TRUCK ACCIDENTS

Do You Need Compensation After you are Seriously Hurt in a Trucking Accident?

There’s a reason a chill runs down your spine when a big-rig semi grows more prominent in your rearview mirror by the second or pulls aside you on the freeway at 75 miles an hour. Many times an 18-wheeler hits someone and causes serious injuries or even death. What happens if one hits your vehicle or someone in your family and kills them? The one thing you dare not do is take your time to decide how to respond to this tragedy because those who are responsible for hitting you are already starting to defend themselves. Thousands of 18-wheelers pass through Texas as a destination or a way station as they haul all types of goods to and from all parts of the country. So accidents, injuries, and even deaths are statistically inevitable when they come to or through Texas.

If you have been injured in an 18-wheeler accident or, worse, if a loved one was injured or killed, an 18-wheeler accident injury attorney with our Law Offices can help you. For over 20 years, we have successfully negotiated compensation for our injured clients with insurance companies and successfully litigated hundreds of trucking accident cases on their behalf. We know you suffer pain through no fault of your own as a result of this negligent accident and bear a significant financial burden. But once you have recovered – and we hope it’s soon – your troubles might just be beginning if you did not have the presence to hire an experienced attorney. Your fight to seek fair compensation for your injuries can be just as trying as the injuries and pain caused to you by accident. Trying to get a fair settlement or litigating to secure a fair injury award without the proper legal counsel simply adds to the drama you don’t need. We feel it is essential to let you know about all legal avenues available so that you can make the right decision when hiring an attorney who will help you achieve just and fair restitution.

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Who is to Blame for Your Damages and Pain after a Serious 18-Wheeler Wreck?

When filing an insurance claim or civil case after you have been seriously injured in an 18-wheeler accident, anyone, or several different parties, can be responsible and held liable for your accident: The list includes:

* The truck driver.
* The company he or she works for.
* The company that loaded the trailer.
* The person who planned the truck’s route.
* Maybe even a manufacturer of a truck part.

That last bullet point comes into play rather often. Trucks are made up of many parts. All must operate as they should to safely operate on the road. Design defects or manufacturing flaws in parts used by a truck may be the manufacturer’s fault, in which case a product liability claim or case might be brought against that company. For example, if a truck has faulty brakes that are a result of a manufacturing defect that causes the truck to slam into your car, or if a strap holding cargo in place has a design flaw that allows cargo to come loose and topple over on your pickup or SUV as you drive side-by-side on the interstate, a manufacturer may be held responsible for your injuries or other damage.

Another different source of compensation comes from the fact that in the past few years, the state and its counties have begun outsourcing much of their road maintenance and highway construction to private companies. So if that company’s construction zone creates conditions that cause an 18-wheeler to hit you, they may also be a liable party to the accident. All private companies retained by the state to build and maintain Texas roads must provide either direct liability insurance coverage or a liability bond to the state.

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Injured 18-wheeler accident victims, as the plaintiff in any legal case, must determine whether the negligent truck driver caused the wreck, if a mechanical malfunction might be responsible, or if someone else like that outsourced road maintenance provider played an important part. Many different contributing factors can abruptly lead an 18-wheeler to enter your life. The company that owned the cargo may have failed to load it properly or didn’t properly secure the cargo. This made it shift or break free during transport and toppled the trailer’s contents onto your vehicle. Or the transport company’s route planner was negligent in sending the truck into an area not zoned for hazardous cargo if the truck that hit you was carrying a hazardous load. It didn’t belong where you were at the time. Many other negligent acts may have caused this wreck. Rare is when we see an open-and-shut 18-wheeler injury accident case. This is why it is in your best interests to harness the expertise of a big rig trucking wreck lawyer who will make sure that all the liable parties for your injuries from that truck accident are held responsible for your injuries, pain, and suffering lost wages as well as the damage to (or replacement of) your vehicle and its contents.

A legal concept in Texas law called “respondent superior” states that employers of those found liable for the wreck are ultimately responsible for the actions or inaction of their employees. So when you have been hurt in an 18-wheeler wreck, determining everyone responsible for the accident is the first thing that must be done. Finding those responsible leads to identifying legally liable parties for your injuries and property damage. In many 18-wheeler accidents, multiple parties may be liable for damages, and there can be more than one defendant, especially when our investigators uncover instances of respondent superior where an employee made a mistake that contributed to your serious 18-wheeler accident injuries. To win your claim among several likely defendants, you need an experienced 18-wheeler accident lawyer on your side who also can investigate the scene of an accident and determine who is (and isn’t) liable. Hence, you know the right defendants to sue. This investigation is over and above the normal local or state law enforcement investigations. Though those investigations mostly reveal the primary responsible parties, they often stop short of the type of examination by experienced truck accident lawyers and their investigators. These “drill-down” investigations reveal every liable party and the degree of responsibility each party played in the accident. Occasionally, our investigations bring other case facts to light that law officials miss. We pass them along for further action if they feel it is warranted. We then go a step further by investigating every liable defendant’s assets. It’s not very fruitful to sue someone who can’t afford to pay your damages or doesn’t have the insurance to compensate you for them. We know what every defendant is worth and learn that quickly.

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Insurance Companies are Your Opponents: They’re not in Business to “Serve You.”

The federal government requires all interstate trucking companies to purchase sizable insurance policies to protect against inevitable accidents. Many people believe that the trucking insurance compensation process is quick and relatively free of surprises just because the companies have insurance. But that isn’t necessarily the case, especially when the insurance company is taking in as much in premiums as possible and paying out as little as necessary in claims. Since insurance policies for 18-wheelers involve vast sums of money, much more significant than your personal car insurance, the trucking insurance underwriter’s primary focus is to keep from paying you reasonably to maintain its high profits. Insurance companies fear rising settlement expenses. So it is no surprise that insurance companies will deny every claim possible, whenever possible, and for as long as possible. Often they do it for one reason: to determine if you’re serious about compensation or are just making empty threats. Without the right attorney on your side, you’re just blowing a lot of smoke instead of working to collect a fair settlement from an insurance company.

While the Texas Civil Practices and Remedies Codes provide the right for someone who has been injured in an 18-wheeler trucking accident, or the family of someone who has been killed, to seek compensation for their loss, the law doesn’t say that compensation is automatically granted whenever a victim claims an injury. This is the dirty little secret that insurance companies don’t want you to know until you find out the hard way by dealing with an out-of-hand claim denial by an insurer. You, as plaintiff, must first prove the liability of the party responsible for the accident and the injuries that were inflicted as a result of that accident. Furthermore, in any liability case, the plaintiff holds the burden of proof to demonstrate that the compensation requested fairly reflects the loss produced by those 18-wheeler wreck damages. The insurance company, and the lawyers who represent them, do everything possible to deny the plaintiff’s claim or argue that the level of restitution you seek is excessive and unreasonable. The best way for a victim in an 18-wheeler accident to ensure total compensation is to find assistance from an experienced 18-wheeler wreck injury attorney who knows how to prove the defendant’s undeniable liability clearly and then win equitable damages.

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The Insurance Company Is Armed with Underhanded Adjusters and Slick Legal Eagles

The more valuable an insurance policy (and policyholder), the more insurance companies are willing to protect such valuable business assets. Regarding policy value, coverage for an 18-wheeler is at least 25 times more than for the most expensive personal auto. Multiply your car insurance coverage by 25, and that’s how much harder their insurance company will fight to defend their trucking policyholders (and protect their bottom line). The soldiers in their war against you are insurance company adjusters and insurance company defense lawyers. An insurance adjuster’s goal is not to help you but to help deny payment to accident victims. Adjusters that work on truck wreck cases are not the same “good hands people” from your friendly car insurance company who put you first. Only the best adjusters handle your 18-wheeler case. They’re the all-stars. They got where they are on the backs of unfortunate accident victims like you. These adjusters are clever. Often, they try and get you to say something so they can record it and later twist your words into some sort of left-field admission of liability to destroy your claim. Some unscrupulous adjusters even convince uninformed personal injury victims to sign away the legal right to sue in exchange for a small settlement that does not come close to compensating the victim’s injuries. So a good rule of thumb is to not talk to any insurance adjuster who doesn’t contact you through your attorney. Even then, you should leave that entire matter up to your experienced 18-wheeler accident lawyer. That’s what you’re paying him for, right? You know the old Texas saying. “You can’t get hung by words you never say.” End of story!

