missing traffic signals or controls
- Negligently-placed traffic signals or controls
- Lack of necessary traffic signals or controls
- Weather/meteorological conditions
- Vehicle crash-worthiness
- Tire failure
- Mechanical/electrical/brake failure
- Liquor liability/dram shop liability
In conducting accident investigations, we frequently retain highway engineers, accident reconstruction engineers, automotive design engineers, tire experts, truck and bus safety experts, meteorologists, as well as experts in human factors, motorcycle and ATV safety. We have successfully litigated cases throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and we pride ourselves in achieving positive results for our hard-working, injured clients. For more information contact us online or call 610-594-1600.