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Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Common Mistakes People Make After An Accident

Common Mistakes People Make After An Accident

One of the number one mistakes that people will make after an accident is trying to handle the case on their own and not hiring an attorney as soon as possible. Sometimes we’ll get a case that’s maybe six months into the process and the client had been handling it on their own, so they’ve given recorded statements to the insurance company, they’ve said all these things about their injuries, or the insurance companies got them tripped up in their recorded statements that they’ll use against them later, maybe there’s some sort of gap or delay in treatment. There’s a number of things that can go wrong when a client doesn’t have an attorney by their side advising them. Another common mistake that clients make is not getting medical treatment. I think it’s common for people to get in some sort of accident, whether it’s a car accident, a slip and fall, or whatever it may be, and to feel like “ok, I’m going to go home, take some pain medication and try and ride this out, let my body heal.” And two or three weeks go by, maybe a month goes by, and they’re not better, so then they go to the doctor. Well the insurance company’s argument is “why did you go so late?” And what I always tell clients is, it’s about documentation and being able to show the other side and to prove to them that you were hurt. If it’s not in a medical record, the insurance company and their defense attorneys aren’t going to believe you. In a jury, if the case goes to trial, a jury may have a hard time believing that you were hurt if you didn’t get medical treatment. So delays in getting treatment at the beginning of a case, and gaps in treatment as the case goes on can really, really harm a case.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Medical Bills

Medical Bills

When somebody’s been injured and they have medical bills coming in, they often ask us “what do I do with these?” And there’s a number of different options. If our clients have health insurance, health insurance should be getting billed. If they don’t have health insurance, or maybe there’s a copay or deductible they can’t afford to pay, sometimes we can ask the doctor’s office to hold off on payment. It’s called a Letter of Protection. We just send a letter to the doctors saying “hey we’ll protect your right to claim this debt, and make sure that it’s paid back out of the settlement when we get it.” Sometimes our clients don’t want us to do that, sometimes our clients want to handle it on their own, and maybe set up a payment plan with the doctor’s office, or maybe talk to them directly. There’s a number of options though, and that’s why it’s important to talk to your attorney that’s representing you and make sure that your bills are being handled the right way. What we don’t want to happen is you have bills coming in and you just let them pile up, you don’t let the attorney know, you don’t ask the attorney for advice, and they go into collections and it harms your credit. At least tell your attorney about it, so that we can come up with a game plan on how we’re going to tackle those bills.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Statute of Limitations

Statute of Limitations

Georgia and every state has what is called a Statute of Limitations for a variety of types of cases. For personal injury cases in Georgia, the Statute of Limitations is generally two years from the date of injury. There’s a variety of things though that can extend that and there’s a variety of things that may actually shorten it, not necessarily the Statute of Limitations, but that may require you to do certain things pre-suit, before filing suit. For example, if you have a claim against a governmental entity like a city, a county, or the state, you might have to go through what’s called the Ante Litem Process, which certain government officials have to be given written notice of the claim in a certain way and in a certain form. If somebody’s sitting back thinking they have two years, but maybe they only have six months or one year to do the Ante Litem Notice and they miss that deadline, they can’t bring the claim. So it’s important to make sure that every case is analyzed to determine what the specific limitations period is. In terms of extending the period, there are things that will extend the Statute of Limitations period. For example, if somebody is a minor, they generally have two years from the date they turn eighteen. But there’s a variety of things that need to be taken into account with that too. So if somebody’s a minor, the parents actually have the claim for the medical bills, and the parents have two years from the date of the injury to bring the claim for the medical bills. If they don’t do that, they’re not able to recover for that claim. So, it’s important that every case be analyzed to determine what specific limitations periods may apply to the overall case and any claims within it, because if an attorney sits back and misses that deadline, the client can be seriously harmed if they’re unable to bring a lawsuit later.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Spine, Back, and Neck Injuries