To represent them, insurance companies have teams of specialized defense lawyers to avoid paying claims against truck insurance policies. Whether they’re on permanent retainer or staff, these lawyers begin to build cases against accident victims like you seemingly before the last ambulance has left the scene. The longer you wait to file your claim, the more behind you already are. They’ve already devised the strategy, have completed their investigations, conferred with the insurance company, and know everything the adjuster knows about you. Because they specialize in this very involved insurance law, these defense attorneys know dozens of ways to trip you up and have your case dismissed before trial. Your claim may be completely legitimate. If you fly solo, or have an inexperienced attorney on your side, eventually, they’ll win before the fight begins on some technicality. The only way to protect your case from these experienced insurance companies, their adjusters, and lawyers is with your own veteran 18-wheeler accident injury lawyer on your side.

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18-Wheeler Truckers Protect Themselves. But Who Protects You from Them?

What would you do if someone threatened your line of work, your ability to earn a living, and take care of your family? In this day of high unemployment, you would probably do just about anything to ensure that you keep getting paid and that your family still eats and has a roof over them. Truck drivers are no different. When they’ve been involved in an 18-wheeler accident and know they are in danger of losing their job if they’re held liable for the wreck, they’re not beyond lying, cheating (or stealing evidence) to save their job. Few (if any) trucking companies would trust one of their expensive rigs to a driver who causes wrecks. The trucker knows he’ll probably lose his job if he’s found responsible for your accident and injuries. It will be hard for him to find another driving gig. So when he hits you, he’s looking for a fall guy. And you’re it.

A client once hired us after suffering an injury in an 18-wheeler accident in which the truck driver claimed that our client was driving with his lights off at night when the accident occurred. Our investigators discovered a security camera pointed directly at the accident scene outside a storefront. The footage clearly showed that our client’s headlights were shining brightly and proved that the truck driver boldly lied. Our investigative methods get to the bottom of 18-wheeler accidents and the lies the drivers sometimes tell. We use the evidence we gather, sworn statements of credible witnesses, video surveillance footage, and forensic test results that prove when a trucker isn’t telling the truth. Sometimes your lawyer will catch a trucker in a lie during a deposition and press him until he gives up the truth. Over the last twenty years, the 18-wheeler accident injury attorneys at our Law Office have taken countless depositions and developed sly questioning techniques to get all witnesses to admit the truth. The truth is your best weapon in winning a settlement before a case goes to trial.

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Self-Insured Truck Drivers Who Cause Accidents Present Different Problems

Unlike federal law that requires interstate trucking companies to have liability insurance, Texas law doesn’t require trucking companies to have liability insurance (past what they carry on their truck to remain “street legal”) nor to cover their loads. However, few would trust someone who didn’t at least has some sort of cash or surety bond to carry their valuable cargo. Some trucking companies protect against personal injuries from accidents by self-insuring themselves through this surety or bond process. This usually involves the transport company reserving a percentage of their assets to pay accident claims rather than purchasing coverage from a traditional insurer. Usually, they allow the same bond to insure the loads they carry and any accident-based liability claims or legal cases.Though the government also monitors the insurance industry, licenses its adjusters, and holds insurance companies to some ethical and legal standards as best it can, no such regulations govern companies that insure themselves. Even though you won’t need to deal with insurance adjusters, winning compensation from these “self-insured” companies can be far more difficult and chaotic. You will be dealing with an officer of the company instead of an insurance adjuster. This company officer’s salary comes from company profits. Any amount you pay for an injury comes directly from the company coffers. So if the company’s officer compensates you for an injury, the amount is paid out of the company funds, which means the company officer is taking money out of their own pocket. So it is not unusual for a self-insured company officer to resort to any means to deny your claim and protect the company’s assets.

Officers of self-insured companies have been known to dispose of damning evidence, bribe witnesses, and intimidate victims. This explains why every time our attorneys are hired against a self-insured company, the first action we take is to prevent anyone from the defendant company from behaving inappropriately toward our clients. We step in so they will not attempt to communicate with our clients unless we are present.

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Are You Seriously Thinking About Representing Yourself? Why Would You Entrust So Important an Issue to a Legal Novice – You?

Have you ever heard the saying, “anyone who represents himself in court has a fool for a client?” Of course, you have. Do you think this wise saying just appeared out of thin air? Some people think they know enough about everything to handle things themselves. And personal injury claimants are no exception. The fact of the matter is a non-attorney has a very hard time successfully representing him or herself in court, effectively negotiating a fair settlement with insurance companies. Litigation in 18-wheeler accident injury cases is extremely complex. Inexperienced attorneys rarely recover reasonable compensation for their accident victims. And non-lawyers have no real hope. Would you design and build your own house on a vacant lot you purchased without experienced help? Of course not. To successfully tackle a personal injury case involving an 18-wheeler wreck, why would you even entertain such a foolish idea of not having the most experienced lawyer on your side, especially when tens, even hundreds of thousands of dollars are at stake?

A few years ago, a person with a viable accident claim came to us but decided against retaining our law firm because he didn’t want to pay 1/3 of his “winnings” with an attorney. So he represented himself. To make a long story short, the man ended up being a legal train wreck and getting a few thousand dollars when he could have won 20-30 times more (at least) had he retained an experienced truck injury attorney: we see a lot of that. And we’re saddened by it, not because they didn’t hire us. They hired no one and ended up losing their one shot at fair compensation. You also might want to pass on any offers of a relative lawyer or attorney friend to represent you, even if the offer is being made with the best intentions. They might be inspired to fight hard for your injury compensation rights after an 18-wheeler has seriously injured you. You’ll soon discover that personal relations might find it very hard to detach him or herself from issues surrounding your case emotionally. A specialized 18-wheeler accident lawyer must be pragmatic and focus solely on the facts if you are to be successful. What happens if that friend or relative attorney doesn’t win the case or accepts a less-than-fair settlement because he knows how badly you need the money? How will all of you feel once you discover this? Keep your family members and friends out of your legal business. You will be wise to remember this when deciding who will represent your 18-wheeler accident injury lawsuit.

Only after trying hundreds of cases can a lawyer develop the right tactics for success at trial or to successfully negotiate with trucking insurance adjusters. Many inexperienced attorneys, much fewer non-attorneys, don’t know how to answer interrogatories, prepare demand packages, and conduct effective depositions. Nor do they know how to conduct effective accident investigations or respond to admissions lists. You need a big rig trucking wreck lawyer who does know how to do all of this and look out for your best interests. Insurance companies will only agree to a just settlement for your legal damages arising from an 18-wheeler accident if you are represented by an attorney with a history of courtroom success. Insurance companies and their lawyers are eager to take on non-lawyers. But they fear us. When we file a claim, then back it up with evidence from our investigations, the insurance companies often see reason and settle for a fair amount. They want to avoid a trial, especially if they already know we have a solid case. Our clients can return to living their lives again quickly because they’ve won a fair settlement and avoided a protracted and contentious civil trial.

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Here’s What You MUST Do Now.

There is an old saying that there are two things we can never take back: wasted time and spoken words. This is a very good way to approach your injury case. Before you speak with an insurance company, accept even a single dollar of payment or compensation, sign anything, or attempt to file a lawsuit on your own, you must contact a competent lawyer. Next, time’s wasting. Steps must be taken to preserve the evidence from your 18-wheeler accident. That means we all must act quickly and begin investigating the accident scene. Every moment you wait to find experienced legal representation, evidence is beginning to spoil, witnesses’ memories fade, or their stories “mysteriously” change. The scene of the wreck itself also changes quickly, and evidence to prove your case also might begin to “mysteriously” disappear. As soon as we are hired, our Law Office begins a thorough investigation of the accident scene to uncover evidence proving the liability of the truck driver and/or the trucking company. We inspect all the vehicles involved, measure the distance from skid marks to the point of impact, hunt for photographic and video evidence, and assemble all the evidence we find to prove your case. We take every measure to uncover any evidence that might help prove your claim beyond a shadow of a doubt.

For example, we were once hired by the families of two men who were involved in a terrible accident with a tractor-trailer rig. The collision killed one of the men at the scene. The other was left fighting for his life for quite a while. The truck driver left his trailer stretching across a road in the dark of night, preventing anyone from passing. Only the taillights of the trailer by the curb were visible to oncoming drivers, and our clients rounded a curve and unknowingly smashed into the trailer. The collision’s force ripped off the vehicle’s roof, killing the driver immediately and critically injuring the passenger. We were hired the next day and began our investigation at the scene. Our client’s car had been towed to a salvage yard. After examining the vehicle, we noted its missing headlights. Our investigators spotted a security camera and asked to look at the video. It showed an official of the trucking company illegally removing the headlights. When the company tried to claim our client had been driving a car without headlights, we produced the video and caught them dead to rights. You can guess how this case ended up. You get a better idea of what we mean when we say that evidence can sometimes “mysteriously disappear.” If the loved ones of these two men had waited any longer to hire us, this crucial evidence would have been gone forever because the salvage yard’s surveillance system re-records over old videotape every two days. We can’t think of a stronger reason why you must find an 18-wheeler accident injury lawyer now, so the investigation can begin while the case is fresh. Lies and missing evidence will cripple your legal right to fair compensation for an 18-wheeler accident from the moment it happens if you allow it to happen by doing nothing.

