http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/index.html LawInfo - Legal Resource Center offers free Georgia Personal Injury legal forms and free Georgia Personal Injury legal documents that is designed to help consumers and businesses resolve their legal issues http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/how-can-i-determine-how-much-my-claim-is-wort.html <p>Attorneys are prohibited from promising that they will obtain a certain amount of money for you. For purposes of settlement, a claim is valued upon an estimate of what a jury would likely believe the case to be worth, taking into account the severity of the injury, the effects of the injury on your life and the negligence of the other party. If you were partially at fault for the accident, the amount of damages will be reduced proportionately. Any settlement will be reduced if there appears to be a good chance that the claim will not be successful. Other factors that may reduce the damages include past medical history, pre&shy;existing injuries, and prior claims history.<p>Considerable compensation may be commanded if your injuries are severe requiring extensive medical treatment, absences from work and permanent injuries. This is especially true if you were a healthy, productive, young worker prior to the accident. That is because an important factor in the value of your claim is the difference between your quality of life before the accident as compared to after the accident. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/how-do-i-decide-if-i-need-to-hire-an-attorney.html <p>There are situations where an attorney is unnecessary, such as very small cases. Small claims court in Georgia will handle claims up to $5000. If your injury is a minor one that will not result in any incapacity, or substantial medical care, then you may want to settle it yourself in small claims court.<p>An attorney should be consulted if you have been seriously injured or are unsure as to the outcome of your injury. These cases can get quite complicated. In such cases, an attorney will have the legal expertise, time and resources to effectively handle your claim. An experienced personal injury attorney will be able to accurately analyze the value of your case and will be able to meet all of the rules, requirements and deadlines that have to be met. Also of note is the fact that statistics show insurance companies pay more than twice as much compensation when an attorney is involved in your claim. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/how-long-do-i-have-to-hire-an-attorney.html <p>The law requires that you file a lawsuit within a specified period of time depending on the nature of the claim and the entity that caused your injury. This is referred to as the statute of limitations. Failure to file suit within this time frame prevents you from filing suit at all. In Georgia, an action for personal injury or death caused by negligence or intentional acts must be brought within two years from the date when the cause of action accrues. For a minor's personal claim, the limitation period is tolled until the child's eighteenth birthday (except for medical malpractice claims). Claims for marital consortium have a four&shy;year statute of limitations. A claim for injury to reputation (i.e. slander) must be commenced within one year.<p>For medical malpractice claims, Georgia has a two&shy;year statute of limitations and a five&shy;year statute of repose. The statue of repose means that in no event may an action be brought more than five years after the date of the alleged negligent act. These limits apply to minors except that the limitation period will never run prior to the claimant's seventh birthday and the statute of repose will never run until the child's tenth birthday. The two&shy;year limitation does apply to a parent's claim for the child's medical expenses. However, foreign object case may be brought anytime within one year of discovering the object.<p>There are special claims presentation requirements for claims against state and local government. For claims against the state or the county, written notice must be presented within twelve months and prior to filing suit. For municipal government, you must present a written claim within six months of the alleged wrongful act. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/how-much-will-an-attorney-cost.html <p>Most attorneys who believe a case has merit will take the case without payment up front. They will take the case on a contingency basis, which means they will receive a percentage of your award if and when you recover for your injuries. Contingency fees average between 25 and 40 percent. Most attorneys charge a smaller percentage if the case is settled before the attorney does all the work necessary to go to trial. If you and your attorney agree to a contingency fee, the attorney must put the agreement in writing and provide you with a signed copy. Some attorneys may charge an hourly fee or a flat fee for their services. The attorney's out of pocket costs are in many cases not included in the attorney's fees. You should be sure to pay attention to how an attorney will bill you for costs because they can amount to quite a significant sum. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/how-will-my-claim-be-processed.html <p>You should be sure not to sign any documents without prior review by an attorney. You need to attend all scheduled doctor appointments in order to document your injuries. Accurate records should be kept of time you missed from work, medical bills, and property damage repairs. You can document your damages with photographs of your injuries or photos of property damage.<p>After a lawsuit has been filed, both parties will conduct discovery. Pretrial discovery usually takes about a full year during which time both parties investigate all aspects of the claim. This may include taking oral depositions, obtaining pertinent records, propounding interrogatories, and hiring expert witnesses to obtain more evidence about the claim. During this period of discovery and as the trial date approaches, the parties will exchange settlement offers/demands. A large majority of personal injury claims settle before trial. If you agree to accept a settlement, you will be required to sign an agreement stating you absolve the other party of all further liability in this case. