Articles Posted in Personal Injury

When you have been hurt in an accident, medical care may begin immediately, and you may be worried about how you will pay your medical bills before you have received a financial settlement. At Quackenbush Law, our team works quickly to assess the situation, review all documentation and statements, advocate with insurance companies, and negotiate on your behalf.

PIP first

The first medical insurance coverage that kicks in is PIP – Personal Injury Protection – which is required on all auto insurance policies in Florida. If you don’t have auto insurance, you can seek coverage from the insurance policy of a family member with whom you live or that of the vehicle you were riding in at the time of the accident, depending on your individual situation. Regardless of what insurance company is paying your medical bills, you must see an approved medical provider within 14 days of the injury to qualify for PIP coverage.

When you have been seriously injured in Florida due to an accident, product malfunction, or medical malpractice, your severe injuries may leave permanent damage impacting all areas of your life. At The Quackenbush Law Firm, we fight for you to ensure that you receive the compensation you deserve.

I leave no stone unturned when I investigate and evaluate every aspect of the accident and its consequences in order to determine, based on all the facts, how this will impact your future life.  My goal is to ensure that you will have the resources to not only compensate for past expenses and take care of your immediate needs but to guarantee that you have the funding for ongoing medical care and fair compensation for your pain, suffering, and lost future earnings.

Long-term consequences

Unless you are an expert in negotiating personal injury claims or taking them to court, you need an expert personal injury attorney to help you with your personal injury lawsuit. Injured individuals are no match for the insurance companies, big business, big government, and big medical institutions that have the knowledge, know-how, and strategies to keep them from having to pay you fair compensation for all that you have suffered. Don’t try to face them without an expert standing between you and them, fighting for your rights.

Preparing a bullet-proof case

I became a personal injury lawyer because I believe in “fighting for the rights of the little guy” against the highly lucrative businesses, insurance companies, and medical institutions that have the financial resources to squash your efforts to recover damages due to their negligent behavior or faulty products.

Vicarious liability, also called imputed negligence, is a legal doctrine that assigns responsibility for one person’s actions to another person if the two have a particular legal relationship that transfers power or authority from one person to the other. This can apply to the relationships of parent and child, husband and wife, owner of a vehicle and the driver, or employer and employee. 

Types of vicarious liability

In a parent-child relationship, if a minor child holds an underage drinking party on the family property, even if the parents do not know, and someone is injured due to the party, the parents are responsible for the breaking of the law and for any harm that may come from it. The minor may also be held responsible for his or her own actions, but the legal burden is upon the parents. 

If you are seeking an attorney to help you with a wrongful death lawsuit, allow me to first offer my deepest condolences for your loss. During this time of mourning, the pain of your loss is heightened by the conviction that it could have been avoided. 

As an experienced Florida personal injury attorney with extensive experience helping clients recover compensation for injury and death, I can help you through this difficult time, respectfully and gently collecting from you the information I need while at the same time aggressively and persistently demanding justice from those whose negligence caused the death of your loved one.

When can you sue for a wrongful death?

Florida is a frequent destination for college students on spring break. And while for most kids it is an opportunity for much-needed relaxation and fun before finals begin, for an unfortunate few, spring break can bring serious injuries from accidents that take place while away from home. 

If your child has been injured in Florida, the first step is to make sure he or she seeks immediate medical attention. The second is to make sure all critical documentation is collected to determine if the injury or accident was caused by someone else’s negligence, which could make your child eligible for compensation. As a Florida personal injury attorney, I know the types of accidents and injuries that can happen on spring break, I know what types of evidence you will need to collect, and I know how to present a solid case so that your child receives compensation for pain and injuries incurred due to someone else’s neglect.

Common injuries when on spring break

Florida law requires that someone filing a personal injury lawsuit be able to prove four things:

  1.       The person or business who caused your injury owed you a duty of care
  2.       The person or business was negligent in that duty

Can you sue a government entity in Florida? The concept of sovereign immunity goes back centuries and is a principle based on English common law that the government cannot be sued unless it consents. Over time, it became clear that the state should not have blanket immunity, but it took time to change the law in order to hold government agencies and their agents accountable for wrongful injury or death.

In 1946, the federal government passed the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), allowing lawsuits against the federal government for injuries that occur on government property due to negligence of government employees when in the course of fulfilling their duties. It did not take long for states to follow suit, and Florida passed Statute 768.28, which provided the same opportunity for justice as the FTCA.

Causes for injury could include failure to maintain a safe environment, wrongful (negligent or reckless) actions, or failure to act appropriately. Wrongful death due to any of these causes is handled somewhat differently than a personal injury claim. If you have lost a loved one due to the negligence of a government entity, I am very sorry for your loss. I will do all in my power to hold the guilty persons or entities responsible for any injury, loss, or wrongful death that you or your loved one experienced.

A deposition is a critical part of your Florida personal injury case. At a deposition, statements are taken from the parties involved or witnesses to the accident by lawyers for the opposing party or parties. The statements (depositions) are taken under oath, so you must tell the absolute truth, and any comments during the deposition can be used in a possible future court case. 

Depositions also aid the defense attorneys in determining if they should settle a case rather than let it go to court. Court cases are long and expensive, and juries often favor the injured party, so if your deposition indicates that you have a strong case and that you would be viewed sympathetically by the jury, lawyers will often offer to settle. The stronger your deposition, the greater the likelihood that they will ask to settle and the greater the financial compensation they will be willing to offer.

For these reasons, I work with my clients so that they go into the deposition with confidence, fully prepared for what the defense attorneys may ask.

If you believe you have been injured because of the negligence of a person, business, government agency, or other entity, you have the right under Florida law to sue for compensation. However, there are certain requirements in a personal injury case that must be fulfilled in order for your case to proceed including proving fault and injury.

Personal injury cases

Most people think first about car accidents or slip-and-fall cases as personal injury cases, but there can be many other situations in which a person is injured due to someone else’s negligence. These may include:

Contact Information