If you suffered injuries in a crash you did not cause, a Glastonbury car accident lawyer could help you hold at-fault drivers liable for their actions. After investigating the incident and determining the full impact of the accident on your life, we could work with you to demand appropriate compensation for all your injuries and losses.
At Claggett, Sykes & Garza, we take cases like yours seriously and are eager to provide the representation you need to recover damages. The efforts of our attorneys have seen us recover over $1.5 billion in verdicts & settlements.
You can count on our personal injury lawyers in Glastonbury to work tirelessly to obtain a fair settlement on your behalf.
Should You Accept a Settlement Offer After a Glastonbury Car Accident?
Our personal injury attorneys recommend against accepting the first settlement offer you receive after a serious collision. That initial settlement offer may seem generous, but in reality, it likely undervalues your actual losses.
If you do receive a settlement offer, our legal team encourages you to compare it against the value of your medical expenses, lost wages, lost benefits, and other losses, including your emotional distress. Our attorneys can help you calculate the value of these expenses and argue for a more sufficient settlement if the need to do so arises.
We do not let insurers or other parties undervalue your losses. If you receive a settlement offer or face pressure to accept insufficient support, let our team know. We can step in and make sure liable parties know that you intend to fight for the compensation you deserve.
Injured in an Accident?
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The Legal Basis for a Car Accident Claim in Glastonbury
When a driver gets behind the wheel, they take on a legal responsibility to drive safely and avoid placing others at risk of harm. This concept, known as a duty of care, extends to all drivers, passengers in cars, bike riders, and even pedestrians. In short, a driver has a duty to protect all other people they may encounter while on the road.
A failure to fulfill this duty to a degree that directly causes an accident is the framework for the cause of action known as negligence. If a driver involved in a car wreck is found legally negligent due to their reckless behavior, they may be liable to provide compensation to those involved in the accident, even though they did not intend to cause any harm.
Common Forms of Vehicular Negligence
A car accident lawyer from Glastonbury can pursue compensation for you if your accident was caused by any of the following forms of negligence:
- Texting while driving
- Speeding
- Ignoring stop signs or red lights
- Improper lane changes
- Driving while drunk
- Following too closely and failing to stop
We can help you gather evidence of the negligence and file an auto accident claim for damages. No matter how serious your accident was, you can count on the team at Claggett, Sykes & Garza to provide the advocacy you need to receive fair compensation.
Injured in an Accident?
Are you struggling to recover from a car accident? Our Glastonbury car accident attorneys are here for you. You can schedule a consultation with our team members today to discuss your right to recover.
How Can You Prove Vehicular Negligence After an Accident?
You have the right to file an insurance claim or a personal injury claim in the wake of a serious vehicular collision. However, both processes will require you to find evidence of a liable party’s negligence. The evidence you can use to prove liability may include the following:
- Electronic evidence, including data from a liable party’s phone or vehicular computers
- Physical debris from the scene of an accident
- Environmental damage
- Photos and video footage of your accident
- Witness statements
- Expert witness statements, including input from police officers and emergency responders
- Accident scene investigations
You do not have to gather this information on your own, though; if it’s safe for you to do so, you can get a liable party’s financial information while you’re at the scene of an accident.
Our legal practice has professional connections with investigators in Glastonbury and beyond. We can bring those investigators onto your case, rely on their expertise to find the data most relevant to your case, and establish trial strategies based on the narrative of negligence behind your losses.
Suffered a Personal Injury?
Let Us Fight for Your Rights and Maximize Your Compensation.
How a Car Accident Lawyer from Glastonbury Can Help With Your Claim
An attorney can help you navigate the initial steps of dealing with a car accident, including telling you what the items on the police report mean with respect to fault and your injuries. A lawyer can also help you understand how to go about requesting copies of your medical bills for your claim.
More importantly, a well-practiced attorney can advise you on what type of claim you should bring against the at-fault driver should you decide to sue. They’ll also negotiate with insurers to reach a settlement agreement that meets your needs.
