Atlanta Injury Attorney Blog

Two clients recently came to me with compression fractures in the vertebrae of their spine as a result of car accidents and they were both women. As an Atlanta injury lawyer, this got me wondering whether compression fractures from car accidents are more common in women after car accidents and indeed they are.

Women are more likely to have osteoporosis and as a result their spinal vertebrae can be weaker and more vulnerable to the compression forces that can occur in car crashes in Georgia. It turns out that forty percent of women will suffer a vertebral compression fracture by the time they are eighty. (Source: University of Maryland Medical School www.umm.edu/spinecenter )

As with all my cases I get deep into the medicine behind the injuries to maximize the recovery and I thought I would explain what happens in a compression fracture injury here. The normal human spine resembles the diagram below with the vertebrae being separated by the intervertebral discs which act as shock absorbers and allow flexibility.

Compression fractures in car accidents occur when too much force is exerted on the spinal column while it is being flexed in an unnatural way. Vertebral compression fractures usually occur at T11 and T12, which is the bottom of the thoracic region and at L1, the first vertebra of the lumbar region. This is due to the natural curve of the spine. See the image below:

As a Conyers, Georgia injury lawyer I had a client who was injured in a crash in Conyers, Georgia and hers was a lateral crash with the at fault driver striking her at a 45 degree angle from the front. In the Alpharetta, Georgia crash, the client was struck from the rear in a high speed crash.

Most compression fractures do not require aggressive treatment and although they are painful, with a brace and rest the client has a good chance of almost a full recovery. On a case by case basis and depending on age and severity, some clients do experience post-traumatic arthritis though and you should ask your doctor for a detailed prognosis before you decide to settle an injury case involving compression fractures. A compression fracture from a car crash is a serious injury and the case can have a significant value so be sure to speak with an experienced Conyers injury lawyer or an Atlanta injury lawyer before you decide what to do.

For further reading, please see the University of Maryland's website for an excellent discussion of the function of the spine.

Let's us assume that you have decided that your Atlanta injury case is small enough that it would not make sense for a lawyer to handle it. This assumes you have already read the article on whether you should hire an Atlanta lawyer or not. We will also assume that you are either in a situation where the insurance company is making a low offer or they are fighting you on the issue of whose fault the crash is. Assuming you have the backbone for the fight...what is next?

First understand that you will be suing the other driver, not their insurance company. You will need to locate the other driver by looking at the crash report. Know that sometimes the address is wrong or the person has moved away so never ever wait until just before the statute of limitations (two years for Georgia injury cases and four years for property damage cases) because you may file the suit and then get a notice back from the sheriff saying that they were unable to serve the defendant ( a "non est")

In Georgia, you must sue the defendant in their home county unless you are dealing with a non-resident of the state or you have a trucking company as a defendant. You can do this by mail, but I suggest going to the clerk's office and picking up the summons and the return of service and sending your complaint. Click on this Georgia personal injury lawsuit that I recently filed. You will have to pay around $125.00 to file the suit.

If the case is small enough not to require a lawyer, then you will be filing suit in small claims court, which in Georgia is called the Magistrate's Court. It has a maximum jurisdiction of $15,000.00 (that is the most that can be awarded in this Court) When you go to the clerk's office for the County where the Defendant lives, you will receive a form to fill out that will become the "Complaint." In this document you will lay out what you are complaining about. For example:

"Mr. Smith crashed into me damaging my car in the amount of xxx dollars and I sustained injuries. I have medical bills totaling $xxxxxx. I am also seeking human damages." In Magistrate Court, it really does not need to be any more complicated than that. The hard part is proving the case at trial but that comes later.

The clerk will give the lawsuit to the Sheriff and then then the Sheriff will make two tries to serve the defendant with the lawsuit. There are some exceptions but generally a person must have the documents handed to them for service to be valid. You can also serve an adult that lives with the defendant.

You will get a copy of the "return of service" which is the sheet the sheriff writes the results of his service attempts on. Keep an eye out for this document when around 30 days have elapsed since you gave it to the clerk. You may need to call the clerk of court to follow up. If the document says service was perfected, then you wait.