We Can Help You and your Family Regain Your life After an 18-Wheeler Accident
Our local Texas truck accident firm of has over 20 years of experience handling personal injury litigation in 18-wheeler accident cases.If you or a loved one has been in a trucking accident, we will use our expertise to ensure you receive fair compensation for your injuries and pain. We’ve successfully recovered compensation for hundreds of commercial truck accident victims in Texas. So if you or a loved one has been involved in a trucking accident anywhere in Texas, you must find an experienced legal partner to get the best compensation. Call us today (toll-free) for a free consultation to find out the legal avenues available to you and keep you from becoming a victim again after being victimized by an 18-wheeler and the defendants who operate it.

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When Your Loved One is Killed in a Trucking Accident, Here is What You Quickly Need to Do

Big rigs, 18-wheelers, and other commercial trucks are on our highways all day and night. Most travel our roads safely and pose no unusual threats to Texas drivers and their passengers or other family members. That doesn’t mean a big rig can’t suddenly careen out of control and create a carload of innocent injury or wrongful death victims in the blink of an eye. If negligence was involved, someone must pay. Have you recently lost a family member after a grinding wreck involving one of these over-the-road behemoths? The law enforcement investigation may have cleared the driver or the trucking company of any criminal charges. But that doesn’t mean that there wasn’t negligence involved in the fatal wreck that took your loved one. How can you find this out? And once you do, what can you and your family do to be fairly compensated for this tragic and unavoidable loss? A fatal trucking accident attorney with our Law Office helps your family win the fair compensation you deserve through a wrongful death lawsuit.

Accidents involving truckers can happen for various reasons, many surrounding negligences of the driver or the trucking company. Recent information from the Texas Department of Transportation suggests that at least 20% of the big rigs on our roads are unsafe, which is why you occasionally see them lined up next to a highway for the Department of Public Safety snap safety inspections of the rigs. The citations for these unsafe 18-wheelers follow like water. Does the driver know what he or she is doing, or even where they’re going? Is the driver fatigued? Recent research shows that 15 percent of all big rig accidents result from driver fatigue. How safe is the truck’s load or the vehicle itself? Questions like these sometimes enter your mind when an 18-wheeler pulls alongside you at 70 miles an hour on the highway or grows perilously more significant in your rearview mirror. Accidents, injuries, and even deaths are always bound to happen when these wheeled monsters hit the road anywhere in Texas.

As you recover from the tragic loss of your beloved family member, your attorney must also fight for fair reimbursement through your wrongful death lawsuit or insurance claim owed to you by those whose negligence caused that big rig wreck. We believe you must understand every legal avenue available to choose the right course of action to win restitution for your deceased loved one’s injuries, pain, and suffering and the income your family has lost due to a fatal truck accident for which others are responsible.

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Commercial Truck Wrecks Produce Catastrophic Damages, Injuries, and Deaths

The first thing that surviving family members must learn is who is responsible for this tragic accident and devastating loss. Several parties may share the blame in many significant truck accidents, which means there could be more than one defendant. In a commercial truck accident injury claim, this combination of different parties can include the trucker, the company he or she works for, the company that loaded the trailer, and the person who planned the truck’s route, just to name a few. Texas personal injury law is a legal precedent called “respondeat superior.” It states that employers of those liable for the wreck their employee causes are, by legal definition, every bit as responsible for the action or inaction of their employee and can be rightfully named as a defendant. And there’s another source of liability. The state of Texas and many counties now outsource a lot of road maintenance and highway construction projects to private companies. The work performed by these firms can sometimes contribute to a big truck wreck that kills your loved one, which could make the contractor liable for the wreck.

To win your claim among a variety of potential defendants, you need an experienced fatal 18-wheeler accident lawyer who can investigate the scene of the collision and discover who is liable among a host of suspects. Local or state law enforcement agencies investigate commercial trucking accidents to determine if any criminal laws have been broken and usually limit those investigations to the primary cause of the wreck. Rarely do they drill down into the granular aspects of liability or identify all indirect contributors to the fatal truck wreck. So law enforcement investigations usually fall short of identifying every underlying cause of the big rig wreck that took your loved one. Experienced trucking accident lawyers and their investigators conduct much more stringent investigations to identify all negligent parties who are liable. Our Law Office and its team of veteran investigators know how to determine the level of involvement of every responsible party in every trucking accident our clients are involved in.

Occasionally our investigations uncover additional facts about the accident that law enforcement investigators might have missed. When that happens, we pass this information on to the appropriate criminal agencies. We often find that they amend their criminal charges based on the new evidence we share. It is not easy to identify all who are responsible for a truck wreck, which is another reason you can certainly benefit from the expertise of a skilled big rig wrongful death accident law firm that identifies every liable party responsible for the trucking accident took your loved one from you.

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What Constitutes a Valid Wrongful Death Claim in Texas and How is it Applied?

Without a clear understanding of the law, many people in your situation may not be fully aware of whether or not you may be able to seek legal action against a negligent party through a wrongful death lawsuit. Below is a list of essential conditions that had to have existed, or may have existed, for a wrongful death lawsuit to be pursued:

* Your loved one must have died due to the negligent behavior of another person or entity. This negligent behavior could have been the direct cause or, in legal terms, the proximate cause of the fatal accident. Proximate cause means that the liable party played a contributing role leading up to the accident.
* Your relative must have a surviving family member or beneficiary that can pursue legal action.
* Your beloved victim or family must have incurred some tangible financial loss due to the fatal accident, which in a civil case are known as legal damages.

If at least one of these basic aspects existed as a result of the accident that claimed the life of your beloved family member, you have every right to seek legal action against the liable parties through a wrongful death insurance claim or lawsuit in civil court. Furthermore, you should also be aware that a civil lawsuit can be pursued regardless of whether or not a liable party is also facing criminal charges. If criminal charges were considered against any negligent parties but weren’t filed, that has no bearing on your right to file a wrongful death lawsuit in civil court. Suppose criminal charges are filed against the liable defendant, regardless of whether a guilty criminal verdict is rendered. In that case, the fact that charges were filed significantly strengthens any civil case you might subsequently choose to file against that defendant.

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The Types of Damages That can be Won in a Texas Wrongful Death Lawsuit.

Damages is the legal term for the financial loss that a victim, or a victim’s family, incurs as a result of a fatal accident. In Texas, damages in wrongful death lawsuits are separated into two categories: damages and survival damages. Because these damages can be viewed differently by a jury, both types of damages must be sought in a wrongful death lawsuit so that the bereaved family can be properly compensated for their loss: and the liable defendants held properly accountable for their negligence. Wrongful death damages are those directly incurred by family members that have lost a loved one due to a fatal accident. These damages can be sought by multiple immediate family members such as a spouse, parents, or children, either separately or collectively. Wrongful death damages often, but not always, include compensation for items such as the deceased family member’s medical bills before death and funeral expenses, along with a family member’s pain and suffering due to their loss, loss of financial support that the decedent had provided, loss of consortium (or unique familial love) and the fact that they likely had to witness their loved one suffer and die. Loss of consortium can also be business related if the deceased loved one was in business with other family members.

On the other hand, it relates to those damages that the decedent’s family members incurred or would have had a right to collect had they survived the accident. In this case, only one family member can seek survival damages since that family member effectively acts as a legal proxy who speaks for their deceased relative in a Texas wrongful death case. However, it should be noted that the family member seeking survival damages can also seek wrongful death damages. Only the closest living family member can pursue a survival damages claim. Usually, the one that will file a survival damage lawsuit is the spouse. If the spouse is absent or does not file a civil suit, the children (from oldest to youngest) are next in line. The only restriction is that the child must be of legal age to have standing (at least 18 years old). After that come the parents of the deceased loved one, then maybe a sibling. Again, only one family member can file a survival damage lawsuit.

