Choosing a lawyer isn’t an easy task when you don’t have a background in law yourself!
It can be easy to become blindsided by legal terminology when you are speaking with potential legal representation, so it can be difficult to know if the services they are offering are what you need or if you are just being sold something that you could probably do without.
Not knowing the law, it can be difficult to know how to compare prospective law firms at the best of times, let alone when you are going through the stress of dealing with a personal injury claim.
Read on to find out what constitutes a personal injury claim, why it’s so important to find the right lawyer, what you should expect to pay, and crucially, what skills you should be looking for in a personal injury lawyer.
What is a personal injury claim?
A personal injury is defined as “an injury not to property, but to the body, mind, or emotions.” So in any situation where you have become ill or injured, you have sustained a personal injury.
A good example to illustrate personal injury as given by Cornell University is slipping and falling on a banana peel at the grocery store. Personal injury would cover any actual harm you sustained in the fall, such as bruising and broken bones, and it also covers emotional harm that you may suffer as a result of falling in public. It would not, however, cover damage to your watch if that broke in the fall.
Suppose you have experienced a personal injury that was the fault of another party. In that case, you may be able to make a personal injury claim to help you to cover the cost of your legal expenses and also to fund things like time missed from work as a result of the injury.
How many personal injury cases are there?
According to the US Department of Justice, there are over 400,000 personal injury cases in the US every year!
Of these 400,000 cases, only around 4% ever go to trial, which is roughly 16,397 cases.
This is because the majority of personal injury cases are settled out of court. In most cases, insurance companies will make an offer to settle the case before it ever goes to trial, and because going to trial can be a stressful experience for people without a background in law, they will take the settlement.
Why is choosing the right lawyer so important?
It’s important that you choose the right lawyer to represent you because in personal injury cases, it will be you up against a large insurance company
a lot of the time.
The insurance company’s job is to try to convince you to settle for less money than you deserve. They are so frequently successful at this because the legal world is overwhelming for people who don’t understand it, and so it’s important that you have an experienced lawyer with you who you can trust to help you to navigate it.
A lot of the time, even with a personal injury lawyer, your case won’t end up going to court, but having a lawyer usually means that a more reasonable settlement amount will be negotiated. An experienced lawyer will have a good knowledge of what a fair settlement amount is for each case type and can use this knowledge to negotiate in a way that would be difficult for someone who didn’t share their experience level.
How much should I expect to pay?
Lawyers are renowned for being expensive, and it’s true that their expertise does come with a price tag.
If you’re looking for a personal injury lawyer, it’s a good idea to find a firm that will take your case on a contingency fee basis, which means that they don’t take payment from you unless you win your case. They should take their fee into consideration when negotiating your settlement, so you won’t end up out of pocket.
Brown and Crouppen Law Firm offer this service because they believe that everyone deserves access to the best possible legal representation, and they are fighting to level the playing field against big insurance companies.
It’s also a good idea to take advantage of this service to assess whether your case has a chance of winning, as experienced lawyers in the personal injury field will have a good idea of which cases are likely to win and which ones are not. Assessment of your case should be free, regardless of whether you decide to continue with it.
What should I look for?
Lawyers are highly qualified professionals; it takes seven years of full-time study after high school just to qualify.
Your lawyer should be registered with the state bar association at a minimum, which will have performed stringent checks to ensure that they are qualified. Not only this, but to remain registered with the bar, lawyers must continue their education so that they keep up to date with changes to the law. They are required to periodically prove their level of education.
When you are looking for a personal injury lawyer specifically, it’s important that you choose one who has experience in that particular area of the law.
‘The law’ is such a huge subject that it would be very difficult for a lawyer to be proficient at practicing in all areas, so usually, lawyers will choose a specialist area in which to work and continuously educate themselves.
Choose a lawyer who is a personal injury specialist, and not only this has proven experience in the field. Any personal injury lawyer who has been practicing for a long time should be able to give you information regarding their case history, specifically how many cases they have taken on and won, and what kind of settlements can be expected for each type of case.
Lawyers who have done an excellent job for their clients should also be able to show you client testimonials, which will enable you to see what kind of experience their past clients had and give you a feel for whether they are the sort of firm that you would want to work with.
