What Qualities to Look for in the Best Accident Attorneys in Austin
When you have been involved in an accident that happened because of the negligence of another person or entity, it can feel very unfair. You may be dealing with traumatic injuries, leaving you in pain that requires expensive medical treatment. This treatment may mean that you have to take time off work to recover, and this can add lost wages to your growing list of worries.
Fortunately in Austin, TX, if your injury was caused by another party, there is a good chance that you are eligible to make a personal injury claim against them. Through either settlement or a lawsuit, you may be able to recover all of the damages you have suffered as a result of your injuries. You also may be able to pursue compensation for the pain, emotional trauma, and mental distress the accident has caused you.
Many victims of personal injury accidents, however, are uncertain of the procedure and may be unsure of how to find the right lawyer for the job. If you have never had the need for representation before, it may seem like a scary prospect, and you may not even know where to start looking.
Here at Chris Morrow Law, PLLC, as a personal injury law firm, we are dedicated to the representation of any victim that needs us. Whilst we believe we are the best choice for anyone who has been injured in Austin, TX, we also believe you should do your own research.
Our team has worked with countless victims of personal injury over the years, and this experience means that we have a long history of successful cases to draw upon. These victories mean that we are better prepared to handle your case, no matter what direction it takes, as we have most likely fought and won cases similar to yours before.
If you are suffering from car accident injuries, we can assign one of our dedicated accident lawyers to your case. If you have slipped on a wet floor in a private business, we can assign one of our premise liability lawyers to your case. Commercial trucking, drowning, electrocution, no matter what type of accident you were involved in, we have a personal injury lawyer uniquely positioned to help.
Call us at 512-520-8100 for a free consultation with an accident lawyer in Austin today.
Our Goal – To Provide a Reliable Austin Accident Lawyer to All Victims
Here at Chris Morrow Law PLLC, we know how scared and uncertain the victims of accidents can feel. Our goal is to provide education, representation, and a compassionate ear to any victim, regardless of their situation. Many potential clients are worried about what happens if they lose their case or if they cannot afford the upfront costs.
As part of our ethos is to help all victims, our accident attorneys in Austin work on a contingency fee basis and offer a free initial consultation and free case review to all potential clients.
This means we will sit down and examine your case for free and will provide you with the space to ask questions and the opportunity to receive some free legal advice from our attorneys. Our hope is that, if your case is a valid one, you will proceed with representation from our team. There are no strings attached and we are more than happy if you wish to walk away more educated than you were before.
If you do decide to proceed, we work for no upfront costs and we do not charge our clients any fees if we lose the case and cannot secure a settlement. If we win your case, we take a predetermined percentage of whatever we win. You never have to find our fees out of your own bank account, and we take the risks on your behalf.
What Qualities to Look For in the Best Austin Accident Lawyer
If you are currently looking for an attorney to represent you in your personal injury claim, it is important to understand what qualities are important. This can help you make an informed decision. After all, this decision is an important one, as your choice of an accident attorney will ultimately be the deciding factor in the success of your case.
Choosing the right attorney will ensure that you have every opportunity to seek the full compensation that may be on offer to you and will allow you to recover an accurate figure that covers the full scope of your damages.
We always recommend that you take the time to look at independent review sites such as AVVO. This can be an easy way to narrow down your choices. AVVO places a rating on attorneys based on a number of factors, such as:
- Previous Victories
- Accolades and Awards
- Peer Reviews
- Years of Service
- Independent Client Reviews
Here at Chris Morrow Law, PLLC, for example, many of our accident lawyers have stellar reputations, such as our founding attorney Chris Morrow, who has an AVVO rating of 9.0/10 and an average client review score of 5 out of 5 stars.
On AVVO, you can look for the attorneys that serve your local area, making it more likely that they have experience with other local attorneys, local insurance companies, courts, and Judges. A working relationship with these individuals can be massively beneficial.
Once you have done your research on the attorneys that serve your local area, you can narrow down your choice, and once you have a shortlist of potential attorneys, you can call them and arrange a free consultation with each of them.
Before this meeting, you should prepare yourself and create a list of questions you want to ask. We recommend asking questions that allow you to understand the following about your potential Austin accident lawyer:
Past Victories
The most crucial quality that you should look for in any attorney you are considering hiring is that they have a proven track record of winning cases that are similar to yours. The more success they have in cases that are similar to yours, the more experience they will have to draw upon. With more experience comes the ability to create a bespoke, robust strategy for your case, one based on the knowledge of what has worked before.
Availability
Most good attorneys will be in high demand year-round. This is usually a sign that they are good at what they do, but you should always ask how busy their schedule currently is and how they plan to allocate your case the time it deserves.
You should not expect to have access to your attorney around the clock, but they should be prompt to answer your queries, and you should never feel left in the dark. A good attorney will make sure that even if they are currently busy with another case, they respond to you quickly and keep you in the loop about when you can expect them to call you back.