Spinal Injuries

One of the most complex things about spine injury cases is a lot of people have had back or neck issues at some point in their life. Maybe it’s, you know, they wake up with a stiff neck, or a stiff back. Maybe they throw their back out in the yard or playing sports. Maybe they’ve had a prior car accident and they’ve gotten some chiropractic treatment. Back and neck injury cases can be very difficult just because of that. Another reason why they’re so difficult is because it’s difficult to show what exactly you might see on an MRI to show whether that’s related to this specific accident or whether it was preexisting. Or maybe it was preexisting but this accident aggravated it and made it worse, and that may be recoverable. One of the best ways to show an insurance company, to show a defense attorney, to show a jury, that somebody’s back or neck injury is related to this incident, is to support it with as much facts as possible to get out there and talk to the friends and the family members and the coworkers who can talk about how they were before. Maybe they didn’t have any problems at all with their back or neck, maybe they had a prior back or neck issue but it wasn’t as bad and now it’s worse. So really being able to explain that and to show the other side that story is important to proving any case involving a back or neck injury.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Brain Injuries

Do You Handle Brain Injury Cases?

One of the most difficult things about a brain injury case is that a lot of times our clients look normal on the outside and one of the most difficult things is explaining how this injury has affected them and explaining how the brain works and showing the defense, the insurance company and the jury that even though they might look normal on the outside, they are different on the inside. Their brain is different, their brain has changed. There is a number of ways to do that, and to really do that well you have to understand who that person is, you have to understand who they were before, and who they are now. You can find that out by talking to family members, friends, coworkers, to really get a full picture on how the injury has affected them. Another problem very similar to the first one I just mentioned is a lot of times people with a brain injury don’t have something you can see on a CT scan or an MRI. If somebody goes out and breaks their bone, you can show an x-ray and see the broken bone. If we have clients that have a brain injury, sometimes we don’t have that. We can’t put up an imaging film to show where the neurons were damaged or demonstrate where the impaired function is in the brain. A lot of these cases come down to telling the story and the credibility of the person who was injured.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Trampoline Park Accidents

We have seen a huge increase in the number of calls we get from people who have been injured at trampoline parks or whose children have been injured at trampoline parks. We’ve handled a number of those cases and have some going on right now. Unfortunately, trampoline parks aren’t very safe and the trampoline park industry tries to use statistics and inappropriate comparisons to other activities to say how safe they are. But people don’t realize just how dangerous they are. Some people think when they go to a trampoline park that as long as they aren’t doing anything crazy they will be fine, but we see clients who are just jumping on a trampoline normally who snap their legs in half or who snap their ankle. We had a client who almost lost her foot, and she was just jumping from trampoline to trampoline. People don’t understand just how dangerous these places are. A lot of attorneys won’t take trampoline park cases, because they’re not the easiest. Some law firms only want to take the low hanging fruits, cases that are going to be easy (they send a demand letter out and the case immediately settles). But that’s not how we operate. We like to take our cases and try to do all the investigating we can and all the research we can to prove our case. And that’s why we do take trampoline park cases. Obviously it depends on the facts. There are trampoline park cases we have turned down for one reason or another. If you were injured at a trampoline park it is important that you talk to an attorney because you need to know what your rights are. Just because you’ve signed a waiver, for example, doesn’t mean you are necessarily barred from bringing a claim. Talk to your attorney about it and let them review it. Let you attorney determine whether or not it is enforceable. Maybe there is an exception to the waiver for your particular scenario. If you were injured at a trampoline park, make sure you talk to an attorney.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Understanding Dog Bite Cases

Georgia Dog Bite Cases

We have represented clients who have been involved in a variety of animal attacks and dog bite cases unfortunately are fairly common. There are a couple of things to keep in mind with a dog bite case. The first is what is the standard for determining liability. There’s a common perception among the public about what is called the “first bite rule”. So if the dog hasn’t bitten somebody yet, it basically gets a freebie. There are exceptions to that and if you can show that the dog had some sort of aggressive nature that the owner knew about before and didn’t take steps to adequately secure the dog or adequately warn the other person about the aggressive nature of the dog or if you can show that the owner violated a leash law (a lot of local ordinances have leash laws, counties have them too) and so if you can determine that a leash law was violated, you may be able to pursue a claim as well.

Once you get past that hurdle of showing who was at fault, you’ve got to find insurance. A lot of dog owners will have exclusions in their homeowner’s insurance policy that say anything related to the owner’s dog is not covered. So if the dog bites somebody, there’s no coverage. It’s important to make sure that the person representing a dog bite victim takes a look at all of the available sources of insurance that might be available.