Survival damages can include financial compensation for things such as a deceased family member’s medical bills that would have been presented to them had they lived, their lost wages due to time off from work while injured, their pain and suffering, their mental or emotional duress in the accident, the compensatory value of their disfigurement or possible long-term injury, and the value of any damage to the decedent’s property as a result of the accident, such as an automobile or anything of value that was in the vehicle at the time of the big rig wreck. Survival damages are very subjective and open to a certain amount of interpretation. So computing the value of these amounts is seldom easy, especially for one who is not well-versed in establishing the value of such losses or projected – but unrealized – amounts of income that might have been earned. So having an experienced fatal truck accident attorney who knows how to calculate these damages is necessary for surviving family members properly.

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Your Family’s Best Hopes to Win Damages Lay with an Experienced Attorney

A non-attorney or one with little legal experience may not appreciate the full extent of damages that a deceased family member’s survivors should be requested. With over two decades of experience in wrongful death cases throughout Texas, the fatal truck accident lawyers with our Law Office have a deep reputation for success and the knowledge to correctly calculate damages in any wrongful death lawsuit. Suppose all those damages suffered by a bereaved family are not correctly calculated or included in the claim or lawsuit. In that case, that unfortunate family stands a very poor chance of realizing full and fair damage compensation for their loss from a fatal Texas trucking accident. Only after trying hundreds of cases or handling hundreds of insurance claims can a lawyer understand and use the intricacies of personal injury and wrongful death Texas law to succeed in negotiations or at trial against insurance companies in an 18-wheeler or any commercial vehicle accident that has killed a loved one. Most people, and many inexperienced attorneys, don’t know the proper way to investigate a complicated accident scene, answer interrogatories, prepare demand packages, and conduct sophisticated depositions to get to the bottom of liability for the tragic fatal trucking accident your family must deal with. An experienced Texas wrongful death attorney knows how to represent your interests forcefully.

The Initial and Very Important Steps Your Fatal Truck Accident Attorney Must Take to Assure a Successful Case
The need to preserve the evidence in your case immediately and act quickly is critical. Your fatal truck accident lawyer must investigate the accident scene immediately. Every moment you wait to hire legal counsel, more evidence is becoming compromised, more witnesses disappear, and their memories fade (or their stories “mysteriously” change). The accident scene becomes altered either by the passing of time, or maybe your opponents do it themselves. Physical evidence that proves your case begins to degrade almost immediately. The moment we are hired, our Law Offices begin a thorough investigation of the accident scene to uncover the right evidence that proves the liability of the truck driver, the trucking company, and any other third parties who had a hand in causing this big rig disaster. We inspect all the vehicles, meticulously survey the accident scene, measure distances, and hunt for photographic and video evidence. No stone is left unturned to gather all the evidence that proves your claim beyond a shadow of a doubt.

We don’t stop there. We also run stringent asset checks on every possible defendant: both the nature and amount of their insurance coverage, who the underwriters are, as well as the overall financial worth of every defendant should their insurance coverage fall short of their actual fiscal liability in the wrongful death truck wreck, and they must make up the difference out of their own pockets. Defendants can’t run a shell game to hide their true worth from us. Many have tried and miserably failed.

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Adjusters Make Their Living by Denying Every Type of Big Rig Insurance Claim; Even Wrongful Death

Insurance adjusters are the “front line troops” in the campaign against your compensation rights. They are very effective. They help insurance companies by creating the illusion they’re helping you. It’s their job to save their companies untold millions by undermining or denying your claim or underestimating the cost of the accident by any means necessary. An adjuster goes to great lengths to convince you that everything will be fine and that all of your needs will be met. Often they try and record you saying something that can be later twisted into sounding like an admission of liability or some other disparaging of your loved one’s character to be twisted around later in court. The adjuster with the trucking company’s insurance carrier conspires with their employers for their own interests and that of their defendant, not yours. Some unscrupulous adjusters even try to deceptively convince uninformed accident victims to quickly sign away their legal right to sue in exchange for a swift settlement that could never fairly compensate bereaved families for their losses in a big rig accident: be it financial or emotional. They haunt emergency rooms and ICUs regularly for just that purpose.

The insurance industry and their defense lawyers love dealing with victims or family survivors who try to represent themselves or those who hire an attorney who is ill-equipped to fight them. The underhanded behavior of many insurance adjusters alone should be inspiration enough for why you need an aggressive trucking accident law firm specializing in wrongful death and knowing how to combat the tactics of the insurance companies and their adjusters. Only your attorney’s history of success and experience will foil these unscrupulous insurance adjusters, frighten their employers into a fair settlement, or defeat them in court if they insist on a trial. Insurance companies fight personal injury and wrongful death claims before accidents occur. Their attorneys are either on staff or on permanent retainer. They specialize in cases like yours and know every trick in the book. Insurance adjusters and their lawyers race to the scene of an accident and begin investigating to build a case against you while you are still trying to figure things out. When it comes to personal injury or wrongful death law, you only get one bite at the apple, which is why you mustn’t hesitate to find a fatal truck accident attorney to help you. You must do it very quickly.

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Trucking Insurers Fight Hard to Wear You Down So You’ll Shut up and Go Away

Since coverage policies for commercial trucking companies involve huge sums of money, the insurance company’s mission is to complicate yours and avoid paying you fairly. When they do that, they increase their already high profits, generating big dividends to their investors and seven-figure bonus checks for their corporate officers. So it is no surprise that insurance companies deny every claim they can, whenever possible and for as long as possible. They do this simply because they can. Without a strong big rig accident attorney on your side, collecting a fair settlement from an insurance company is simply a fool’s errand. Texas Civil Practices and Remedies Codes grant any family survivors in a fatal commercial trucking accident the right to bring suits for damages. That’s light years from a guarantee that reimbursement will be granted when you file that claim or lawsuit. Insurance companies want you to think they’re on your side until it’s time to pay. Then you find out the hard way by dealing with denial after denial by an insurer. It becomes a frustrating revolving door. As plaintiffs, you, your family, and your attorney must first prove the liability of all responsible parties for the fatal accident that took your beloved family member from you.

Moreover, you must clearly show that the money you’re asking for fairly reflects the loss you’ve suffered from those damages and injuries once you prove that liability. The insurance company and their lawyers do everything possible to deny a plaintiff’s claim or argue that the amount you seek is excessive and unreasonable or that your loved one caused the accident. Often, they’ll try and claim all three because if they can succeed in denying only one of these charges, they’re off the hook when paying damages.

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Can You Trust a Big Rig Trucker to Tell the Truth After a Fatal Accident?

With so much at stake, it’s not a good idea to count on the trucker who hit your loved one, to tell the truth after a fatal accident. If truck drivers are found to be liable for a wreck involving their rig, not only can they be fired, they might go to jail. But if they’re only fired, it could be very difficult for them to get another driving job. Sometimes the transport company will throw the driver “under the big rig” by quickly firing them outright and get out in front of the punishment that is certain to follow a deadly wreck. Then, they try to evade response superiors or lessen their financial liability in other ways. The truck driver knows his head’s on the block in a wreck and does everything possible to deflect the blame in any other direction. So to them and everyone else on their side, your beloved relative looks like a pretty good candidate on which to pin the blame.

After a fatal trucking accident in which the truck driver claimed that our client was driving with his lights off at night, our investigators quickly examined the scene. They discovered a security camera outside a convenience store pointed directly at its parking lot and the accident scene behind it. The video clearly showed our client’s headlights shining brightly. We proved that the truck driver boldly lied. Witnesses and defendants can lie or callously misrepresent critical facts in trucking accident cases. We see it all the time. The fatal truck accident attorneys at our Law Office know how to uncover the lies and counter them with facts that protect family members who have lost a loved one in an 18-wheeler wreck. For over 20 years, we have conducted thousands of accident investigations, gotten to the bottom of them, and won fair and just compensation for our clients by shining the light on the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth on the accident.

Sinister Behavior by Self-Insured Companies or Independent Truckers
Rather than purchase coverage from an insurance carrier, many trucking companies protect against personal injury and wrongful death claims and cases that arise from accidents by reserving a percentage of their assets to pay them directly or by purchasing a liability bond. Though federal and state governments monitor the commercial insurance industry and their adjusters and try to hold them to ethical standards as best they can, no ethical regulations exist for self-insured trucking companies or independent truckers. Nor does any formula exist to oversee their behavior. You will likely be compelled to settle that claim with an officer of the self-insured company. This officer’s salary is tied directly to company profits. Any wrongful death settlement paid to your family comes directly from the company coffers, which means that the company officer is taking money out of their own pocket. So we’re never surprised at the depths a self-insured company officer will stoop to deny your claim and protect the company’s assets. Self-insured companies (and self-insured/non-insured independent truckers) have been known to destroy evidence that proves your claim and bribe or intimidate witnesses – sometimes physically. Sometimes they even try to intimidate our clients. This is why every time our attorneys are hired against a liable self-insured party; we are often forced to file motions in court against these defendants that demand they entirely refrain from communicating with our clients or their families in any way unless one of our attorneys is present.