Then the Defendant has 30 days from that day to file their answer with the Court. In the case of Georgia car accident cases, the defendant will normally send the lawsuit to their insurance company and the insurance company will hire a lawyer or assign one of their in-house attorney's to defend the suit. It is very very difficult to outlawyer a lawyer so understand that if you cannot get your case resolved with the adjuster for the insurance company now that it is "in litigation" you need to decide if you can make it on your own or whether your need to hire a lawyer. Even if an Atlanta Injury Lawyer will not take the case on a contingency fee, some may agree to handle the case on an hourly basis. Assume that you will pay between $175.00 and $200.00 per hour for their services at trial and the time would include some prep time. That said, if you are fighting over repairing or replacing your car and you don't have collision coverage or if you have significant medical care, then it may be worth it.

Georgia drivers that are hit by hit and run drivers face unique challenges in handling their injury and property damage claims. We will break the discussion into two key subtypes; where the driver is eventually found and where they remain a phantom vehicle.

Hit and Run Driver is Eventually Located
These are great cases in that leaving the scene is a basis for an award of punitive damages in Georgia. This normally occurs when the driver flees the scene after the crash and someone is able to get the license plate number and the police track them down. If you are hit in a crash in Georgia and there is some basis for tracking the hit and run driver, work on the investigating officer to pursue the lead on the scene because many of these hit and run drivers leave because they are drunk or stoned. In the eventual civil case, we would be unable to introduce speculative evidence of intoxication, but hard evidence developed from the officer's investigation that very night can be powerful.

In a case involving a located hit and run driver in Atlanta, you should get a copy of the accident report and get in touch with the other driver's insurance company immediately. They will advise you if there are any coverage defenses (unauthorized driver, named driver exclusion, etc.) If the coverage is valid, you should have an easy time bargaining for a high dollar value on your car if it has been totaled out as the threat of punitive damages gives you leverage. Remember to also ask for diminution in value if your car is repaired.

Continue reading " Georgia Victims of Hit and Run Drivers Face Unique Challenges " »

As a Georgian, I was saddened to see that CDC officials have confirmed that there is salmonella contamination at a Blakely, Georgia factory that ships peanut paste and other products to 85 different companies. The outbreak of Salmonella has caused illness in over 40 states and has caused at least six deaths among the elderly.

Kellogs is recalling Austin and Keebler brand Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers and some Famous Amos Peanut Butter Cookies and Keebler Soft Batch Homestyle Peanut Butter Cookies.

It is still unclear if the salmonella strain in the Blakely plant matches the strain that has sickened people across the US. If the strains do match though, it is apparent that the peanut paste and peanut butter produced by the Peanut Corp. of America will have to be tracked down in every product it was baked in. Before I became an Atlanta injury lawyer, I practiced as an insurance defense lawyer and handled food poisoning cases for Taco Bell, Olive Garden and Red Lobster. The key to prosecuting these cases is identifying the bacterial agent responsible for the illness and determining if there is a DNA match with the strains causing the outbreak. For the time being, Peanut Corp. has made a voluntary recall of all peanut butter made since Aug. 8 and all peanut paste produced since Sept. 26.

According to scientists at the CDC, salmonella can lay dormant and then when ingested, it can multiply rapidly. Typhimurium is the strain in question and it is most dangerous for the elderly and those with weakened immune. The most common symptoms are diarrhea, stomach cramps and fever.

Although it is still unclear how this strain broke out, if you come down with food poisoning, be sure to get medical help immediately.

If you have been injured by a drunk driver in Georgia, it almost always makes sense to hire an injury attorney because punitive damages are recoverable and they can multiply the value of an injury case ninefold. Although I have advised many prospective clients with minor injuries that they are capable of handling their claim on their own, when it comes to injuries from being hit by a drunk driver in Georgia, even modest injury cases can have significant value because punitive damages may be recovered.

Continue reading " Being Injured by a Drunk Driver in Georgia makes the Decision on Whether to Hire a Lawyer Easy " »

One of the most commonly asked questions is whether an injured client without health insurance can expect the at fault driver in a Georgia car crash to pay their medical bills. On a simple trip to the emergency room in Georgia, an average ambulance ride is $500.00, the ER physician is $250 and the ER itself is another $500.00.

