What Does It Take To Win An Injury Case?
Folks who seek out personal injury law services often wonder about what will be needed to win a case. Outcomes can vary. Many cases come together very quickly because an insurance claims adjuster ends up finding the claim to be good. Other cases may end up being fought to the appellate courts over years or even decades.
What's the difference? Let's take a look at which factors will likely dictate if, how, and when you will win your case.
Police and Medical Reports
For a personal injury attorney, reports from respected professionals with direct knowledge of what happened are the bedrock of most claims. Not only do these folks bring authority with every statement, but their reports can be quickly conveyed to insurance companies. This can speed up the process an adjuster uses to conclude whether the claim is valid. Once a claim has been deemed valid, most of the remaining delay is likely going to be over how much compensation should be involved.
The Severity of the Injuries
The severity of a claimant's injuries will play a role in two aspects of the process. Foremost, the severity of your injuries may determine whether your case is considered catastrophic. Depending on the state you live in, there may be caps on what you can recover if an incident is a particular type. Most exemptions to these laws center on catastrophic injuries. These are injuries so severe that they permanently change your life, including disfigurement, nerve damage, brain injuries, and mangled or lost body parts.
A secondary role for injury severity is that it may dictate how long it takes to file a claim. If you have to wait for swelling to go down in your neck before a doctor can confirm whether there is major nerve damage, for example, that can slow your case down significantly.
Is the Defendant Insured?
For a personal injury attorney, learning that a defendant is insured is usually great news. An insurance company will usually seek to settle all valid claims, although the negotiating part of a case might get a little stick.
Conversely, it's hard to guess what an insured party might do. They might be self-insuring, and that may play out like dealing with an insurer. However, an individual may not have the money to settle, and you might have to go to court. In the toughest scenario, you may even have to go to court a second time to have a lien placed on their assets.
For additional details, reach out to a local personal injury attorney.
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