Articles Posted in Hiring a Lawyer

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This image shows what happens if you are involved in a car accident and your front airbag deploys with your feet on the dash.  Ouch!  The result is ugly: two femoral hip fractures which are serious and painful and will require surgery to repair followed by a 4 to 6 month recovery period.  The owner’s manual of every vehicle with airbags warns of this danger.  Assuming the accident was the fault of someone else, can you still recover compensation for your injuries in such an accident if you failed to heed the airbag warnings and that failure caused your injuries in the accident to be worse? Continue reading

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Part of our job is to attempt to keep up with what our opponents (the insurance industry and their lawyers) are thinking and doing.  One of the many ways we try to do that is by reading insurance industry publications such as Claims Journal.  In a recent Claims Journal article, the author interviewed Harish Kapur, CEO of Across America Insurance Services.  Mr. Kapur’s comments are nothing new to us, but they are a good reminder to anyone who is considering filing a personal injury or wrongful death claim.  Here are three key take-aways:

  1. The insurance companies handle injury claims all day-every day, while this is hopefully your one and only injury claim.

Mr. Kapur bragged about his “crack team of in-house adjusters” and how they “have to know everything about the file.”   The insurance adjusters know what information is critical.  They know how to ask questions and frame the narrative during a recorded statement.  They are trained how to interview witnesses and scour the internet for information on you.

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For Valentine’s Day, I received a gift card for a spa.  When I began to book an appointment online for the massage, I was asked to electronically sign a Release of All Claims.  Among other things, the Release of All Claims for a massage at this spa stated that if death resulted from the massage, then the spa was not responsible.  There were also other excessive provisions. I declined to sign the Release of All Claims, and the spa was kind enough to refund the purchased gift card, but the outrageousness of their request is not particularly isolated.  Every day, businesses ask their prospective customers to sign releases before providing services or allowing participation in activities.  As such, we thought it would be good to review what exactly is a release of all claims. Continue reading

 

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The most common cause of a bike accident is collision with a car or truck.  Not surprisingly, given the disparity in weight and protection between a bicycle and car, the bicyclist typically suffers serious injuries.   Most bicycle accidents occur in urban areas and are caused by a car or truck driver failing to yield.  According to the Department of Safety, there were 370 bicycle accidents in Tennessee in the most recent data year.  So, if you are a bicyclist, do you know what to do after a bike accident?  Do you know what insurance covers a bicycle accident?  Do you know how to make a claim for a bike accident?   And do you know how long it is going to take to recover from a bike accident? Continue reading

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Litigation is fighting with rules, confrontation with a referee.  Most people do not enjoy confrontation, and for others, it brings out their worst.   If you are involved in litigation or have a claim that may result in litigation, please take our advice: don’t get cute.  A few news articles lately have shown what happens when people try to get cute during litigation. Continue reading

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Five lawyers at The Law Offices of John Day have been recognized by Best Lawyers.   The categories in which at least one of our five lawyers were recognized were: Personal Injury, Medical Malpractice Litigation, Product Liability Litigation, Bet-the-Company Litigation and Commercial Litigation. What is Best Lawyers and why should you care?  Best Lawyers is an organization that only recognizes lawyers who have been nominated and voted on by their professional peers through more than 13 million evaluations across 76 counties.  This year, after that laborious process, Best Lawyers recognized and listed 159,987 lawyers.  So why is this important? Continue reading

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Kristen Chenoweth, the Emmy and Tony winning actress, has a new book out, and this week she has been giving interviews to promote it. In the interviews, she has talked at length about the serious injuries she sustained in an accident on the set of the television show “The Good Wife.” Lighting equipment on the set fell and hit her causing a fractured skull, a fractured rib and nose, broken teeth and other long-lasting injuries. Chenoweth’s Dad counseled her to get legal representation. She did not. She now regrets it. Here are some things you should think about if you are hurt in an accident and are reluctant to seek legal representation. Continue reading

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It is fascinating to see what some people search for on the internet.  “I want a lawyer and a sandwich” is commonly searched because of a popular line in the 2011 movie titled Blitz.  A sassy criminal suspect delivers the line in response to being placed in police custody.   Of course, most internet searches focus on more routine and basic legal issues such as “When do I need a lawyer for a car accident?” and “How do I hire a lawyer with no money?” and “Can anyone be your lawyer?”  We have rounded up some of the most common questions and answered them.  Read on. Continue reading

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If you have Googled “How to Win an Accident Case” or “How Much Can I Sue for in an Accident Case” or “How to File an Accident Lawsuit” or anything similar to these types of searches, please proceed with extreme caution.  If you were in an accident with very minor, fully resolved injuries (like your neck was a little sore for a couple of days and without any medical intervention it completely improved), you do not need a lawyer.  But anything beyond that, you really should, at a minimum, consult an injury lawyer.  Now let us tell you why. Continue reading

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The first person ever arrested for drunk driving was a man named George Smith.  According to the History Channel, on September 10, 1897, Mr. Smith, a young taxi driver, got drunk and then drove his taxi into a building.  124 years and 6 days later, drunk driving continues to be a problem on roadways.   That is why The Law Offices of John Day continues to offer safe ride homes, and we are excited about our current free rideshare program with Middle Tennessee State University. Continue reading

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