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What Are the Risks of Representing Myself?

Commercial truck accident wrongful death cases are extremely complex due to the likelihood of multiple defendants and their liability. Inexperienced attorneys have only a slightly better chance than you to recover any reasonable compensation on your own. So why would you even consider hiring anything short of a successful wrongful death lawyer with the expertise and investigative power to represent your claim against those who caused a big rig, large delivery vehicle, or any other commercial truck accident that killed your loved one? Transport companies, insurance providers, and attorneys can wait for your claim because the laws and procedures involved are so complex that the deck is stacked against you. If you hire an unproven lawyer or represent yourself, you are a lamb being led to the slaughter. Just having basic legal knowledge in such matters comprises little more than a third of all the necessary elements to win personal injury cases against trucking companies. Successful negotiation and, if necessary, litigation requires thorough knowledge of civil procedure and the ability to develop the right strategy to battle the trucking and insurance companies and their lawyers. Having your opponent’s respect is also a critical element. They won’t respect you. This is why a highly regarded wrongful death and truck accident law firm like our Law Office has spent years taking on and beating the insurance companies seditious games are the most potent weapon in your fight for compensation.

Our Law Offices’ Big Rig Accident Lawyers Help Families Recover Quicker
The best way to win fair compensation for family survivors after a big rig accident that takes the life of their loved one is to quickly retain a fatal truck accident lawyer who knows how to prove every defendant’s undeniable liability clearly and then win equitable damages. Because you just don’t know what your opponents will do to deny your rightful damage award or successful insurance claim. In one example, we were once hired by the families of two men involved in a terrible accident with a big rig. After the initial accident, the truck’s trailer was stretched across the unlit road on a moonless night. Only the trailer’s taillights near the shoulder of the highway were visible to oncoming drivers. Our clients rounded a curve and unknowingly smashed into the trailer.

Did You Know? Our Texas attorneys have won hundreds of 18-wheeler accident cases. Call us today to discuss your case.

The collision’s force ripped off the vehicle’s roof. One man died at the scene. The other was left fighting for his life. The next day we were hired, immediately flew to the accident scene, and began investigating. Our client’s car had already been towed to a salvage yard, our first stop. After examining the vehicle, we noted its strange lack of headlights. Our suspicious investigators spotted a security camera on the premises and asked to view the videotape. It showed an official of the trucking company illegally removing the headlights. When the company tried to claim our client had been driving a car without headlights, we produced the video that caught them red-handed. You can guess who won this case. Maybe now you get a better idea of what we mean when we say that evidence can “mysteriously disappear.” This is not isolated behavior either. If the loved ones of these two sober men who drove down the road, minding their own business when tragedy found them, had waited any longer to hire us, this crucial evidence would have been gone forever because the salvage yard’s surveillance system didn’t save its video for more than two days. Lies and missing evidence will destroy your rightful fair compensation from your loved one’s fatal trucking accident, but only if you allow it by not acting quickly.

The fatal trucking accident attorneys with our Law Office have over 20 years of experience handling litigation in wrongful death accidents caused by commercial trucks and their drivers. If you have lost a loved one in an accident with one of these vehicles, we use every ounce of our expertise to fight for your family’s fair and rightful compensation. We’ve helped win millions of dollars for hundreds of Texas truck accident victims. Insurance companies never agree to fair settlements unless you are protected by a fatal truck accident attorney with a history of success in court. While insurance companies and their attorneys are eager to take on non-lawyers and inexperienced attorneys, they fear us. When our law firm steps in, the insurance companies often settle with our clients for a fair amount to avoid a trial, especially if they know you have a strong case. Call us today (toll-free) for a free consultation. We will fight for your legal rights and the compensation your family deserves so you can begin to recover from the tragic loss of your loved one at the hands of a negligent trucker and the trucking company who callously took the life of your beloved family member.

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CONSTRUCTION ACCIDENTS

Surviving Family Members Must be Rightfully Compensated for a Loved One’s Fatal Construction Accident.

Accidents on construction sites are common in Texas, which seems to be in perpetual building and change. The employee can return to work with little trouble or fanfare if the injury is not severe. There are times when such an accident is serious. Sometimes, these unfortunate mishaps can take the life of an innocent loved one to happen with a certain amount of regularity. If you have lost a loved one in a construction accident, nothing can bring that beloved family member back to you or replace their love. The only thing you can do is seek restitution for your family’s loss and other damages surrounding the fatal construction accident. The stakes can be very high when families seek survival damages. Powerful forces align against you to deny your insurance claim or legal case. Losing a “breadwinner,” mainly if that family relies on not only his or her loving presence in the home but vital income for the family to survive, places acute strain on any family emotionally and financially. The victim’s family deserves financial relief from their loss.

The fatal construction accident attorneys with our Law Office can help your family through this time of profound tragedy. We also feel a duty to help you understand your legal options. Construction workplace accident lawsuits can be very complex. Those that lead to wrongful death are even more perilous. Some of the facts of your case can also be very difficult to prove. Some burdens of proof when it comes to negligence that leads to a fatal construction injury can be greater than usual. Defendants often deny liability by alleging that your loved one was never their employee. Unsurprisingly, those with little or no experience handling wrongful death insurance claims or litigating these cases can quickly be doomed to confusion and failure. How to handle your insurance claim or civil injury lawsuit after a family member’s fatal workplace accident depends upon the actual details of the case and the events leading up to the catastrophe. But even more important is knowing whether your loved one’s employer had workers’ compensation insurance. That question must be answered because it affects the route surviving family members and their attorneys take to be compensated.

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All Construction Accident Legal Actions Begin with Determining Workers’ Comp Status of the Employer.
The Texas Workers Compensation Insurance program pays a portion of reimbursement for catastrophic medical expenses, lost wages, pain and suffering, and a relatively small death benefit. But workers’ comp payments often end up falling woefully short of the total damage amount a deceased worker’s family needs, especially if a death is involved. But regardless of whether or not workers’ comp covers your loved one’s employer, you also need to know what to do if any contractors or subcontractors, over and above your loved one’s employer, might also be liable for the accident. Just as necessary is your need to know whether, in the eyes of the law, your loved one was an employee or merely a contractor; sometimes, this issue can be called into question by the employer. Sometimes this question can be improper, which means you must have evidence to prove your claim that this loved one was indeed an employee. Your ability to win proper compensation depends on the answer to each one of these questions. The best person to help you find those answers is a wrongful death construction accident attorney.

Other more discrete issues may also influence any fatal construction injury case. Plus, because a lot of personal injury actions rely more on case law (recent applicable rulings) than written laws, the occasional ambiguities of some of these decisions can permit some employers and their insurance providers to find loopholes that allow them to unfairly refuse the rightful claims of thousands of injured or wrongfully killed workers, and their families, every year. Because of that, inexperienced lawyers consistently fail to win fair damages in fatal construction accident cases, whether through negotiation or civil trial. Inevitably, those with no legal experience who insist on representing themselves in such matters will suffer a disappointing fate. In most fatal construction accidents, the victim’s loved ones can pursue restitution by either filing a workers’ comp claim or a wrongful death lawsuit against the employer. If an investigation reveals other reliable defendants, they too must be made to accept legal responsibility for their negligence through appropriate third-party lawsuits.

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Is Your Loved one’s Construction Employer a Workers’ Comp Subscriber or Non-Subscriber?

Thanks to our lawmakers (and the insurance company lobbyists), understanding some workers’ comp laws and regulations can be quite difficult. Portions make no sense at all. Texas companies are not required to purchase workers’ comp insurance. This divides worker injury claims (and cases) into two distinct categories that require altogether different approaches and strategies to resolve. Employers who carry workers’ comp are subscribers. Those who don’t are non-subscribers. To know how to proceed with the insurance claim or civil action surrounding your loved one’s workplace death, it must first be determined whether the employer falls into one or the other category. Workers’ comp benefits come from a “pool” of funds restocked by private insurance carriers participating in the program. By paying for worker injuries through workers comp’s “umbrella coverage,” these pool subscriber employers are protected from civil lawsuits arising from all workplace injuries and fixed compensation amounts, which are called “capped benefits.” By denying workers, the traditional civil avenues of compensation, the rights of employees (and their surviving family members) to be fairly reimbursed for catastrophic workplace injuries are significantly hobbled, be it in a warehouse or a busy construction site. The primary exception comes when survivors cite employer gross negligence as the cause of the fatal accident. However, that is often very difficult to prove.

