VEHICLE ACCIDENTS AND PERSONAL INJURY CLAIMS
By Alice Kupferberg, Esq.
Budin, Reisman, Kupferberg & Bernstein, LLP
Impact
Accidents happen. Sadly, they tend to occur regardless of our preventative measures and our need for stability. Nothing can eliminate the unsettling effects of an accident on a driver's life but having a plan of action to adjust to these changes can lessen the impact on the lives of the accident victim and his/her family and allow the driver a measure of control over their future actions.
This article and the four following ones are written as a guide to those unfortunate accident victims beginning with the impact of the accident and ending with the resolution of the claim/lawsuit.
As a practitioner of plaintiff's personal injury law for more than a quarter century, I will endeavor to provide a method of approach that I hope will leave the injured claimant in the best possible position to face his/her new challenges in this post accident world.
The Scene of the Accident
Your actions at the scene of the accident can positively or adversely affect your potential case so a plan of action is highly recommended.
First, assess your injuries. As long as the car is not in imminent danger of exploding due to leaking gas and fire, stay put. When emergency medical services and police arrive on the scene their reports often reflect your actions at the scene. Drivers, often in shock, jump out of their vehicles displaying physical invincibility occasioned by adrenalin. I have seen reports by unhelpful police officers stating "Driver of vehicle #1 pacing outside his car with no signs of visible injuries yelling into his cell phone". Stay in your vehicle and await emergency personnel. It is the only way to avoid such unhelpful comments on your police report, and it is, in fact, safer
The failure to use a seatbelt is also a source of problems in emergency medical services and police reports as they are a necessary safety device.
Under the vehicle and traffic laws of New York failure to use a seatbelt is a violation and can be used to lessen the amount paid by the responsible party. While lawyers are aware that taxi drivers are not obligated to wear seatbelts as an aid to quick escape in the all-too-frequent event of robbery you can be assured that testimony or evidence of the lack of a seatbelt will be a factor in the amount an insurance company will pay for an injury. Use your seatbelts and, if asked, state with assurance you were using your seatbelt.
As to the question of whether to go from the scene of the accident to the hospital, lawyers on both sides of a personal injury case are particularly interested in the answer. In negotiating thousands of plaintiff's personal injury cases we have found that one of the first elements of injury evaluation is whether the plaintiff took an ambulance to the hospital from the scene. In evaluating the severity of the impact, nothing on the police report speaks louder than the boxes that refer to the severity of the physical complaints and the transport to the hospital. If you are in pain following an accident go to the hospital immediately. This will create an official record of your physical complaints. Once there, complaints about all injured body parts must be made or questions will arise whether they were, in fact, injured in the happening of this accident.
There remains one last aspect of the post impact accident scene, and that is the description of how the accident occurred and who was at fault.
When the police approach your car to determine the extent of your injuries and your version of the accident, it is important that you remember to keep it simple. The police are there to record your expression. If you start apologizing you can be assured the fault on the police report will be yours. Simple statements work best, e.g., "she ran the red light", "he made a u-turn", "I was stopped and she hit me in the rear" are better than, "I changed lanes and a few seconds later I got hit in the back", "I don't know what happened, he came from out of nowhere". Any admission of fault will likely make its way to the narrative section and result in future problems.
Next month: No-Fault or Workers' Compensation:
How to survive your post-accident reduction of wages and what to do about medical treatment.