Personal injury law, also known as tort law, covers a wide range of cases where someone suffers an injury as a result of someone else’s negligence. It is a form of civil law, unlike criminal law, which involves the government prosecuting people who commit crimes. It’s important to understand how personal injury law works because it can have a dramatic impact on your life and your finances.
The Legal Elements of a Personal Injury Case
There are many different types of accidents and injuries, but the general path that most personal injury cases follow is pretty standard. It starts with determining that the defendant breached their duty of care to you, it goes on to figuring out what caused the damage and how that caused the damage, and it finishes up with calculating the damages you suffered.
In addition to these basic elements of personal injury law, there are other considerations you may want to discuss with your attorney. For example, you’ll need to determine the statute of limitations for your case.
Depending on the type of accident you’ve been involved in, the law Pourgol Law will have a different time limit for filing your claim. You’ll need to contact an attorney as soon as possible after the incident to make sure that you don’t lose your opportunity for recovery.
Your New York personal injury attorney can help you navigate all of the laws and procedures that you’ll need to know in order to file your claim. It’s also important to be aware of the various defenses that may arise in your case.
Negligence and Proof
The first thing you should do after an accident is to take detailed notes of what happened. This information can help you to strengthen your case and will be invaluable when discussing it with an attorney.
Negligence is the act of putting someone else in danger by failing to exercise the level of care that would be exercised by a reasonable person under similar circumstances. It’s a very broad category of behavior that can include anything from driving recklessly to letting a child ride in your car without your consent.
Proximate Cause and Intent
Another key element of personal injury law is proximate cause. Proximate cause is a legal requirement that a defendant’s actions must have been the foreseeable cause of your injuries. This means that a defendant must have either done something wrong or been influenced by something that was going on in the environment before they caused you to get hurt.
This is important because it can have a major impact on your compensation award. If you’re able to show that the defendant was responsible for your injuries, you’ll likely be awarded more than just compensation for medical bills and lost wages.
Special Damages
A New York personal injury attorney can help you to calculate the damages you’ve suffered. These damages can include anything from medical expenses to the cost of your future pain and suffering. These damages can be assigned a monetary value through the testimony of experts, such as doctors or psychologists.