Workers’ comp is “no-fault” insurance. This is because those employees covered by workers’ comp are reimbursed, regardless of how the accident occurred or who was at fault. If the injury is minor, it’s a pretty good deal for construction workers if they can return to work in a week or two. The “donut hole” of substandard coverage can be very large when it comes to serious or fatal injuries. So in exchange for that quick, no-fault workers’ comp coverage after a serious or fatal construction accident injury, the amount of money a family receives cannot realistically approach the financial loss suffered by the surviving family. Workers’ comp has no provisions for a surviving family’s pain, suffering, or emotional devastation brought about by the sudden death of their loved one. Since approximately one-in-two employers subscribe to the program, many Texas companies and contractors (and subcontractors) hold their breath and accept the risk of not subscribing to workers’ comp. Then, when the odds catch up with them, they try to avoid a lawsuit when one of their workers is fatally injured by saying they have workers’ comp when they don’t. These employers may try to quickly pay survivor benefits that a family might normally receive from workers’ comp and ask them to sign what the employer represents as a “standard workers’ comp release.” We’ve seen some of these forged releases, which look pretty convincing. This underhanded ruse only furthers their deception to avoid a very expensive non-subscriber lawsuit and victimizes the deceased worker’s family again.

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To receive restitution from a non-subscriber to workers’ comp, the primary surviving family member, usually, the husband or wife, must file a lawsuit. Fortunately for them, the laws that encourage companies to subscribe to that “no-fault” workers’ comp insurance’ have lower provable liability standards, which is good for the worker. These lower standards of proving general subscriber negligence usually also apply against non-subscribers in a civil case or insurance claim. So if you file a lawsuit against your loved one’s non-subscriber construction employer, general contractor, or subcontractor for a fatal accident on the construction site, it’s not as difficult to prove true liability due to that lower standard of negligence standard outlined in workers’ comp claims. An experienced fatal construction accident lawyer will get to the bottom of your deceased loved one’s construction company’s workers’ comp status. This allows you to know what legal course is open to you. Once we have identified the nature of this employer’s workman’s comp standing, our attorneys will know the best way to proceed with your case.

Third-Party Lawsuits Often – but not Always – Fairly Compensate Family Members of Deceased Construction Workers
There is another likely avenue to receiving injury compensation outside of a workers’ comp claim. The family members of deceased employees can file an insurance claim or lawsuit against someone other than the subscribing employer, typically referred to as a third party, if an investigation by your wrongful death attorney proves that others were directly involved in the fatality. Third-party claims and lawsuits arise when someone besides the employer has been found to have been negligent and caused your loved one’s fatal injury either directly or indirectly. If a faulty piece of machinery caused the death, a defective product lawsuit could hold the manufacturer financially liable. If the property owner did not provide a safe working environment, they could be held accountable. If a contractor or another employee negligently caused the injury, then they could become a liable defendant. Your loved one’s employer may have “loaned him out” to another construction company, contractor, or subcontractor, and the death occurred at that other property. So, in this case, if workers’ comp covers your loved one’s employer, then the other company is a liable third party in the death of your loved one, and workers’ comp does not apply to any third party liability. In such cases, you can sue the responsible party or parties, not the workers’ comp-subscribing employer. Experience and the ability to properly investigate the accident scene and the roles these third parties played in the fatal accident are required to determine all parties’ responsibility and make them pay for the injuries they caused. A skillful local fatal workplace accident attorney with our Law Office can devise the right plan of attack for construction wrongful death cases. This offers the best chance for you to win damage compensation in a complex Texas work-related claim. Suppose your loved one’s employer is a workers’ comp subscriber. In that case, these third-party cases often combine with the traditional workers’ comp claim to deliver appropriate and full damage compensation to the family members of an employee killed on a construction site.

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What Part Does Gross Negligence Play in a Fatal Construction Accident Case?

Two types of negligence could have led to the wrongful death of your family member on the construction site: simple negligence or gross negligence. You need only prove standard negligence to file a successful lawsuit against a non-subscriber. But as we’ve already discussed, if the employer subscribes to workers’ comp insurance, you must prove gross negligence, which is held to a much higher standard of proof than simple negligence. The slightest error in the investigation, the strategy, or the execution of your case, could ruin your compensatory expectations and let the defendant escape unpunished for his or her negligence. Because of the intricacies of successfully proving the level of negligence, inexperienced attorneys or non-lawyers have a much slimmer chance of navigating the legal process successfully. For over 20 years, the wrongful death attorneys with our Law Office have successfully filed insurance claims and litigated wrongful death lawsuits on behalf of surviving family members. We know how to build an impervious case to prove the level of negligence each defendant exhibited in your family’s wrongful death claim or lawsuit.

Generally, the difference between simple and gross negligence is a degree. Simple negligence is a solitary error or temporary lapse in concentration or judgment. But gross negligence is when the defendant is proven to have displayed a reckless disregard for the safety of others. To illustrate this point, consider a construction worker who accidentally knocks something off the top of a building, killing another worker when the object lands on his head. Generally, this defendant employee has only committed standard negligence. However, if the same person entertains himself and his co-workers by occasionally throwing bricks off the top of the building, gross negligence is a pretty strong case. In the first instance, nobody could have foreseen the standard negligent accident. But in the second example, the worker should have been stopped from his or her childish behavior of tossing bricks off the building. If the tragedy had been anticipated and avoided, gross negligence would have probably been committed. Unless the workers’ comp employer has committed gross (or willful) negligence resulting in construction-related wrongful death, the subscriber-employer is safe from becoming a defendant in a civil lawsuit.

Under the best circumstances, unless the facts of the case are overwhelming, gross negligence can be very difficult to prove. So in the event of wrongful death claims, relative to workers’ comp, whichever workers’ comp underwriting insurance company is assigned the claim and responsible for negotiating a settlement; again, with benefit caps, the odds are highly unlikely that the victim’s survivors, will receive the equitable compensation for gross negligence damages they rightfully deserve after a construction wrongful death has occurred. As an aside, by proving respondent superior, which is a legal term that states employers are legally responsible for the actions of their employees, that grossly negligent employee who tossed bricks off the top of a building to amuse his buddies is the responsibility of his (in this case) workers’ comp employer. The same holds true if the employer is a non-subscriber. It’s possible that a construction employer can be liable for civil damages over and above a typical workers’ comp claim, especially if it can be proven that the employer may have been aware of this employee’s possible willful actions before the fatal construction accident that took your loved one’s life.

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TRUCK ACCIDENTS

Here’s What You Need to Do When You are Hurt in a Tractor Trailer Truck Accident

A lot of 18-wheelers and other transport trucks are on our highways at all hours of the day and night. Many are just passing through to drop off their loads and continue on to another destination. Most of these 18-wheelers that use our roads pose no threats to our community’s drivers and their passengers: but what about the rest of those large tractor-trailers? Does the driver know what he or she is doing, or even where they’re going? Is the driver overly fatigued at the end of a 700-mile journey that began before sunup? A lot of different research says that over 15 percent of all 18-wheeler truck accidents result from driver fatigue. How safe is the truck’s load? How safe is the vehicle itself? Does it even belong on the road? The Texas Highway department says that as many as one-in-three are not. Questions like these cannot help but enter your mind when a tractor-trailer pulls alongside you at 70 miles an hour on a crowded highway; or grows perilously larger in your rear-view mirror: eventually hugging your bumper.

Accidents, injuries, and many deaths are always bound to happen when these wheeled monsters hit the road anywhere in Texas. If you have been injured in a commercial trucking accident, or if a loved one was injured or killed in one, a tractor-trailer accident lawyer at our Law Office will help you win the compensation you deserve. We have negotiated numerous fair insurance settlements and successfully litigated hundreds of trucking accident cases in court for our clients during our 20-plus years of service to these injury victims. We know the pain and financial distress you suffer after being injured in one of these horrible accidents. As you fight to recover from your injuries, your trucking accident injury attorney must also fight for fair reimbursement owed to you by those liable for that big truck accident and their insurance companies. You might even have to file a lawsuit to secure the fair injury award you deserve. We believe you must understand every legal avenue available to you to choose the right course of action to win restitution for your injuries, pain, and suffering, as well as the income you have lost (and might continue to lose) from a commercial truck accident in which others are responsible.

