Who Is At Fault For My Accident? Proving Fault Is Vital In Personal Injury Cases.

Victims of car accidents often face a battle to overcome injuries that occurred in the accident. For these victims, getting medical care is the top priority after the accident. Once the medical treatment has begun, the victim might opt to explore their options to be compensated for the accident. This entails filing a personal injury lawsuit to try to recoup a monetary amount from the person and/or entities liable for the accident. 

While it is possible to wait until medical care is started before beginning the process of seeking compensation, it is vital to get a personal injury claim started as soon as possible. Each state has a statute of limitations for personal injury claims. The statute of limitations varies from 1 year to 6 years, depending on the state. Louisiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee each have a 1-year limit, while North Dakota and Maine have a 6-year limit. The remaining states fall in between those timeframes. Since the clock starts when the accident occurs, victims should seek legal help as soon as they can after the accident. 

In personal injury cases, it is possible for a victim to list more than one party as the defendant. In some cases, this might be the driver of the vehicle that caused the accident, an insurance company, and a business if the accident was caused by a commercial vehicle. Determining who should be held liable for an accident often comes only after scrutinizing the evidence in the case and looking into a variety of factors. Seeking the help of an experienced personal injury attorney can often help victims to determine how many parties should be named as defendants and why those parties should be held liable. 

Some people might not realize that in many states they can seek compensation for an accident even if they were partially at fault for the accident. In states that use comparative negligence as the basis for the personal injury award formula, the percentage that a person is at fault for an accident reduces the award by that percentage. That means that if a person was 25 percent at fault for an accident, a $100,000 award would be reduced by 25 percent so the person's final award would be $75,000.

It is vital that you work with someone familiar with personal injury claims so that your case complies with applicable laws. Most personal injury lawyers work hard on your behalf so that you can focus on healing from the injuries caused by the accident. For more information, contact a car accident lawyer like Carl L. Britt, Jr.