FAQs For Who Is At Fault In An Accident

Have you sustained injuries in an accident? It can be difficult to prove who can be held responsible for an accident.

How can I legally prove who is it at fault for a specific accident?

Most likely it will be an insurance company that you need to present your case to, instead of a court of law. Therefore, it isn’t necessary to get perfect legal “proof” of anything. Instead, you will be informally negotiating with an insurance company via phone calls and letters to an insurance adjuster. You need to just use plain language and make a reasonable argument – that another company or person was careless “negligent”, even when the other side may have plausible arguments as well.

For instance, with a car accident case, it isn’t necessary to provide precise angels of the collision or tire mark measurements like a car accident lawyer in Corpus Christi would do for you in a court of law. You just need to indicate that the other driver either turned right in front of you or hit you from the back. Common knowledge on driving rules will tell the insurance company as well as you who was at fault in the accident.

If you are able to make a sound argument for why the other individual was at fault, then the insurance adjuster will conclude that if the case ended up in court, that there would be a high chance that its insured individual would be found to be legally responsible. Usually, companies prefer paying a reasonable claim earlier rather than having to risk paying for lawyer fees and court costs, in addition to your injuries later on.

Can I receive compensation for the injuries I sustained in an accident that may have partially been my fault?

the accident, you still can receive compensation from others who also partially caused the accident due to recklessness or carelessness. How much an individual is responsible for an accident is determined by comparing her or his carelessness with yours. For example, if the other individual was 75% at fault, and you were 25% at fault, then the other individual or their insurance company will be required to pay 75% of whatever the fair compensation is for your injuries. The rule is referred to as “comparative negligence.”

There are a couple of states that prohibit you from receiving compensation when your carelessness contributed substantially to the accident. (It is referred to as “contributory negligence.”) However, practically speaking, the question of how much your carelessness may have contributed to your accident is something that can be negotiated with an insurance adjuster.

There isn’t any formula that is used to assign a percentage to carelessness – for either you or the other individual. When negotiating your claim, you will determine one percentage; and then another percentage might be determined by the insurance adjuster and provide you with the explanation of why they think your responsibility is greater for the accident. These different percentages that you arrive at will then be part of your negotiations along with all of the other factors in order to determine the amount of your claim.

Can I receive compensation for the injuries I sustained if I have physical limitations made it more likely for the accident to occur or to make my injuries worse?

Maybe your eyesight is not really strong, even with glasses. Or you might have a bad knee that causes one of your legs to be somewhat unsteady. If you happen to fall on a stair that is broke, are you entitled to receive compensation still even if someone who has better eyesight or stronger legs may not have fallen?

Yes, absolutely. All individuals, no matter what their physical abilities are, have the legal right to get through life without unnecessary danger. Occupants and owners of the property are not allowed to put any person in unnecessary danger who may reasonably expect to be on their property. This is also true for drivers anybody else – nobody is allowed to create any unnecessary danger for anybody who might cross their path.

The legal term for careless behavior that contributes or causes an accident is a negligence. For example, an individual is negligent if he failed to stop at a stop sign, which resulted in him hitting your car when you came through the intersection.

An individual may be considered to be negligent whenever she or he had a duty to act carefully and did not do that. (In general, all of us are obligated to act with reasonable and ordinary care in all situations – in a way that doesn’t foreseeably injure anyone around us). For instance, an individual wearing sunglasses while driving at night would be negligent, since any reasonable driver knows that increases the chances that they will cause a traffic accident.

For a majority of accidents, an individual will need to be found negligent to be deemed legally responsible for someone else’s injuries. If the individual behaves in a negligent manner and this behavior harms you, then most likely you will be able to recover compensation for the injuries you sustained in the accident.