Our attorneys will understand every detail and document of your case. They’ll know how to combine these pieces of evidence to obtain the desired outcome.
Filing an Insurance Claim Versus Pursuing a Personal Injury Claim
Should you file an insurance claim after a vehicular crash, or should you pursue a personal injury claim first? Both processes have their benefits. It’s usually in your best interest to explore your right to an insurance claim first, as state law requires all drivers to purchase at least Connecticut’s minimum liability insurance.
However, insurance claims adjusters want to do everything in their power to deny you support. Working with an experienced Glastonbury, CT, car accident attorney can help you make an insurer take you seriously, but you may still struggle to make adjusters agree to give you a settlement that addresses all of your losses.
Filing a personal injury claim allows you to financially recover from your losses even if a liable party doesn’t have reasonable insurance. You can negotiate for financial support directly from a liable party. Notably, filing these claims doesn’t always require you to go to trial, though you retain the right to do so.
Our Glastonbury Car Accident Lawyers Work on Contingency
You don’t have to worry about legal fees when working with our team to file an insurance claim or pursue a personal injury lawsuit. Claggert, Sykes & Garza take legal cases on a contingency fee basis.
Our contingency fee agreements ensure that our clients don’t have to put down initial payments to start working with our staff. We don’t ask for deposits or retainers. None of our clients will receive bills while their cases are in progress, either.
Instead, our car accident attorneys in Glastonbury only get paid once we win your case. At that point, our payment comes out of your final settlement.
Injured Due to Negligence?
Experienced Personal Injury Lawyers Ready to Assist You.
Damages a Car Accident Attorney in Glastonbury Can Pursue
No one anticipates how expensive recovering from a car accident can be. Fortunately, an experienced lawyer in Glastonbury can help you calculate the true value of your case and fight for the car accident damages you’re owed.
Your final settlement should account for losses like the following:
Economic Losses
If you’re seriously injured in a car accident, you may need emergency medical care. You may also need to continue visiting specialists and other medical professionals to restore your lost quality of life.
When you compound those expenses with the cost of replacing a damaged car and taking mandatory time away from work, your recovery may be significantly more expensive than you anticipate. Fortunately, you can count all of these losses as “economic losses” when putting forward a request for damages.
Our personal injury attorneys encourage you to keep records of all of the expenses you incur related to your accident as you recover. Bills, invoices, and expense records make it easier to prove your right to specific compensation, whether you’re pursuing an insurance claim or a personal injury lawsuit.
Non-Economic Losses
The non-economic losses tied to your car accident do not leave paper trails like economic losses do. Instead, attorneys can individually account for these losses and rely on precedent and legal experience to assign them a value. The damages awarded under the category of “non-economic losses” can include the following:
- Pain and suffering
- Emotional distress
- Reduced quality of life
- Reduced enjoyment of life
If you lose a loved one in a car accident, you also have the right to request compensation based on your loss of consortium, loss of companionship, and grief.
Punitive Damages
If you take your fight for car accident compensation to a civil trial, you may have the right to receive punitive damages from a judge. Punitive damages are designed to compensate you for gross negligence or recklessness. They specifically punish the person responsible for your accident.
You may not ask for punitive damages when initially filing a car accident claim. Likewise, you may not ask for punitive damages while your case is in progress. It’s entirely up to a judge to determine whether or not you can integrate these damages into your final settlement.
You can discuss what role, if any, punitive damages may play in your court proceedings with your Glastonbury car accident attorneys as your case develops.
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What Injuries in a Glastonbury Car Accident Attorney Allow You to File a Claim?
A single moment is all it may take to change your life forever, and nowhere is this more evident than in the aftermath of a serious car accident. The forces at play in these incidents are often immense, and even low-speed collisions can impart thousands of pounds of pressure on your body, leading to severe injuries.
Even if you are fortunate enough to be able to walk away from a car wreck, you may endure injuries that require weeks or months of rehabilitation. Medical treatment for auto accident injuries can be incredibly expensive, especially if you’ve suffered an injury that requires long-term care.
