Motorcycle Injury Law

Insurance Company Warnings

Immediately after you are injured in a motorcycle accident, the insurance adjusters, insurance investigators, and insurance defense attorneys begin to work on limiting how much money their insurance company will have to pay you – the victim. Even though you were not at fault in the accident, the other driver's insurance company may immediately send investigators to take photos of the accident scene and the damage on both vehicles. Next, the insurance adjustor (i.e., the individual from the insurance company who will decide how much money, if any, to pay to you) will begin preparing your case. It is their job to reduce the amount of money that their employer (the insurance company) will pay to you. They often will immediately contact you in order to get a tape-recorded statement on the phone in order to minimize your award. They will also offer you a small amount of money within 24-48 hours after an accident and will attempt to get you to sign a release waiving all future legal rights. The reason that they do this is that most accident victims do not begin to feel the real pain until 48 hours after an accident. These are known as "soft tissue" injuries and can persist for the remainder of your life.

If you attempt to settle the case yourself in order to "save some money," chances are you will obtain a much smaller recovery, even without a lawyer’s fee. Remember, your future and your families future may be altered by what you do or say to any insurance company's employee. This is the equivalent of a tourist walking into a Las Vegas casino for the first time and attempting to play cards against a professional card shark- you will walk away with less money. The insurance companies are NOT your "friends".

In even simple motorcycle accident cases which involve permanent impairment, settlements can range anywhere from five figures up to seven figures plus. In most cases, the important factors when ascertaining the level of settlement is specifically based on the amount of medical bills, the pain and suffering, life care costs and employment damages.

Medical bills often can run well above $100,000 if there was extended hospitalization with subsequent physical and vocational rehabilitation. Getting these bills paid is often the primary goal of the accident victim's family. Often when another person is at fault for the injury, their insurance companies’ adjustor will attempt to approach you as soon as possible after the injury in order to offer a settlement. These settlements will include "taking care of all of the medical bills". It is very tempting to sign papers and accept the settlement, however, they will not adequately pay for the years of life care that will follow along with vocational training which will be necessary after the immediate hospital stay. Never accept any type of settlement with an adjustor before speaking with a qualified attorney who handles serious injury cases. Remember, serious injury cases are different than other types of cases. Simply settling for three or five times the medical bills is not an option with serious injury cases. Many times when individuals are comatose, the medical bills will remain steady and constant, yet the damage to their future lives is increased dramatically with every day they are in a coma. Make sure you contact Cantor Simon immediately if you are approached by an insurance adjustor, or if another attorney has suggested that you settle for "three times the medical bills" for a serious injury case.

Pain and suffering calculations are often combined with employment losses and damage to ones family life. Usually, in order to ascertain these types of damages, you will have to look at the lifelong impact on the injury victim. It is important to focus on how much the life care costs will be along with the employment losses and damage to the victim's family life. Many times the award given by juries regarding pain and suffering can be larger than all the other damages combined. This is sometimes due to the fact that even though somebody's future earning capacities would total $1,000,000 in their lifetime, it is not worth any amount of money to live in constant pain, with a vastly lowered IQ and in a partially vegetative state. The same holds true even if a less serious injury still allows the victim to work, but their life enjoyment is greatly reduced.

Life care costs are often defined as not only the future medical bills, but also the amount it will cost to secure rehabilitative treatment and in-home care. Many times the vast majority of the in-home care will be conducted by family members. This does not mean that this care was "free" or "without cost". Family care can be even more taxing and costly to the family unit due to the fact that it may remove other members from their employment. It is very important to your case to secure the proper experts and produce the right testimony during the settlement phase or, if necessary, at trial. At Cantor Simon we will secure the top life care experts to work on your family member's case.

Employment damages also need to be calculated when dealing with any injury case. Many times a person will no longer be qualified to perform the work they were doing prior to their injury. However, they may be able to secure employment in a different field. Many times this "secondary" field of employment pays a much lower wage than what they were previously making. In severe cases, some victims are often unable to work at all. In other cases, the injury has occurred to a child prior to them being given the opportunity to go to college, or receive training to secure a job. Determining their losses requires a highly skilled law firm, such as Cantor Simon.

Sometimes an injury can be more discrete, and not quite as noticeable. Although the injury victim may secure employment, they often lose that employment shortly thereafter, or they do not get promoted within their workplace. Again, it takes a highly skilled lawyer to pinpoint these facts when determining the amount of employment losses.

Once an individual has suffered a physical injury, even if it is slight, often their employment lifespan will be shorter than before. In order to calculate damages, it is necessary to look at what a person was making and what they would have made prior to their injury. You then look to what they will now make, and you calculate how much money will be lost over the course of their working career. You also must factor in if they have a shorter working career than they would have had before the injury. Many times a true number can be calculated by utilizing a multiplier dealing with inflation and an increase in a certain occupations' market value. It is important to have the proper vocational expert calculate these types of future losses.

Although many times this may not be the largest number requested when calculating damages, it is often the most understandable number to the average person. The average juror will understand "the motorcycle accident victim will lose ‘x' amount of dollars over his lifetime, and his family will never see this money". When this number is combined with existing medical bills and projected future life care costs, it will magnify the pain and suffering award greatly. It is easy for a jury to understand how a victim once destined for a full and rewarding personal and employment life fears he will be forced to settle for less. The juror will understand that it is their role to make sure that person does not have to "settle for less". At Cantor Simon, we also make sure that the insurance company knows this too, and we will increase your loved one's chances of a large settlement prior to any type of trial.