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Too Many Commercial Trucking Accidents Produce Expensive Damages and Painful Injuries
After you’ve been hit by a commercial truck and injured, the first thing that must be learned is who is responsible and, therefore, legally liable for the terrible injuries and property damage you suffered. Several parties may share the blame in many big truck accidents, which means there will likely be more than one defendant. In a commercial truck accident injury claim, this combination of different parties can include the trucker, the company he or she works for, the company that loaded the trailer, and the person who planned the truck’s route, just to name a few. Texas personal injury law is a legal precedent called “respondeat superior.” It states that employers of those liable for the wreck their employee may have caused are, by legal definition, every bit as responsible for the action or inaction of their employee. So it is appropriate that when you sue the employee, you also sue the employer. There’s another source of liability. The state of Texas and many counties now outsource a lot of road maintenance and highway construction projects to private companies. The work performed by these firms can sometimes contribute to a big truck wreck in which you are the injured victim, thereby making the contractor liable for the wreck.

To win your claim among a variety of potential defendants, you need experienced tractor-trailer truck accident injury attorneys who can investigate the scene of the collision and discover who is liable. Local or state law enforcement agencies investigate commercial trucking accidents, though their jobs are to get to the bottom of the primary cause of the wreck and any laws that may have been broken. Rarely do they spend time identifying the rest of those responsible once they have determined the primary cause for the wreck. Law enforcement investigations usually fail to identify every underlying cause of the accident. Experienced trucking accident lawyers and their investigators conduct much more stringent investigations to identify all liable defendants. Our Law Office and its’ team of veteran investigators know how to determine the degree of each responsible party in every trucking accident. At times our investigations uncover additional criminal facts of the accident that law enforcement investigators miss. When that happens, we pass this information to the appropriate agencies for further discretionary action. Once our investigation is complete, we then investigate the financial status (and representing insurance companies) of all defendants because what’s the use of suing someone if you cannot recover compensation because they cannot pay you? Because it is not easy to identify all who are responsible for a truck wreck is another reason why you stand to gain the expertise of a Texas trucking accident injury attorney who determines every liable party that is responsible for a local trucking accident, the damage to your vehicle and its contents, and the painful injuries to you and the passengers in your vehicle.

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What Are the Risks of Representing Myself Against Their Insurance Company?

Here are a couple of facts. A non-attorney just doesn’t have the depth of knowledge to effectively negotiate a fair settlement with insurance companies or successfully argue so complicated a case in court. You have even less of a chance if you represent yourself. Commercial truck accident-related injury cases are extremely complex due to the likelihood of multiple defendants and their liability. Inexperienced attorneys have only a slightly better chance than you to recover any reasonable compensation on your own for the very same reasons. So why would you even consider not hiring a successful personal injury lawyer with the expertise and investigative power to represent your claim against those who caused a tractor trailer accident that injures or disables you or causes the death of a loved one: much less represent yourself? “Having a fool for a client” when the “lawyer” and injured party are one in-the-same is doubly dangerous in any commercial vehicle accident injury case against a trucking company. These transport companies, insurance providers, and attorneys have deep pockets and years of experience winning these kinds of cases. They can wait you out because the laws and procedures involved are so complex that the deck is stacked against your inexperience. If you hire an unproven lawyer or represent yourself, you are little more than a legal accident waiting to happen.

Just having basic legal knowledge in such matters comprises little more than a third of all the necessary elements to win personal injury cases against trucking companies. Successful negotiation and, if necessary, litigation requires thorough knowledge of civil procedure and the ability to develop the right strategy to battle the trucking and insurance companies and their lawyers. Having your opponent’s respect is also a critical element. They won’t respect you. This is why highly regarded trucking accident attorneys who have spent years taking on and beating the insurance companies and their attorneys are the most powerful weapon in your struggle for fair compensation from all defendants. We know the right way to answer interrogatories, prepare demand packages, and conduct effective depositions that get to the bottom of the accident that caused your injuries, pain, suffering, and lost wages. Experienced trucking accident attorneys know how to conduct effective accident investigations, respond to lists of admissions, and turn away the defendant’s lawyer’s attempts at requesting summary judgments before all the facts are in, which is a very popular defense trick. Most people, in general, and many inexperienced attorneys, can’t.

Suppose you have a relative or friend who is a lawyer, even though he or she might be looking out for your best interests and is inspired to fight hard for you against an 18-wheeler transport company and its experienced insurers and defenders. In that case, that person might often have difficulty emotionally disassociating him or herself from your case. Personal injury law is quite intense. A specialized tractor-trailer accident attorney must be pragmatic, focus solely on the facts of a case, and be cool under fire to succeed on your behalf. What happens if that friend or relative attorney doesn’t win the case or accepts a less-than-fair settlement because he knows how badly you need the money now; and leaves even more on the table because of it? How will you feel about your friend or relative then? Keep your family members and friends out of your legal business. Consider it a word to the wise.

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Without Legal Protection, Trucking Insurers Wear You Down So You’ll Give up and go Away

Federal law requires interstate commercial transport companies to purchase sizable insurance policies to cover them against accidents. State law demands they either carry similar insurance or provide proof of financial liability protection such as a cash bond. Many of you faithfully believe that trucking accident injury and other damage compensation is quick and fair. All you have to do is file a claim for that fair compensation, and the check from that bighearted insurance or trucking company will be “in the mail” in no time, right? Guess what? If it were that simple, there would be no need for specialized commercial transport accident attorneys like us. That’s because all insurance companies are in the business of collecting premiums and not paying out claims. It’s a fact. Since coverage policies for commercial trucking companies involve huge sums of money, the insurance company’s mission is to do all it can to avoid paying you fairly. By doing that, they increase their already high profits, generating big dividends to their investors and seven-figure bonus checks for their corporate officers. So it is no surprise that insurance companies deny every claim they can, whenever possible and for as long as possible, especially if they know an experienced lawyer does not represent you. They do this simply because they can. And without a strong local trucking accident attorney on your side, collecting a fair settlement from an insurance company is little more than a fool’s errand.

Texas Civil Practices and Remedies Codes grant anyone injured in a commercial trucking accident or the family of one who was killed the right to bring suits for damages that compensate them for their loss. That’s far from a guarantee that reimbursement will be granted when a victim such as you file that claim or lawsuit. Insurance companies want you to think they’re on your side until it’s time to pay. Then you find out the hard way by dealing with denial after denial by an insurer. It becomes a frustrating revolving door. All the while, you still have bills piling up, with no ability to pay them or take care of your family. You, as plaintiff, must first prove the liability of all responsible parties for the accident and the injuries you suffered from it. What’s more, you must clearly show that the money you’re asking for fairly reflects the loss you’ve suffered from those damages and injuries once you prove that defendant’s liability, which is easy. The insurance company and their lawyers do everything possible to deny a plaintiff’s claim or argue that the amount you seek is excessive and unreasonable or that you caused the accident. Often, they’ll try and claim all three because if they can succeed in wiggling out of only one of your charges, they’re off the hook, and you’re stuck.

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Insurance Adjusters Earn Their Keep by Denying Your Tractor Trailer Accident Claim

Insurance adjusters are the first line of defense against your claim. They are very effective. They help their employer by creating the illusion that they’re helping you. It’s their job to save their companies untold millions by denying your claim or underestimating the cost of the accident by any means necessary. An adjuster behaves like your best buddy and goes to great lengths to make you believe everything will be fine and your needs will be met to your heart’s content. A more sympathetic advocate you could never have, right? Wrong! The adjuster then turns around and slyly cuts you off at the knees but always blames someone else “up the line.” Often they try and record you saying something that can be later twisted into sounding like some oblique admission of your liability and cripple your chance to receive fair compensation. The trucking company’s insurance adjuster and the companies that employ them conspire to feather their own nests: not yours. Some unscrupulous adjusters will even try to deceptively convince uninformed accident victims why it is in their best interests to quickly sign away their legal right to sue in exchange for a swift, shoddy settlement that could never fairly compensate them for injuries or other losses from an 18-wheeler truck accident.

A favorite opening line of an adjuster when he calls is to tell you, “I’ve got good news and bad news.” Then you find the good news is minuscule, and the bad news is tragic. They get away with that nonsense a lot: but not with us. Our clients know how to talk with insurance adjusters, and that’s not to talk with them. We handle all adjusters. If they can’t talk to you, they can’t confuse, delay or shine you on. There’s no way they’ll twist your words against you. The insurance industry and their defense lawyers love nothing more than finding a victim who tries to represent themselves or one who hires an attorney who is not equipped to fight them. It’s easy for them to lead legal novices down a primrose path of disappointment and defeat. The underhanded behavior of most insurance adjusters alone should be proof enough of why you need an aggressive tractor-trailer accident attorney who knows how to combat the tactics of the insurance companies and their “guard dog” adjusters and win the fairest injury compensation for you.