Fortunately, our team can pursue full compensation for your treatment expenses. We’re familiar with every common car crash injury and can work with medical professionals to gather the evidence required to recover a fair payment. We can fight for the financial support you need to treat and manage any of the following injuries:
- Whiplash
- Concussion
- Broken bones
- Soft tissue injuries
- Traumatic brain injury (TBI)
- Spinal cord injury
- Internal bleeding
- Cuts and lacerations
- Chest injuries
- Knee injuries
- Shoulder injuries
- Wrist injuries
- Facial injuries
- Seat belt injuries
- Bruises and contusions
- Psychological injuries, such as PTSD
It’s Important to Follow Up With Doctors After a Car Accident
You should always continue to meet with your doctors after your initial diagnosis and car accident injury treatments. Regular healthcare updates prevent insurers from claiming that you no longer need care or financial support based on your losses.
You can work with our attorneys to maintain a record of all of the doctors’ appointments relevant to your recovery. We can refer to that history of documentation if an insurer or liable party tries to question your right to financial support.
Injured Due to Negligence?
Experienced Personal Injury Lawyers Ready to Assist You.
Why Is It Important to Call the Police After a Car Crash?
Some mistakes that people tend to make after being involved in a car crash include not calling the police. Some drivers think it is enough to exchange insurance information. However, when involved in a collision, even a minor one, an individual should make sure that law enforcement makes a formal record of the incident.
When a police officer arrives at the scene, they can collect insurance information, write everybody’s names down, secure everybody’s identification, and make a determination of fault. If a case turns into a lawsuit and there is a trial later, a police report and that officer’s determination of fault are important pieces of evidence.
A seasoned car accident lawyer from our team in Glastonbury can help you obtain the police report after a car accident. Then, they’ll use the report, along with other forms of evidence, to build a fact-based claim that’s highly likely to yield the outcome you deserve.
How Long Do You Have to File a Car Accident Lawsuit in Connecticut?
After a car crash, it’s important to keep Connecticut’s statute of limitations for personal injury lawsuits in mind. The statute imposes a strict time limit on your case that you must abide by if you want to receive the compensation you’re owed.
Under Connecticut General Statutes §52-584, you must file a civil case no more than two years from the date of your injury. If you don’t comply with this rule, you’ll be denied the damages you need to afford medical care, replace income losses, and move forward with your life.
Luckily, our car accident attorneys from Glastonbury can work quickly to get your suit filed on time. If you get in touch with our team ASAP after your crash, we’ll be able to satisfy this important filing requirement.
How Does Litigation Proceed if There Are Multiple Defendants?
If your case proceeds to litigation and there are multiple defendants, your court case will be handled in the same way as it would if there were only one at-fault party. In other words, the order in which your case is presented before the court will not change.
Your attorney will present your case first, and then the defendants can choose whether or not they want to make an argument. When presenting a car accident case with multiple defendants, a Glastonbury lawyer informs the jury why each liable party is at fault for causing the crash and to what degree.
Multiple Defendants and Case Outcomes
Having multiple defendants may influence the outcome of your case because there might be more peremptory strikes in the jury selection. Defendants may have eight peremptory strikes instead of four, which can make a big difference in who is on the jury.
Additionally, on some occasions, having multiple defendants adds more confusion to the situation, which may be beneficial to the claimant.
Contact a Glastonbury Car Accident Attorney Today
It is an unfortunate fact that another driver’s careless actions can cause you to suffer severe injuries that may impact you for the rest of your life. Fortunately, a skilled attorney can pursue the compensation you need to treat your injuries and support yourself throughout your recovery.
Whether you need help filing an insurance claim or you want to take your car accident claim to civil court, you can count on our comprehensive legal services to see your case through to the end.
The team at Claggett, Sykes & Garza can investigate the facts that led to the crash, evaluate the actions of all parties involved, measure your losses accurately, and demand appropriate compensation. Contact a Glastonbury car crash lawyer from our firm today to schedule an initial case consultation.
