You make every effort to drive safely and avoid accidents, but what if a drunk driver comes along and crashes into your vehicle? Even defensive driving techniques can’t prevent every collision, and an impaired driver can be hard to avoid.
Often, drunk drivers swerve erratically, and their next move could be hard to predict. At the same time, they’re more likely to be speeding, which can make a crash more serious.
Unfortunately, people who are hit by drunk drivers frequently suffer serious, sometimes permanent injuries. These may include broken bones, traumatic brain injury or TBI, internal bleeding or bruising, lacerations, soft tissue injuries, back or spinal cord injuries, and more.
Many injured people may be out of work for weeks or months while medical expenses and typical bills still keep coming.
Can a Duluth Drunk Driving Attorney Help You?
If you or a loved one have been injured in a drunk driving accident, you probably expect the drunk driver’s insurance company to pay for your damages—and they should. Unfortunately, the insurance company adjuster will work to avoid paying your claim or to pay you less than your claim is worth.
Here are just a few of the potential problems an experienced drunk driving lawyer can help you with:
The Insurance Company Blames You
If you think the insurance company can’t blame you because their client was driving drunk, think again. Even if the police report states the other driver was intoxicated, and they were subsequently arrested, the insurance company could still say you were also at fault.
This is due to a legal concept called modified comparative negligence, which is used in personal injury cases in Georgia.
Modified comparative negligence allows for two parties to share fault in an accident or injury. This is not necessarily bad because there are many car accidents where both parties have some fault.
Under comparative negligence, an injured person is not barred from recovering damages simply because they made a small mistake that contributed to the accident (as would be the case in a state with contributory negligence statutes). In Georgia, the injured party can collect damages as long as they are less than 50 percent at fault.
Any percentage of fault assigned to the less responsible party is then deducted from their final settlement. For example, if you were 10 percent at fault, you would lose 10 percent of your final damages.
When fault is apportioned correctly, this is generally an equitable system where the injured party is only responsible for the percentage of damage they caused. The problem is that insurance companies tend to take advantage of this system in several ways:
- The insurance company adjuster might claim there is some evidence you were partly at fault when you weren’t.
- The insurance adjuster may overestimate your percentage of fault so they can pay you less than you deserve.
But who ultimately decides how fault is distributed? In most cases, the insurance companies for the two drivers will negotiate until they reach a deal, but this agreement may or may not reflect who was really at fault.
For instance, your insurance company might be willing to concede that you were 30 percent at fault when you were only 10 percent responsible; after all, they still don’t have to pay anything because you were less than 50 percent at fault. However, you will lose a significant amount of your recovery.
The sad reality is that neither the drunk driver’s insurance company nor your own is going to fight for you to recover all your losses. However, an experienced drunk driving lawyer will work to show you had little or no fault in the accident so you can recover all the damages you deserve.
The Insurance Company Blames You, Part 2
Aside from comparative negligence, there’s another issue that may affect cases involving drunk drivers. When an intoxicated motorist causes an accident, this usually results in criminal charges in addition to a civil suit for damages.
The drunk driver will retain a criminal defense attorney, who will often attack the evidence against their client. They might, for example, argue that the responding officer didn’t administer the breathalyzer test correctly, so the results shouldn’t be considered accurate.
Alternatively, they could argue that blood samples weren’t handled appropriately, there was an issue with the chain of custody, etc. In some cases, the charges against the driver may be dismissed if the evidence against them doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.
The insurance company could use that as an excuse to argue their client wasn’t at fault for the accident, either.
While it can be frustrating to learn that the driver who caused your accident won’t be punished in the criminal court system, it doesn’t necessarily mean they will win in a civil case for several reasons:
- First, a driver can still be at fault in an accident if they’re sober. If they caused the crash, their liability insurance company is obligated to pay your damages either way.
- Your attorney will begin searching for evidence of fault in the accident. In many cases, we’re able to obtain witness testimony, photos or videos of the accident, evidence from their car’s black box, and more.
- The burden of proof in a civil case is lower than the burden of proof in a criminal case, where the jury is asked to decide if the defendant is “guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Does that mean you have to go to court? Probably not.
Your attorney can negotiate with the insurance companies on your behalf. Once we explain how much evidence we have of the other driver’s culpability and your lack of responsibility, it’s likely the insurance company representatives will be willing to come to a fair agreement.
However, in rare cases, they may refuse to be reasonable, and we will pursue your claim in court.
The Insurance Company Undervalues Your Claim
How much is your claim actually worth? This is an essential question to answer before beginning your claim or making an agreement with the insurance company.
Unfortunately, it’s not an easy question to answer on your own. We meet many people who have overlooked entire categories of damages or forgotten about certain expenses.
As a result, they may have significantly underestimated what their claim is worth. For this reason, we always ask our clients questions so we can accurately value their claims before we begin negotiations.
Potential damages include:
- Medical bills. It’s important to remember that future costs should be figured in along with current ones. If you’re still in treatment, your lawyer will probably wait until it’s finished to settle your claim in order to ensure all your costs are covered. These include not only hospital or doctor bills but also physical therapy, out-of-pocket costs for exercise equipment, travel costs to see a specialist, etc. If you have serious injuries that will require lifetime care, we will estimate your future costs.
- Lost income or earning potential. If you missed work while recovering, you deserve compensation for that lost time, even if you had paid days off. If you become permanently disabled and can no longer work, you also deserve compensation for your lost earning potential.
- Permanent disability or disfigurement. Whether or not it affects your livelihood, you deserve compensation for any disability or disfigurement that significantly affects your life.
- Pain and suffering. Car accidents can cause painful physical injuries, but the trauma can also lead to emotional or mental pain or suffering, including symptoms of insomnia, anxiety, depression, or PTSD.
- Property damage. This usually includes expenses for repairing or replacing your vehicle and any other property involved in the accident.
- Wrongful death. If a loved one died in a drunk driving accident, you could seek damages, including funeral or burial expenses, final medical bills from the accident, loss of financial support, loss of consortium, and more.
- Punitive damages. These are not meant to compensate the victim for a specific loss but to punish the defendant for particularly reckless or egregious behavior. In some cases, they may be awarded in drunk driving cases. In Georgia, punitive damages are usually capped at $250,000, but there is no limit in cases involving drunk drivers.
If the insurance adjuster finds there is no evidence you were at fault, they might make you an offer. That seems like a good thing, but we’d advise you to be very careful—the insurance company’s first offer is frequently lower than your claim’s actual value.
The insurance adjuster hopes you will accept and sign an agreement freeing them from any further responsibility in this matter. Then, when you realize you have more expenses, they won’t have to pay any more.
If you’ve received an offer from an insurance company for your accident, we strongly advise you to seek legal advice before making a decision. An experienced drunk driving lawyer will review the offer and help you determine if it’s a fair one.
If not, we can negotiate with the insurance company to help you achieve the settlement you deserve.
Get Help From a Duluth Drunk Driving Law Firm
Please contact the CEO Lawyer Personal Injury Law Firm for a free consultation about your accident. Our experienced team will review your case, answer questions, and show you the options for pursuing compensation.
There is no obligation, and if we take your case, there are no fees until we win or settle it.
Attorney Ali Awad is the founder of the CEO Lawyer Personal Injury Law Firm. He quickly transformed it into one of the fastest-growing personal injury law firms in the country and remains dedicated to helping injured people and their families.
As a result, he has recovered millions of dollars in compensation for his clients. When he’s not working on a case in the boardroom or the courtroom, you can find him on social media, making informative yet interesting posts about legal topics for more than a million followers.
Contact The CEO Lawyer today at (470) 323-8779.
