From Harm to Healing: Your Legal Rights in Personal Injury Cases
Injuries can happen in a variety of ways. When they are caused by someone else, you may have a personal injury claim. Personal injury cases involve situations where someone becomes injured as a result of the actions or inactions of another person’s negligence.
Legal Rights in Personal Injury
If you were harmed in this way, you can pursue compensation for your losses. Understanding your rights can help you determine whether to proceed with seeking justice with the assistance of a personal injury attorney.
Understanding How Negligence Is Involved in Your Right to Pursue Personal Injury Cases
In personal injury cases, you only have a valid claim if negligence is a factor. Negligence hinges on the fact that people owe each other a duty of care. A prime illustration of this is easy to see with car accidents since every driver on the road has a duty of care to all other drivers to obey traffic laws and drive safely.
When someone fails to uphold their duty of care in any situation and it leads to an accident that causes another person harm, they are negligent. This means they can be held liable for any resulting economic and non-economic damages.
In a car accident, negligence could take the form of another driver texting while driving and failing to notice a red light. The distracted driver may run through the red light and crash into your vehicle, leaving you injured and with financial losses.
Negligence must be proven by the injury victim in any personal injury case in order to claim compensation. Whether you slipped on a wet floor at your favorite restaurant, a dog attacked you while you were strolling through the park, or another scenario, it all boils down to negligence on the part of the at-fault person.
This can be further complicated by comparative fault, which may mean you incur some of the blame. It’s always advisable to consult a personal injury attorney to discuss your accident and find out if you have a strong case.
Your Right to Collect Damages
Personal injury lawsuits offer a way for you to be made whole again after enduring injuries at the hands of another. This is accomplished by pursuing damages, which can include economic and noneconomic impacts.
Economic damages are often the easiest to receive in awards because they can be shown down to the dollar amount. Things like your medical bills, lost income from being unable to work, damaged property, and future loss of wages can be tallied up with ease.
It’s far more challenging to prove you have endured noneconomic damages in your personal injury case. Often, though, these are the most lasting of your impacts as they can take a toll on your enjoyment of life for the rest of your days. An attorney can help you demonstrate the need for these awards and give you a better chance of recovering what you deserve.