If you or a family member was injured by someone else’s dog, call The Champion Firm, Personal Injury Attorneys, P.C., for a free consultation with a Marietta dog bite lawyer

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Social Media and Lawsuits: Should You Keep Posting?

Posting on Social Media During a Lawsuit

When we have somebody that comes to us and hires us, we don’t tell them to shut down their social media. We do tell them to be cautious because we don’t want to make it look like they are changing their normal daily activities and doing something different because that may look suspicious. If you go from posting on Facebook six times a day to just complete silence for two years before your case goes to trial, it can look strange. We just tell our clients to be aware that what they are posting is going to be read by somebody else and could be used against them. A very important thing to remember is to never ever delete something from social media once they have a case. If it turns out they’ve posted something about the accident or posted something about their injuries, or maybe they posted about something before the incident that might have some relevancy to their claims or their injuries and that gets deleted, the court could dismiss the case and sanction the plaintiff. Even if there isn’t a dismissal, the court can impose a variety of different sanctions and it will never be good if it turns out that a client has destroyed or deleted something. So we always tell our clients, don’t destroy or delete anything on social media, be aware that what you are posting will be read be somebody else and could be used against you and if you want to set your page to private that there is nothing wrong with that, as long as you don’t delete anything.

Categories: Personal Injury Process

08.13.18

Darl Champion discusses the different methods insurance companies use in order to make money.

How Insurance Companies Makes Money

Sometimes we will have a client contact us who has been dealing with their insurance company and they will commonly tell us that they aren’t sure if they need an attorney yet because the insurance company says they are going to take care of everything. What I always tell clients is insurance companies are not charities. They are for-profit companies and the way that they make the most money is by paying as little as possible on the claims. So if you are hurt and you are dealing with an insurance adjuster, you should understand that the insurance adjuster is not looking out for your best interest. The insurance adjuster is looking out for the company’s best interest. You need someone on your side who is going to fight for you and advocate for you, and that is what we do as personal injury attorneys. Insurance companies have a variety of factors they use to evaluate a case. One of them is the type of attorney they are up against. They don’t necessarily look at win/loss records, but I think they recognize the lawyers that are willing to fight for their clients, and that’s where I think the difference comes. The lawyers that they know are going to roll over and take whatever settlement is given to them, they are going to offer those lawyers less money. The ones who are going to fight tooth and nail for their clients, they know who they are, and they develop a reputation over time, and the insurance companies know they are not going to get off easy. A lot of times, we skip the pre-settlement process if we think our client isn’t going to get a fair result. We don’t even waste time trying to negotiate with the insurance company. We will file suit right away sometimes. I’ve had cases where someone was seriously injured on someone’s property and I know they are not going to get a fair result, I will often file suit the very next day after getting hired. The reason for that is you don’t want to sit around and wait for the insurance company to give you a low ball offer if you think that’s coming. You are just delaying the inevitable. So when we think that is going to happen, we just go ahead and file a lawsuit. Now that’s not every time, there are times when it makes sense to try to go through the settlement process and see if they will resolve a case, but if they don’t offer our client a fair value, the insurance company is going to know that we are ready and willing to fight for our client.

Categories: Personal Injury Process About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Why Should You Hire a Personal Injury Attorney?

Why You Should HIre a Personal Injury Attorney

My name is Darl Champion and I’m a personal injury attorney. People need a personal injury attorney anytime they’ve been hurt to make sure they are being treated fairly and to make sure they get a good result on their case. A lot of times that result includes financial compensation and making sure they are getting the most money possible for their injury. One of the things we like to focus on at The Champion Firm is providing individual service to our clients and we believe that is something that sets us apart from other law firms, especially larger ones where attorneys have hundreds of cases each. We try to keep our case loads more manageable so that each attorney can give the case the individual attention it deserves. We want each of our clients to feel like they are our only client. We also treat our clients the way that we would want to be treated. So if you are a client in a law firm and you a represented by an attorney who has hundreds of clients, it can be hard to get that personal attention, and that’s something we strive for here.