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/i-was-injured-can-i-file-a-lawsuit-against-th.html <p>In general, when a person is injured as a result of another person's negligence, the injured party may pursue a claim against the party or parties that caused the injuries. You are entitled to compensation for your injuries if it is found that a defendant was negligent and that such negligence was a cause of your injury. Any personal injury case depends on liability, damages, and whether or not you can collect from the negligent party or parties. Georgia has adopted a variation of comparative negligence. Under this doctrine, a claimant's action is barred if he could have avoided the consequences of the defendant's negligence. Otherwise, the claimant's recovery is diminished in proportion to his degree of negligence.<p>Personal injury law attempts to cover all areas and types of injuries suffered by individuals. Some of the most common areas are automobile accidents, premise liability, medical malpractice, and product liability, among others. Whether or not you are entitled to compensation may depend on the type of accident that caused the injury.<p><b>AUTOMOBILE ACCIDENTS</b></p><p>Georgia operates on a "fault" system, which determines liability based on a showing that one party was at fault because of negligence, which caused the accident. In other words, if the other driver is to blame for the accident, you can collect damages, and vice versa. Generally, people who operate motor vehicles must exercise reasonable care under the circumstances. Failure to use reasonable care is the basis for most lawsuits for damages caused by an automobile accident. In these cases, proof of fault is often contested and requires thorough investigation. A driver may also be liable for an accident caused by intentional or reckless conduct. A reckless driver is one who drives unsafely, with willful disregard for the probability that the driving may cause an accident.<p>The other driver's insurance company is the liability carrier and will pay you, as a victim of the other driver's negligence, for your out of pocket damages and pain and suffering. The mandatory minimum liability coverage in Georgia is $25,000 per person and $30,000 per accident for personal injury, and $25,000 for property damage. If the person who caused your injury has automobile liability insurance, an insurance adjuster will gather the pertinent records including medical records, medical bills, wage loss verification and the like in an effort to verify your damages. The insurance company may make you an offer to settle the claim. You may find the offer acceptable and once you accept it, the claim process is over. If you do not receive an acceptable offer, you can proceed with filing a lawsuit. Be careful when dealing with the other party's insurance company because they may try to rush you into a settlement before you can adequately evaluate the extent of your damages. If you are in an automobile accident with an uninsured driver who is at fault or a driver who does not have enough insurance to cover your damages, the uninsured or underinsured motorist provisions of your own policy will apply if you have purchased such coverage.<p><b>PREMISE LIABILITY</b></p><p>If you were injured at someone else's home or at a commercial establishment, the person responsible for the premises may be found liable. This can cover a variety of situations including slip and falls, dog bites, assaults, among others. In Georgia, the duty of a landowner to the injured person varies depending on the status of the person at the time of the injury. A higher standard of care is imposed on a property owner with respect to an invitee than a licensee, and a higher standard with respect to a licensee than a trespasser. For an invitee, the property owner is liable for injuries caused by his failure to exercise ordinary care in keeping the premises safe. The owner of the premises is liable to a licensee (including a social guest) only for willful or wanton injury. It is usually willful or wanton not to exercise ordinary care to prevent injuring a licensee who is actually known to be, or is reasonably expected to be, within the range of a dangerous act or condition. The duty of the owner to a trespasser whose presence is not anticipated is not to set up traps for him or injure him willfully or wantonly. There is an exception for trespassing children that says that under certain circumstances, a property owner is liable where he should in the exercise of ordinary care have foreseen that harm would result to a child whose presence he should have anticipated. For recreational land made available for public use without charging admission, the owner has no duty of care to keep the premises safe or to give any warning of a dangerous condition.<p>It is the duty of an owner to exercise reasonable care in the maintenance of the premises and to warn a visitor of any dangerous conditions that are known, or should be known to him, if the conditions are not likely to be perceived by the visitor. The owner or operator of the property must have notice of the defect or circumstances that caused your injury prior to the injury having occurred. The notice can either be actual notice or implied notice, meaning the owner knew or should have known of the dangerous condition given all of the surrounding facts and circumstances. The person liable for your damages is the party in control of the property. That party is responsible for the care, maintenance and inspection of the property. For example, an owner may not be the responsible party if he or she has leased the property to another party who actually has control over the premises.<p><b>PRODUCT LIABILITY</b></p><p>Product Liability deals with recoveries for personal injury or property damage resulting from the use of a product. An action can be based on negligence, breach of implied or express warranty, or strict liability. A lawsuit can be brought against anyone participating in the chain of manufacture for that product, from the manufacturer, to the designer to the retail store. When a company designs and manufactures a product, they have a responsibility to ensure that anyone exercising reasonable care within the expected parameters of usage expected for the product will not be injured.<p>Under the newest theory of strict liability, you do not have to prove the manufacturer or designer was negligent. You only have to prove that the product was defective due to faulty design, error in manufacturing, or that the manufacturer did not provide sufficient warning of potential risks or failed to provide adequate instructions. Any lawsuit based on strict liability must be filed within ten years from the date of the first sale of the product. Sellers who are not actually manufacturers cannot be held liable under the strict liability doctrine. Be aware that there are other limits to product liability law such as when the consumer was careless in using the product.