Personality
Personal injury lawsuits can take several years to complete when the case is complex, and this means that you may need to spend several years working with the attorney you choose to represent you. You should make sure that you get along and that your personalities work well together because you may have to discuss personal matters with them and spend a lot of time on the phone or in meetings.
What To Do After An Accident In Texas
Having an accident attorney in Austin on-call can help those that have been involved in an accident to avoid the common pitfalls that many victims fall into. These pitfalls may lower your chances of a successful claim, and in the worst cases, the wrong move may make it impossible to claim.
If you have an attorney on call, you should involve them immediately, as they will be able to advise you on what to do and what not to do at the scene.
If you have not got an attorney on call, here is what you should do at the scene of an accident.
Check Injuries and Move To Safety if Possible
The number one concern following any accident is to prioritize your own health and well-being above everything else. This means that you should first take stock of the injuries you have suffered. If you are worried you have suffered a critical injury, such as head trauma or damage to the neck or back, you should refrain from moving, and if possible, do not let anyone else move you unless there is a dire need until the paramedics can assess the damage.
If you are certain your injuries will not be aggravated by doing so, you should try to move away from any further danger. If you have been involved in a fire, for example, move away from the fire if possible. If you have been involved in a car accident, move to the side of the road. Once you are safe, you can consider your next moves and assess others for injuries.
Call An Ambulance
Even in cases where the injuries are minor, unless you are a fully trained and competent first aider or there is a fully trained first responder or paramedic on the scene, you should always call for an ambulance to attend. This is important for several reasons.
Firstly, traumatic accidents can place victims into a state of shock, this can happen when adrenaline floods the system. This adrenaline can mask the pain and the symptoms of a serious injury, and even though the victim may feel fine, the pain and symptoms may appear when the adrenaline wears off. If the adrenaline was masking the symptoms of an internal injury or trauma, the delay in receiving treatment may prove fatal. Other injuries may not have any symptoms whatsoever, such as head trauma. By calling an ambulance, you protect everyone involved.
Secondly, the ambulance team attending the scene and addressing your injuries will help you when it comes to proving causation, which is the element of negligence that proves the injuries you suffered were a direct result of the accident and the other party’s negligent behavior.
Finally, all first responders and paramedics have to file an accident report once they have attended the scene, and this accident report is a great piece of unbiased evidence that can be obtained by your accident attorney later on down the line.
Call the Police
There are certain situations that will always warrant the police attending the scene. If the accident was caused by criminal behavior, involved drunk drivers or traffic, or if the at-fault party is acting aggressively towards other victims, you should always call the police.
In drunk driving cases, they will be able to carry out blood alcohol tests that will be instrumental in proving the negligence of the drunken driver. This will help your Austin accident lawyer when it comes to building your case.
The police will also file a police report following a car accident, which can be obtained by your accident lawyer in Austin, similar to the report filed by the ambulance team.
Collect Evidence
Evidence is one of the most important parts of any claim, and the more evidence you can provide your attorney when the case begins, the better. In some situations, you may not be on the scene, such as if you have been taken to hospital in an ambulance, but if you are on the scene waiting for an ambulance, and your injuries allow it, it will benefit your case if you can snap some pictures, a video or two and record a voice statement of what happened in your eyes.
Exchange Information and Witness Statements
Fortunately for some victims, witnesses on the scene of an accident often wish to help the victim and are willing to act as their eyewitnesses. If you were lucky enough to have eyewitnesses that wish to help, tell them that the best way they can help is to allow you to record a voice statement from them. You should also collect their contact details, email, numbers, addresses, names, etc.
The reason why a voice statement is so useful is that, in many cases, witnesses seem willing to help on the scene but become unreliable in the months or years that follow. If you have a recording of them, they only have to confirm the statement when your accident attorney calls up later.
Seek Medical Attention
One way that many insurance companies will attempt to fight a case is by fighting your attorneys’ claims of causation. If you did not receive medical treatment on the scene of the accident and did not seek medical attention in the hours, or days that followed, they may claim that you cannot prove that the injuries occurred in the accident.
This is why we recommend that if you did not receive immediate medical attention on the scene, you seek a checkup from a qualified physician as soon as possible. This record of medical attention can prove that the pain or injuries you are feeling were caused by the accident. A checkup can also ensure that you have not got any hidden injuries that were missed on the scene.
Call Your Insurance Company
When it comes to making car accident injury claims, you may be required to inform your own insurance company that you were involved in an accident in a certain time frame. You do not need to tell them any details of your car accident injury claim. Simply tell them that you were involved in an accident and that your Austin accident lawyer will be in touch with them shortly.
You should always be careful when it comes to discussing car accident cases with anyone other than your injury lawyers. Both your insurance company and the other party’s insurance company may use what you say against you to reduce their payouts.
This means you should never apologize to the other party, your insurance company, or the other insurance company, and you should never tell anyone that you feel fine or that you have not suffered serious injuries.