The short answer is the other driver's insurance will not pay your medical bills soon but eventually they will. When people are injured in a car wreck in Atlanta and they speak with the other driver's insurance company, they are usually asked if they are hurt and then the adjuster will dissuade the client from getting any follow up medical care with a statement like this "we will only pay for medical care that we think is reasonable."

To put it simply, if you have an injury and are seeing a doctor, the other driver's insurance will not pay the bills as you go, even though they may give you that false impression by telling you to send over the bills. Do not become confused with your own vehicle's Georgia medical payments insurance provisions as they will pay as you go.

When you have medically stabilized and your care is at an end, you can gather your medical records and submit them to the at fault driver. Keep in mind that you may not need a Atlanta injury lawyer if your case is minor. If you have medical bills totaling over $2,000.00, if you have been injured by a drunk driver, or you are dealing with a fracture or disk herniation then you should speak with an Atlanta car accident attorney.

As we have been discussing, the new Georgia Uninsured Motorist laws that went into effect on January 1, 2009 are drastically different. Check out this video for more details

When you are injured in a Georgia collision, you need to put your Georgia Uninsured Motorist Insurancecarrier on notice as soon as possible because the failure to do so can void coverage. Problems usually arise with these coverages when you are covered under your parent's or grandparents policy and you don't realize that until a year down the road when you finally hire an Atlanta injury lawyer.

Depending on the facts of the case and the Uninsured Motorist Insurance policy language, you can be required to give notice in as few as 30 days of the crash. See Flamm v. Doe, 167 Ga. App. 587 (1983). In Manzi v. Cotton States Mutual Insurance Company, 243 Ga. App. 277 (2000), the Court of Appeals ruled that the insured's failure to give notice within 60 days voided the coverage. Keep in mind that if the policy is worded correctly, you can lose thousands of dollars of potential insurance coverage just by not asking the right questions. Failing to hire an injury attorney when there are serious injuries involved can have dire consequences.

What are some other sources of Georgia Uninsured Motorist coverage? If you have multiple car policies even with the same carrier, so long as there are separate policy numbers, these policies likely stack under OCGA Sec. 33-7-11(b)(1)(D(ii)

You may also qualify as an additional insured on the policy of a relative that you live with pursuant to OCGA Sec. 33-7-11(b)(1)(B). One final place to look is at your employer's policy if you were on the job at the time of the Georgia crash. See Chastain v. USFG 199 Ga. App. 86 (1991).

Georgia wrongful death attorneys will help you work through the stacking of these coverages because the stacking rules can be complex.

As an Atlanta car accident lawyer, I receive numerous calls from clients that have had their cars totaled out in a crash only to learn that their car has depreciated tremendously since the time they purchased it. Most people are aware that if you buy a new or used car from a dealership, you are paying a premium price. With most new cars, 50% of the value you paid for is gone after three years. It is less true with used cars, but many of my clients that bought SUVs in the last 3 years cannot believe how much value has been lost. For most people though, the drop in value is on paper only as they don't plan to sell the car; what happens when it is in a crash and totaled out though?

When your car is totaled out in a car crash in Georgia, the at fault party(and their insurer) owes the current market value of the vehicle and that is it. If you are upside down on the loan, there is no way to recover that from the other guy's insurance company. Why not? The truth is you were upside down on the car 5 minutes before the car crash too and the crash only brought the situation into reality. Georgia Courts will not hold the other driver liable for anything beyond loss of use (rental) and the total current market value of the car if it is totaled.

Due to plunging resale values, the smartest thing you can do is buy gap insurance coverage when you purchase the vehicle. This coverage fills in the gap between the market value of the car and what you owe on the loan. In these tough times I cannot recommend this strongly enough.

Let us imagine a situation where we have litigated your Georgia personal injury case and the insurer has finally come to their senses and has agreed to settle the case. One huge question is, will I have to reimburse my health care insurer out of the settlement? The answer is maybe. This is an extremely complex area of law and if your medical care is paid by insurance then it makes sense to hire an Atlanta personal injury lawyer but for the sake of this conversation, here are some general truths:

First I will order a copy of the policy to review the policy language to see if it entitles the plan to reimbursement from the settlement. These days, most of the health insurance plans issued in Georgia have refined their language to permit their recovery.

Continue reading " After I Settle My Geogia Injury Claim, Is My Georgia Health Insurer Entitled to Reimbursement ? " »