Compensation

What Do I Do if the Other Driver Says the Accident is My Fault?

January 30, 2020 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

emergency worker standing near emergency vehicle Car accidents are catastrophic events. Sometimes it can be difficult just to determine what happened, let alone who may be at fault. Even when you can determine what happened, the other party may deny that it was their fault, or may even say that you caused the accident. If the other driver is trying to blame you for the accident, don’t lose home – there are things you can do to protect yourself and still successfully pursue a claim.

Get Statements from Witnesses

The people who were involved in the accident aren’t always reliable witnesses. For one, they may not have seen what happened or may have difficulty remembering details. Second, they are sometimes motivated to give a version of events that is biased in their favor. Any third-party witnesses to your accident can be tremendously helpful when it comes to proving liability. Because they are considered to be neutral parties, their statements or testimony can be very persuasive.

What is Your Claim Worth? Calculating Lost Wages and Income in Georgia (Part 2 of 3)

February 23, 2019 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

A man turning out his pockets If your injury leaves you unable to work, you will be facing lost income and the possibility that you may not be able to pay your bills. You may therefore be entitled to compensation that includes both your lost income and future income, regardless of whether you are a full-time employee, part-time employee, or work on an hourly or salaried basis.

Basic Lost Wages

For this part of your claim, it’s important to emphasize that you are calculating the income you actually lost. As a result, it’s important to carefully track the exact number of days and hours that you miss work, even if it’s just a couple of hours off to go to a doctor’s appointment. This is a straightforward calculation if you are paid on an hourly basis – you simply multiply the number of hours that you missed by your hourly wage. For salaried employees, the calculation is pretty much the same, but you may have to document your claim a little differently.

Social Media and Your Personal Injury Case

September 22, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

Social media is here to stay – most everyone uses either Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or one of the other platforms, and many people use multiple forms on a daily basis. We use social media to stay in touch with friends and family, celebrate important milestones, and even share the seemingly insignificant but entertaining aspects of our day. We even use it to share our struggles and misfortunes when we need a sympathetic ear.

In fact, social media has become so ingrained in our daily lives that we share our daily stories without much thought. “Oversharing” can be annoying or embarrassing, but in the context of a personal injury case, it can do irreparable damage to your chances of success. In this post, we’re going to share some suggestions to help keep your social media accounts out of your personal injury case.

First and Foremost: Check Your Privacy Settings

Understanding Insurance in Car Accident Cases

September 12, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

If you’ve been involved in a car accident, your first priority is your health. Before anything else, you need to get examined by a doctor and seek the necessary treatment. Unfortunately, everything that comes after that – namely, paying your medical bills – can get fairly complicated. In this post, we hope to shed some light on how insurance plays a role in compensating you for your injuries.

For purposes of this post, we’ll assume that your injuries are serious and will require long-term treatment, loss of income, and a significant amount of pain and suffering. Let’s also assume that you wind up having to pursue legal action in order to get fair compensation for your injuries.

Health Insurance

What Is My Claim Worth? (Part 2 of 2)

September 7, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

In our last post, we discussed some of the elements that you would use to calculate the value of your personal injury claim. To review, your claim should include the following: (1) medical expenses; (2) future medical expenses; and (3) property damages. In this post, we’ll review the remaining components of your personal injury claim.

Lost Income

Many people often overlook their lost income when trying to figure out what their claim is worth. To put it simply, lost income can be calculated as any time that you had to take off from work in order to seek medical treatment for or recover from your injuries. This could include the initial visit to the ER, follow-up visits with your doctor, and time you took off for physical therapy. In addition, you can also claim time that you had to take off for recovery. For example, if your doctor ordered you to stay in bed for a week following the accident, you could claim these days as lost income.

What Is My Claim Worth? (Part 1 of 2)

September 3, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

When someone is injured in an accident, there is a period of time where the victim is wondering whether or not to hire a personal injury attorney. Part of this decision involves trying to figure out what, if anything, the victim’s claim may be worth. This is very difficult for most non-lawyers to figure out, and they often leave important factors out when thinking about their expenses. As a result, most victims tend to underestimate the value of their claim, and often wind up settling their claim with the insurance company for far less than it is worth.

To be clear, getting injured in an accident is not like hitting the lottery – the objective is not to make money. But by undervaluing your claim, you run the risk of winding up with unpaid medical expenses or other economic losses on top of the pain and suffering you have to endure. We strongly recommend that you consult with an experienced personal injury attorney to get the compensation you deserve, but over the next couple of posts, we’ll review the various components of your claim.

