Are you sure about this? If I broke my leg in an accident in Florida, I wouldn’t be able to sue? This is a law in Florida?
The same thing happened to me, except I was the one who got rear-ended. It was a pretty good bump–dented my tailgate and made my head hit the window behind me (I was in a small truck).
So, I get out. We exchange info. He says to call him if the charges are less than $500 and he’ll just pay them out of pocket, and he gives me his business card.
He’s a police lieutenant from that very city. His station is about two blocks away.
I’m starting to think that I might get hosed here.
Anyway, I got a couple of estimates and called him. They were less than $500, but he says go ahead and submit the insurance claim anyway. So I did. His insurance paid up and everything was hunky dory.
Yep, pretty much. Your personal injury protection is supposed to cover your pain, suffering, missed work, and so on.
Yes, it seems silly, but that’s no-fault insurance for you. In theory, it reduces the fees that insurers incur as a result of the neverending well of litigation that comes with doing business in America.
In practice, it tends to drive insurance rates up.
This isn’t legal advice and shouldn’t be construed as such.
If you haven’t already, call your insurance company and let them handle this. They have lawyers on staff whose job it is to deal with this kind of thing. If you haven’t already called them, do so now. (It sounds like the insurance company is already aware since there has already been discovery on your insurance policy)
They deal with this kind of thing all the time and should be pretty good at it.
Oct 2nd I was rear ended in my car (his fault). His car was a mess and had to be towed - his airbags deployed as well. My car was damaged (later cashed out by my insurance company due to repair costs vs value of the car) but I drove it the half km home to call the police because the at-fault driver would not call.
Right after the accident I was sore but I thought I was fine except for being slammed into at 60-65 kph. I was taken to ER on a backboard and neck brace to be sure. Honestly, I thought it was a bit silly at the time. A few hours later when I was still in the ER, and the pain started to set in, I’m glad I was there.
The following days just resulted in more pain.
Here we are a month and a half later and I can’t stand for more than 30 minutes at a time and can’t lift anything more than a few pounds. The pain in my back is fairly intense. My neck is quite sore and movement is limited. Today was the first day I felt well enough to even drive again (hard to look in the blind spots when you can’t turn your neck). I’m doing physio twice a week which has been taking time out of my work having to bus and train to the appointments.
I’m lucky my main work is currently from home as a computer consultant because I can fit my schedule around my doctor visits. I only missed about 10 days of work on the consultant side of things.
My friend just started a business which I was looking forward to helping him with. This required a fair amount of physical labour on my part but paid a nice wage. The first job with him was a few days before the accident. I’ve not been able to work on any projects after. In just 45 days with this job alone I’ve lost about $3k in wages. Not a huge amount, but it was “extra” money slated to be put back in savings (which we took a large bite out of moving out of the country).
I don’t currently have medical coverage so ALL my doctor visits are out of pocket. My auto insurance from the states is supposed to cover some of this stuff, but so far they haven’t even finished paying me for my car - they’ve only paid half and are dicking me around.
I do not know how long this pain will last but it has greatly affected my life at the moment. I can’t make it though a grocery store without being in pain. I can’t take out the garbage without pain. I can’t sit or stand without pain. Dealing with the pain I had to go and find a new car and deal with crappy car salesmen. It took two weeks of car searching and test driving before we found one.
Two days after the crash and I realized this was going to be ongoing, I had a lawyer. I am not about to pay one cent out of my pocket because some shithead couldn’t keep his eyes on the road. At the end of the day the guy who hit me WILL pay for everything - even down to my train fare to the doctor. I fully expect to be paid for my lost wages from both jobs. I also expect to be paid for my pain and I will not settle this case until I feel like I was the afternoon before this guy hit me. I don’t know enough about the law in these cases to handle this myself - thus, the lawyer. I also have enough to worry about so I’ll let the lawyer handle this matter.
Your son was at fault. It is completely possible he damaged this man. If I recall, airbags deploy at around 50kph (30 mph) so your son must have really smaked this guy hard. Is it too early to tell if your son permently damaged this man? I think only a doctor could say for sure. I wouldn’t assume for a moment he wasn’t hurt though.
Here is another thing to consider. The only contact I had with the at-fault driver in my case was at the scene of the crash. He saw me up and walking around, talking, looking more or less fine. What he hasn’t seen is the on-going pain I’ve been in since the crash. He hasn’t seem me going to physio twice a week. He hasn’t seen me ask my 15 your old daugher to lift objects for me because, at the moment, I can not. The only contact I will possibly ever have with him is through my lawyer.
My guess is that he’s going on what his lawyer or insurance company told him to do. There will be court dates where he will have to prove he’s permanently injured, and you can’t always tell that it’s permanent immediately after the accident.
In his defense, not all injuries manifest themselves immediately after the accident. As long as you’re adequately insured, your insurance company should pay the claim.
The burden of proof is on him. Get a lawyer.
I got sued back in 2002. That fucker is still caught up in legal ping-pong. I wonder if it will ever be settled.
