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Car accidents happen every day in Roswell, and many of them cause injuries that need medical care. After an accident, you may be sore and in pain, or you may be in the hospital facing a long road to recovery. Either way, you may wonder who is legally responsible, and how you will pay your medical bills and stay afloat financially during your recovery. But you have a right to recover the full cost of your injury from whoever was at fault. You need a car accident lawyer in Roswell.
John Foy & Associates is one of the top accident law firms in the state. From the time we opened our law office more than 20 years ago, we have focused only on helping injured people recover money. We’d like to give you a free consultation for learn more about your accident and let you know if you have a claim. Let us give you a free consultation. Call us at 404-400-4000 and get your free consultation today.
Who is liable for my car accident injuries?
Most car accidents happen because someone is negligent, which is a legal term that means they weren’t as careful as they should have been. There are many ways a driver can be negligent, including:
- Speeding
- Not maintaining a safe following distance
- Not signaling when changing lanes
- Driving too aggressively
- Running a stop sign or red light
- Driving while distracted by a cell phone
- Driving drunk
A driver who is negligent is liable for injuries to other drivers and passengers involved in the accident, as well as all property damage. This means that the driver’s insurance company is responsible for paying the full cost of the accident.
How much money can I recover in a car accident claim?
If you were injured because of someone else’s negligence in the City of Roswell, you are entitled to be paid for all the consequences you have suffered because of the accident. This means you can recover the cost of your medical bills, your lost time from work, and your car repair bill, or the cost of replacing a car that was totaled. These types of losses are known as “special damages.”
But that’s just the beginning. In a more serious accident, you can recover for other ways the accident has impacted your life. For example, you might be living with chronic pain, or your injury might have left you depressed or unable to continue participating in activities that were important to you. These losses are known as “general damages” or “pain and suffering,” and they can often be far greater than your special damages.
Finally, in certain cases you may be eligible for punitive damages. The local courts award punitive damages to punish especially reckless behavior. The most common reason punitive damages are awarded in car accident cases is for drunk driving. The state hopes that penalizing drunk drivers will send a clear message that people who drive drunk will pay a heavy price.
What kinds of injuries can I recover money for?
You should be able to recover money for ANY injury that you suffer in a car accident. However, in our years of working with car accident claims, there are some injuries we have seen more often than others. These include:
- Whiplash. Whiplash is probably the most common car accident injury, and it frequently occurs after a rear end collision. Whiplash is a muscle injury that affects the neck and is caused by the head “whipping” back and forth upon impact.
- Broken bones. Fractured hands, feet, arms and face bones are especially common. These fractures usually happen because extremities strike against hard surfaces of the car or because body parts are forced into unnatural positions.
- Head injuries. Concussions are very common, and while many heal on their own, others cause long-term complications. A traumatic brain injury can be one of the most devastating car accident injuries of all.
- Cuts and scrapes. These can cause disfiguring scarring or can become infected.
Many times, the full extent of car accident injuries isn’t obvious right away. You may go home feeling just fine, only to wake up the next day in severe neck pain. Or you may feel dizzy and nauseous. Never ignore your symptoms or assume they will go away on their own. Always have a doctor examine you after you have been in an accident.
How should I handle the insurance company?
Chances are, you’ll hear from the other driver’s insurance company pretty quickly, sometimes within hours of the accident. Our recommendation is this: be very careful what you say, and talk to a lawyer before you accept money or provide a recorded statement. Here’s why. The insurance company will act like it wants to help you out at a difficult time. But its real goal is to make a profit, and that means finding ways to pay out as little as it can to injured people like you.
Insurance companies do this by using a standard set of tricks that we have seen over and over again. They call and try to get you to chat with them, hoping you’ll innocently say something that will damage your claim – like “I’m sorry,” or “I’m not really hurt all that badly.” Or they’ll ask you to give a recorded statement and then ask questions that are calculated to confuse you and get you to say things on tape that you didn’t really mean. Or they’ll offer you a little bit of money – far less than you really should receive – hoping you’ll take it and give up any claim you might ever have to get anything more.
The best way to deal with these insurance company tactics is to tell them you’re talking to a lawyer, and then let us take it from there. Then we’ll gather evidence and use it to get the insurance company to pay you what your claim is really worth.
Talk to a Roswell Car Accident Lawyer
At John Foy & Associates, we won’t be pushed around by insurance companies, and we will fight hard to get you all the money you deserve after a car accident. Let us give you a free consultation. We won’t ever charge you a fee if we don’t get you money. Call us at 404-400-4000 or fill out the form to your right and get your FREE consultation today.