Medical Expenses

Hot Coffee: Don’t Let Misconceptions Keep You From Pursuing a Personal Injury Claim

August 19, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

“I don’t want to be one of those people who gets injured and acts like she hit the lottery.”

“I’ll be fine, and I’m not looking to get rich.”

“I don’t want to milk the system.”

Terminix Fined $9.2 Million for Using Pesticide that Poisoned Family

March 28, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

The pest control company Terminix will pay more than $9 million in criminal fines tied to their use of a banned pesticide that sickened a Delaware family who was on vacation in the US Virgin Islands in 2015. The US Department of Justice says Terminix was sentenced earlier this week after admitting to using a pesticide called methyl bromide at 14 locations, including the St. John resort where the Esmond family was vacationing. Terminix will pay $8 million in fines and $1 million in restitution to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The company will also perform community service.

The EPA Found Traces of the Illegal Substance

The incident occurred in 2015 while the family was on vacation at the Sirenusa resort on St. John when two employees of the local Terminix fumigated the villa below theirs on March 18 with methyl bromide, which is not approved for residential use. After the family became ill, the Environmental Protection Agency found traces of the lethal gas in their villa. The exposure was so significant inside the treated unit that 6 weeks after the family fell ill, dangerous amounts of methyl bromide were still being detected inside the rental villa, according to EPA documents.

Five Ways to make Money If You’re Out Of Work Due to Injury

March 16, 2018 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

So you’ve been involved in an accident and you can’t work until you are healed. How do you make money in the meantime? This is a very common dilemma many of our clients face, and something that we are asked about often. While workers’ compensation and disability can help to lighten the blow of not being able to collect a paycheck, you may have additional expenses you need to take care of that those programs don’t cover.

Below are five ways that you can make additional money while you are out of work due to an injury.

Online Selling

Pot-Linked Traffic Incidents on the Rise

November 15, 2017 | by Slappey & Sadd, LLC

The number of drivers involved in fatal crashes in Colorado who tested positive for marijuana has more than doubled since 2013, federal and state data show. These trends coincide with the legalization of recreational marijuana in that state that began with adult use in late 2012, followed by sales in 2014. Coroners in the Denver area have been finding increasingly potent levels of marijuana in positive-testing drivers who die in crashes. Nearly a dozen in 2016 had levels five times the amount allowed by law and one that was at 22 times the limit. These levels were not as elevated in the years prior to Colorado’s legalization of recreational marijuana. In response, police, victims’ families, and safety advocates say the numbers of drivers testing positive for marijuana use are rising too quickly to ignore and highlight the potential dangers of mixing marijuana with driving. “We went from zero to 100, and we’ve been chasing it ever since,” Greenwood Village Police Chief John Jackson said of the state’s implementation of legalized marijuana. “Nobody understands it and people are dying. That’s a huge public safety problem.”

The 2013-2016 period saw a 40 percent increase in the number of all drivers involved in fatal crashes in Colorado, from 627 to 880, according to the NHTSA data. Those who tested positive for alcohol in fatal crashes from 2013 to 2015 – figures for 2016 were not available – grew 17 percent, from 129 to 151.The 2013-16 period saw a 40 percent increase in the number of all drivers involved in fatal crashes in Colorado, from 627 to 880, according to the NHTSA data. Those who tested positive for alcohol in fatal crashes from 2013 to 2015 – figures for 2016 were not available – grew 17 percent, from 129 to 151.

While recreational marijuana is not legal in Georgia, medical marijuana is, and there is evidence that the state is not immune from the negative effects of the drug that Colorado has faced. In fact, police estimate that the number of people being arrested for driving while high on drugs is up 20 percent in Georgia in the past five years. Despite this, Governor Nathan Deal signed a measure into law earlier this year that expands the list of conditions eligible for medical marijuana to include AIDS, Alzheimer’s disease, autism, epidermolysis bullosa, peripheral neuropathy and Tourette’s syndrome. Although marijuana provides numerous medical benefits to patients suffering from a variety of conditions, it is still a mind-altering substance, and eligible patients should not drive while using it. Driving while under the influence of marijuana is treated as a DUI, and anyone doing so will face the normal consequences that DUIs entail, including criminal prosecution and civil personal injury and wrongful death suits.