Only the history of success and experience of big truck accident lawyers like those with our Law Office will foil these insurance adjusters who play fast-and-loose with the rules and frighten their employers into a fair settlement or defeat in court if they insist on a trial. Insurance companies even fight injury claims before the accidents occur. Their attorneys are either on staff or permanently retained. Those who are also retained probably represent more than one insurance company which makes them very good. They take on injury lawsuits like yours every day and eat the inexperienced for breakfast. They know every trick in the book. Adjusters and insurance company lawyers race to the scene of an accident and begin investigating to build a case against you while you are still in the emergency room. They know the drill well. You only get one bite at the rightful compensation apple, so you mustn’t hesitate to find a local Texas trucking accident injury law firm to help you now.

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Can You Trust a Trucker To Tell the Truth Immediately After your Wreck?

With so much at stake, the chances are no better than half that the trucker won’t begin denying his part in the wreck that injured you or killed a loved one. Can you count on them, to tell the truth immediately after an expensive accident? If truck drivers are found liable for a wreck involving their rig, not only can they be fired, it could be very difficult for them to get another driving job after costing their previous employer enormous damages due to their negligence. Sometimes the transport company will try to get out in front of a lawsuit by throwing the driver “under the rig” by quickly firing them outright. Then, fight hard to evade respondeat superior or lessen their liability in other ways. The truck driver knows his livelihood is on the line in a wreck and does everything possible to deflect the blame in any other direction. So to them, and everyone else on their side, you’re the first fall guy. If this driver has been in previous accidents, the driver could lose either his state trucking driver’s license or his DOT certification. If that happens, this now unemployed soul has to find a new line of work in a very tough economy. With high unemployment in the U.S., the temptation for that drivers to lie, cheat or behave dishonestly to save their job just cannot be ignored. Truck drivers have to eat, pay bills and support their families, too: right?

After suffering an injury in a trucking accident in which the driver of the 18-wheeler truck claimed that our client was driving after dark with his headlights off, our investigators quickly examined the scene. They discovered a security camera outside a convenience store pointed directly at its parking lot, with footage of the accident in the background. The video clearly showed our client’s headlights shining brightly. We proved that the truck driver boldly lied. Witnesses and defendants can lie or coldheartedly misrepresent critical facts in trucking accident cases. We see it all the time. Our Law Office knows how to uncover the lies and counter them with the actual facts of the case to stop witness misrepresentations in their tracks. Over the past 20 years, we have conducted thousands of accident investigations, sorted facts from misrepresentation and conjecture, and won fair and just compensation for our clients by shining the light on the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth of the accident.

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Self-Insured Companies or Independent Truckers can be Even More Dangerous.

Rather than purchase coverage from an insurance carrier, many trucking companies protect against personal injury claims from accidents by reserving a percentage of their assets to pay them and then filing such information with the state. Would that paperwork stand up to an audit if Austin asked for one? Not always. Though federal and state governments monitor the commercial insurance industry and their adjusters and try to hold them to ethical standards as best they can, no such regulations exist for self-insured trucking companies or independent truckers. Nor does any formula exist to oversee their behavior if one of their rigs negligently causes your accident. Seeking compensation from either a liable non-insured trucking company or an Independent can be far more complex, chaotic, quite toxic to your legitimate compensation claims, and possibly even pose more than just a financial danger to you or your family. If representing yourself, you will likely be forced to negotiate a settlement with an officer of the self-insured company. Typically, this decision-makers salary is tied directly to company profits. Any injury amount paid to you comes directly out of the company coffers, which – by definition – means that when the company’s officer pays your compensation, he or she is taking money out of their own pocket. So we’re never surprised at the depths a self-insured company officer will stoop to deny your claim and protect the company’s assets.

Self-insured companies and independent truckers who are self-insured (or have no insurance) have been known to destroy evidence that proves your claim, bribe witnesses deliberately, and even intimidate their victims, sometimes physically. Some intimidation attempts are directed at our clients if they have no legal representation. This is why every time our attorneys are hired against a liable self-insured party; the first thing we usually do is to prevent anyone with the company from behaving unsuitably toward our clients. Often, the commercial truck accident injury attorneys with our Law Office are forced to file motions in court against these liable defendants, demanding that they completely refrain from communicating with our clients, or their families, unless one of our attorneys is present.

Only after trying hundreds of cases can a lawyer understand how to harness the intricacies of personal injury law to negotiate the deal with, or at trial against, insurance companies in an 18-wheeler, or any commercial vehicle accident, that has injured you. Most people, and many inexperienced attorneys, don’t know the proper way to answer interrogatories, prepare demand packages, and conduct sophisticated depositions to get to the bottom of liability for the trucking accident that caused your injuries and pain. An experienced tractor-trailer accident attorney conducts complicated investigations every day, responds to lists of admissions, and knows how to represent your interests with cool aplomb assertively. Insurance companies never agree to fair settlements unless you are protected by an attorney with a history of success in court. While insurance companies and their attorneys are eager to take on you alone or your inexperienced lawyer, they fear us. When our trucking accident attorneys step in, the insurance companies scramble to settle for a fair amount with our clients to avoid a trial, especially if they know we have constructed a strong case. And a fair settlement allows you to resume living your life again more quickly after we’ve secured that compensation on your behalf.

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The First Steps Your Truck Accident Attorney Must Take to Make Your Liability Civil Action a Success

We must immediately preserve the evidence in your case and investigate quickly. We must get to the accident scene immediately. Every moment you wait to hire experienced legal counsel, more evidence becomes compromised, and more witnesses disappear. Their memories fade (or “mysteriously” change). The accident scene becomes altered either by the passing of time, or maybe your opponents will do it themselves. Physical evidence that proves your case begins to fade and becomes harder to recover. The moment we are hired, our Law Office begins a thorough investigation of the accident scene to uncover the proper evidence that proves the liability of the truck driver, the trucking company, and any other negligent third parties who had a hand in causing your tractor-trailer wreck. We inspect all the vehicles, meticulously survey the accident scene, measure distances, and hunt for photographic and video evidence.

No trail is too obscure for our investigators to follow to gather all the evidence that proves your claim beyond a shadow of a doubt. In one example, we were once hired by the families of two men involved in a terrible accident with an 18-wheeler truck. After the initial accident, the truck’s trailer was stretched across the unlit road on a moonless night. Only the trailer’s taillights near the shoulder of the highway were visible to oncoming drivers. Our clients rounded a curve and unknowingly smashed into the trailer. The force of the collision ripped off the roof of the vehicle. One man died at the scene. The other was left fighting for his life. The next day we were hired, immediately flew to the scene of the accident, and began investigating that same day. Our client’s car had already been towed to a salvage yard, our first stop. After examining the vehicle, we noted its strange lack of headlights. Our suspicious investigators spotted a security camera on the premises and asked to view the video. It showed an official of the trucking company illegally removing the headlights. When the company tried to claim our client had been driving a car without headlights, we produced the video that caught them red-handed. You can guess who won this case. Maybe now you get a better idea of what we mean when we say that evidence can “mysteriously disappear.” This is not isolated behavior either. If the loved ones of these two men who drove down the road, minding their own business when tragedy found them, had waited longer than the few hours for them to hire us, this crucial evidence would have been gone forever because the salvage yard’s system didn’t typically save its surveillance video for more than two days. Can you think of a better reason why victims of local commercial trucking accidents need to find the right lawyer now, so the investigation can begin while the case, and evidence, are still fresh? Lies and vanishing evidence will certainly cripple your legal right to fair compensation for a trucking accident from the moment it happens, but only if you allow it to happen by not acting quickly.

Our Local Truck Accident Attorneys Help You Take Back Your Life After a Wreck
The best way for any victim in a commercial truck accident injury to win fair compensation is to quickly retain a lawyer who knows how to prove every defendant’s undeniable liability clearly and then win equitable damages for their injuries, pain, and suffering, lost wages, disability and even wrongful death for the beloved survivors. Our Law Office’s trucking accident attorneys have over 20 years of experience successfully handling personal injury litigation in accidents caused by commercial trucks and their drivers. Suppose you or a loved one is the victim of an accident involving one of these vehicles. In that case, we use every bit of our expertise to investigate the accident, then fight for fair compensation for the injuries and pain you have suffered. We’ve helped win millions of dollars for hundreds of Texas truck accident victims. So if you or a loved one has been involved in a trucking accident anywhere in Texas, let an experienced tractor-trailer accident attorney with our Law Office fight for and win the best compensation possible. Call us today (toll-free) for a free consultation to continue your road to total recovery and resume your life. Don’t let yourself become a victim again.

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