Atlanta Injury Attorney Blog
What if I am seriously injured but I got the ticket? Will a lawyer take the case? We finished settling two cases for clients who were turned down by a well know TV lawyer here in Atlanta and the clients were very pleased with the outcome. This begs the question, if your lawyer has turned the case down, is it worth talking to another lawyer?
The answer depends on a few factors; if you have severe injuries, you should always get a second opinion. Another factor is the identity of the lawyer turning it down. At most TV law firms, you never actually talk with a lawyer, you speak with a case manager instead. These are not attorneys and they cannot analyze legal liability. Most TV lawyers have no seen the inside of a courtroom in years and do nothing but push paper around their desk and hope the insurance company will be nice to them.
Let’s take the first case as an example. 22 year old crossing the street in a thunderstorm at a four way side street intersection in downtown Atlanta, controlled by traffic signals. The power is out so the signal is down. There are crosswalks at three of the meeting sections but she crosses the street at the one without. About where the red arrow is.
The officer tickets the pedestrian while she is in the hospital with multiple hip fractures. Talk about insult to injury. She calls an Atlanta TV lawyer and they tell her that because she got the ticket, she has no case.
Moreover, the investigating officer forgot the most important rule in operation; when a traffic light is out in Georgia, cars must treat the intersection as a four way stop.
O.C.G.A. § 40-6-70(a) states that “when two vehicles approach or enter an intersection with an inoperative traffic light, the driver of each vehicle shall be required to stop in the same manner as if a stop sign were facing in each direction at the intersection.”
The result? The insurance company has to do the right thing and pay out policy limits.
The bottom line is this: if there is a serious injury and you got the traffic ticket and are being told you don’t have a case, call us to evaluate all of the evidence. Sloppy lawyers miss critical facts and arguments. We are lawyers who will take an injury case even if you got the ticket in the right situation.