<p><b>MEDICAL MALPRACTICE</b><p><p>When a health care provider causes injury due to his or her failure to meet the accepted standards of care for that particular field of expertise, you may have a claim for medical malpractice. A claim can be brought against physicians, dentists, nurses, therapists, hospitals, clinics, and pharmacists among others. Some examples of medical malpractice include incorrect diagnosis, failure to treat, improper treatment, delay in treatment, prescription errors, surgical errors, rendition of services without informed consent, etc. Medical malpractice claims are some of the most difficult to prevail in and are quite costly due to the need for qualified expert review and testimony. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/what-damages-can-i-recover.html <p>You can recover your actual economic losses such as the costs of reasonable and necessary medical care, property damage, car rental expenses, costs of domestic services, and loss of earnings. The law allows compensation for future medical and care expenses that the claimant can prove will be reasonably necessary to treat the injury. The claim may include income the claimant can prove will probably be lost in the future because of the injuries. Loss of earning capacity is also allowed when the patient proves he or she is less able to earn a living as a result of the injuries<p>You are also entitled to non&shy;economic damages for physical pain and suffering, mental and emotional suffering, inconvenience, physical impairment, disfigurement, loss of enjoyment of life, etc. There is no definite standard of calculating reasonable compensation for these types of damages other than being just and reasonable in light of the evidence.<p>In certain instances, damages may be awarded to families of injured claimants for loss of care, companionship, love and affection. When a child is injured, the child and the child's parents have separate claims. The child's claim may include physical and mental pain and suffering, and future medical expenses and income loss that will occur after the child turns eighteen. The parents' claim can include all medical and other necessary expenses related to the injury of the child up to age eighteen, and loss of the child's services.<p>Family members can be compensated for the wrongful death of a loved one. Generally immediate family members including spouses, children and parents can pursue a claim. The measure of the damages is the full value of the life of the deceased from the decedent's perspective. These damages may include medical and burial expenses; loss of income that would have supported the family members; loss of benefits such as pensions, insurance coverage, etc; loss of inheritance; emotional suffering; loss of care, protection, companionship and the pleasures of the family relationship.<p>Punitive damages are intended to punish a defendant and are only awarded when a plaintiff presents clear and convincing evidence of willful misconduct, malice, fraud, wantonness, and oppression. In Georgia, punitive damages are limited to $250,000, unless the claimant can demonstrate that the defendant had specific intent to cause harm. Georgia Personal Injury FAQs Tue, 29 May 2007 21:19:00 GMT http://resources.lawinfo.com/en/Legal-FAQs/Personal-Injury/Georgia/who-is-responsible-when-a-person-is-injured.html <p>The law of personal injury is concerned with determining who may be responsible for your injuries and how much they should be required to pay for your damages. Personal injury is part of the law of torts, the legal term that includes many types of injuries to people and their property. Every tort claim must include four basic elements including duty, breach of duty, damages, and proximate cause. The defendant must have a legal duty toward the plaintiff. The defendant must have violated that legal duty. The plaintiff must have suffered some harm for which the law allows an award of monetary damages. The defendant's breach of a legal duty must be related to the plaintiff's injury closely enough to be considered a proximate cause of the injury.<p>There are a number of principles that apply to the law of torts and personal injury. These principles recognize degrees of fault on the part of the person who causes the injury. In general, the degrees of fault can be described as negligence, intentional fault, and strict liability.<p>The term negligence is essential to tort law. Everyone is expected to take normal ordinary care to ensure that their action or the actions of others under their control, do not cause anyone harm. If they fall below that standard, and someone is injured or their property damaged, then they become negligent. Negligence does not mean that the person deliberately intended to cause harm; it only means that they did not take reasonable care or they did not act when any reasonable person would have. The degree of care varies with the circumstances of each case. A plaintiff likewise has a duty to exercise reasonable care under the circumstances on his own behalf.<p>Strict liability means that one does not have to prove negligence to recover damages. In the case of product liability, the law now holds that you do not have to prove the manufacturer was negligent if someone is injured while using a product. They only have to prove the product was defective when it left the hands of the particular seller and that was the proximate cause of the injuries. A lawsuit can be brought against anyone participating in the chain of manufacture for that product, from the manufacturer, to the designer to the retail store.<p>An "intentional tort" refers to a personal injury caused by a person who has the intent to cause harm. It may also refer to injury caused by willful or reckless conduct. Intentional torts include assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, libel and slander, etc.<p>There may be more than one cause of an injury. When the negligent conduct of two or more parties contributes concurrently as causes of an injury, liability is apportioned severally based upon each party's degree of fault. However, if the claimant is without any fault, joint and several liability is imposed on each defendant. 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