Finding yourself injured at the hands of another person or organization is a frustrating experience, especially when there isn’t anything you could have done to avoid the incident. Oftentimes, a person’s first reaction to sustaining injuries in an accident is to seek out a way to make themselves whole, typically through the court of law.
However, this process isn’t as straightforward as it may seem at first glance. Even relatively simple cases can take a long amount of time to resolve themselves. This is why learning everything there is to know about personal injury lawsuits is so important.
What is a Personal Injury Lawsuit?
For those who are unfamiliar with the term, personal injury law, a subset of tort law, deals with redressing a wrongdoing that has been performed on one party by another party. As implied by the name, the party who has had the wrongdoing performed to them is typically injured in a physical or non-physical way.
The goal of a personal injury lawsuit, which is filed by the injured party, is to seek monetary compensation in order to make themselves whole in regard to their injuries. This is done by filing a formal lawsuit outlining who the defendant is and what the claim is regarding their actions, along with how much the plaintiff feels they are entitled to.
Common Examples of Personal Injury
There are a variety of common types of personal injury lawsuit cases to consider which can really drive into perspective what personal injury looks like. The most prominent of these includes the following situations:
- A person is walking down the street and comes to a crosswalk. They receive the “walk” signal and step off the curb after looking both directions, only for a car to come barreling around the corner and slam into them. The driver was texting and didn’t see the light was red.
- A person is walking on the sidewalk and hears a barking noise rapidly approaching. An owner of a dog has allowed their animal off-leash, and upon seeing the other person the dog sprints at them and attacks them unprovoked, leading to bite wounds.
- During a surgery, a doctor chooses the make the immoral, unethical, and illegal decision to “sign” the work they have performed on the patient internally, only for it to be discovered later on.
How Do You Prove Personal Injury in Court?
As mentioned, winning a personal injury lawsuit will not be a walk in the park, even for a case that seems open and shut. The following four factors must be proven in order to build your case successfully:
- Duty of Care
First, it must be shown that a defendant in a personal injury lawsuit had a duty of care to act in a manner which kept the plaintiff and others from being involved in the accident that occurred. This simply means acting with behavior that a reasonable person in the same situation would also act with, as opposed to acting with negligence which can lead to the following point.
- Breach of Duty of Care
Second, a plaintiff must prove that the defendant breached their established duty of care. In most cases, this comes from negligence on behalf of the defendant which causes them to act in a manner unbecoming of the situation.
- Causation in an Accident
Following the established breach of duty of care comes perhaps one of the more challenging aspects of a personal injury lawsuit: demonstrating causation. It must also be shown that the breach of duty of care led to the accidents that the plaintiff was involved in, and that the fault is on behalf of the defendant.
- Proportional Damages
Finally, once all of the above has been proven, it must also be demonstrated that the injuries the plaintiff suffered line up with the damages that are being requested. For example, a plaintiff cannot request damages related to a back injury that did not come from the accident caused by the defendant.
Compensatory vs. Punitive Damages: What You Need to Know
When it comes to earning something from a personal injury lawsuit, a plaintiff will seek compensatory or punitive, or perhaps both, damages. Compensatory damages are those which seek to make the plaintiff whole through direct monetary compensation, such as reimbursing for medical bills or physical therapy costs.
Punitive damages, however, are strictly meant to punish the defendant, rather than make the plaintiff whole. These could take the form of fines or general percentage amounts that are determined by a judge. The goal of punitive damages is to ensure the incident does not happen again through the punishment given to the defendant.
How Much Can a Person Win from a Personal Injury Lawsuit?
When it comes to debunking myths about personal injury settlements, one of the most common is that personal injury lawsuits do not earn a plaintiff much money. While it is true that the median award of $31,000 may not seem like a lot compared to medical expenses, keep in mind it’s only a median value. Depending on the specific type of personal injury case, the monetary value can climb into the hundreds of thousands, particularly with medical malpractice cases. How much is on the table for a plaintiff to earn depends entirely on the details of their case.
The Bottom Line
Before filing your personal injury lawsuit case, consider all of the above points to determine if this is actually a course of action you wish to take. For many people, personal injury lawsuits can be lucrative if they can prove their case, but this doesn’t mean it will be easy to win in court. Be prepared for a long deliberation in front of a judge and be ready to defend yourself. Above all, ensure you are being honest with the court and with your attorney to have the best chance possible at success in your case.