Airbags deploy depending on the accident, at collision speeds between about 6-12 MPH, not 30. What you hit has a large effect on at what speed the bag will deploy at. A brick wall will cause the bag to deploy at a much lower speed than a sapling tree.
Hope you get feeling better soon.
My brother hit someone behind at a light. The distance he traveled was only the length of a normal interval between cars at a stop light. So, he couldn’t have been goin more than a couple mph. His airbags deployed. There was less than 100 dollars damage to the front of the car, but the airbags were like 3-5 grand to replace.
Thanks for clarifying this so I didn’t have too. No, airbags certainly don’t deploy at 50mph as was posted. The accident was less than 20. The stupid air bags made my car too expensive to fix so I just junked it. Why pay 4000 for a car worth about 3000? I know they are their purpose but they really should go off at a higher rate of speed to be more effective. Of course, I am just speculating and have no idea what the real statistics are.
Your insurance company will provide the lawyer–usually a better one than you would be willing to afford. A few minutes’ reflection and you will understand why this is.
Yes. I am aware I don’t need my own lawyer. The insurance company will handle all of this. Fortunately, I pay for good coverage. It is just annoying.
This summer, I was stopped at a stop light and a 16-year-old kid rear-ended me. He was probably only going 10-15 MPH and there was no damage to his car and only a scratch to the work vehicle I was driving. At the time I felt fine.
Two days later I woke up and couldn’t move. I was in severe pain for a few days, and still have lingering whiplash effects to my right shoulder, despite the low impact of the crash. Luckily, because I was driving a work vehicle and covered under workman’s comp, I was able to get all the doctor visits and chiropractor visits I needed. I had about the mildest case of whiplash one can get, and if that was mild I hope I never feel what a bad case feels like.
The thing about back and neck injuries is that you can’t know immediately what the damage will be. At the time of the accident I felt fine. I agree that it sounds as though this guy is just out for money, but you never know.
I thought 30mph. I don’t know where I heard that but it might have been old stats or something.
You know what else is annoying? **Having some kid drive his car into the back of your car. **
Perhaps this guy is running a scam, but it would never even happened if your son learned to drive (or would drive) correctly. There is no reason I can think of where a good driver, at a proper distance, should EVER hit the guy in front of them.
Yeah, as everyone else has said, it’s much less than 50 mph. I was in a bad car accident a year or so ago-- oh wow, maybe 2 (I posted about it here on the board). I was going 40 mph and a woman pulled out in front of me and stopped (so it was totally her fault). I slammed on my breaks, so I may have been going 30 or so when my airbags deployed, but I still had bruises on my head from hitting the airbag . I can’t imagine if I had hit the wheel :eek:.
I got second degree burns on my wrist from the airbags, as well as an $8k hospital bill for the CAT scans to make sure my organs stopped bleeding. That said, I’ve got insurance and it covered everything. Everyone- and I mean everyone - was telling me to sue the woman because a: my arm is perm. scarred up from the burn and b: my jaw was knocked about in such a way that it clicks now. I just can’t reasonably sue her though. But hey. maybe I’m just not one of those people.
Best of luck to you and your son.
Thanksgiving, last year. On our way to dinner at my daughter’s and my son is driving. It has just started to snow and sleet. We’re making a left turn after a stop, and there is a light immediately after the turn…about four car lengths in on the road we are turning onto. That light is red. We can’t see this until we’ve made the turn. A car is sitting at the light, so my son brakes. The road is slippery due to the snow, and we skid, and tap the bumper of the car sitting at the light. There was no way to avoid this, due to the road conditions. If the lights had been timed better so that you didn’t have to make a stop again just after starting up from a stop, when you would normally be accelerating through a turn, and if the road hadn’t been icy, there would have been no accident. Or, if there had been no car sitting at that light, we could have slid through the light. But with no warning, no traction and no room…accident.
Absolutely. It was totally his fault and he is paying for it financially through the nose. You can just imagine what an 18 year old male’s insurance rate is with a careless accident on his record. Then add 2grand a year to that!
I suppose I am a cynic because in my line of work I see this stuff all the time and hate to think I am falling victim to the same scam. Person gets hit, gets a lawyer, starts seeing a chiropractor who exhausts all medical benefits. Refers to a back specialist who sees no objective findings for the pain. “Victim” keeps complaining and are given the benefit of the doubt until we get the inevitable surveillance video showing him moving boxes or playing basketball.
Just because you’re annoyed and inconvenienced doesn’t make it right to expect to get a pay day out of it. Again, he may really be hurt. I have no way of knowing. I do know personally, I would be seeking treatment for quite a while before it would occur to me that I may need some representation to protect my future interests.
Your statement implies that every vehicle in this situation would be involved in an accident. Is this the case?
Volume! 
Agreed. That is the one part of your story that brings up red flags. If he’s got grade one or two whiplash, he should fully recover. If he has a spine problem or some other condition then it might take longer.
Personally myself, I’m not planning on settling my case until I’m sure there will be no more medical expenses. This guys lawyer should be telling him the same thing.