Contact An Accident Attorney in Austin Texas for Legal Representation
When it comes to the process of making a personal injury claim, the sooner after the accident you involve your accident lawyer in Austin, TX, the better your chances of winning your case. The more time they have to investigate, the better, and when it comes to time-sensitive evidence, such as CCTV footage that may be deleted daily or weekly, the better the chances they will have of finding the evidence necessary to support your claim.
The 4 Elements of Negligence in an Austin Personal Injury Claim
When it comes to personal injury law, there are four elements that need to be proven for liability to be assigned. The four elements of negligence are the core of your case, proving each is a task your attorney will carry out on your behalf.
The four elements are:
- Duty Of Care — For negligence to have occurred, the other party must have owed you a duty of care at the time of the accident. There are a number of reasons a person may assume a duty of care, which is a legal obligation to act in a way that protects others from harm. Common examples are the duty of care that all healthcare professionals assume to their patients and the duty of care that all road users owe to all the other users of the road when they get behind the wheel of a vehicle. This is why car accidents are usually more straightforward than other personal injury cases, as the duty of care is always assumed by drivers to other road users.
- Breach — The next step is to prove that the at-fault party acted unreasonably, thus breaching the duty of care they owed. To do this, your attorney will consider how a reasonable individual owing the same duty of care to you should and would have acted.
- Causation — The accident must have directly led to the victim of the accident sustaining injuries. Proving causation usually relies on being able to evidence that your injuries occurred during the accident. The best way to show this is with medical records that showcase the treatment that you received. The closer to the incident the better, which is why we always recommend calling an ambulance to the scene of an accident, no matter how serious the injuries may seem.
- Damages — You suffered economic and/or non-economic damages as a result. Proving economic damages usually means showing invoices, bills, and wage slips that prove you have suffered an economic loss. For your non-economic damages, it will be down to your attorney to present a compelling case that you have suffered as much as they are claiming you have suffered.
Negligence Explained
Understanding negligence is important. Essentially, negligence is the unreasonable behavior of an individual, who, at the time of their behavior, owed a duty of care, a legal obligation to act in a way that protects others from harm.
Proving negligence often relies on your attorney’s ability to show that a reasonable individual in the same circumstances would have acted differently if they were placed in the exact situation where you were injured.
Austin Accident Attorney FAQs
Is My Claim a Valid One?
If you are unsure if you have a valid claim, you should discuss what has happened with a skilled accident attorney. With their experience, they can offer a free consultation and case evaluation, using the meeting to ask important questions about what happened. At the end of this meeting, they will have a good idea of whether or not your claim is a valid one, and they will tell you as such. Personal injury lawyers take cases on a contingency fee basis, meaning they will want to evaluate your case to make sure it is worth the risk.
If I am Offered a Quick Settlement, Should I Take it?
It is a common tactic for insurance companies to offer a quick settlement that is much lower than the true scope of your damages. They know this is an effective tactic because many people will see the money they offer as attractive. Once they sign to accept the settlement, they forgo the chance to pursue further compensation. When the true scope of their damages becomes apparent, they are then left without enough compensation to cover for medical bills and expenses later down the line.
We recommend discussing any potential offer of compensation with your attorney. If you decide the offer is worth taking, you are free to do so, but usually, the first offer will act as a bottom line for your attorney to begin negotiating a settlement.
What are Punitive Damages, and How do I Claim Them?
Punitive damages are damages awarded by a Judge to punish the at-fault party. This is usually because they have acted in a malicious or grossly negligent way, and the Judge wants to make an example of them.
Punitive damages can only be awarded by a Judge, meaning your case must have reached the courts in order to pursue them. If your case settles outside of court then you will not be able to pursue punitive damages.
How Long Do Personal Injury Cases Take to Settle?
Every personal injury case comes with its own complex factors and a range of unique aspects that will be different from every other case. This means that the time they take to complete will be completely unique to that case.
The more complex the case, the longer it will take to settle. Examples of factors that make a case complex are: the severity of your injuries and the recovery time, the skill of your attorney, how clear the liability is, the other parties’ insurance company, and the skill of their attorneys.
Often, one of the most important factors is the reputation your attorney has. If your attorney is well known for winning cases in court, the other party will be more likely to settle as they know their chances of winning are lower.
Will My Case Go To Court?
Most personal injury cases will settle without the need for court intervention. However, you need to make sure that your attorney is a skilled litigator, as well as a skilled negotiator, as this will give you the best chances of success, no matter what direction your case takes.
Contact One of Our Accident Attorneys in Austin Today
If you are currently looking for legal representation for your Austin personal injury case, you should contact one of the skilled and experienced attorneys here at Chris Morrow Law, PLLC.
We have countless victories under our belts, giving us the advantage when it comes to creating a strategy based on previous success. We have working relationships with many of the attorneys on the other side of the table, and we have worked with many of the judges overseeing your case in court if it gets that far.
Call Chris Morrow Law, PLLC today at 512-520-8100, the Attorney That Works!
