Injury Attorneys in Houston

Discuss Your Case With Our Injury Attorneys in Houston Texas

If you have been injured in an accident due to someone else's negligence you may well be able to seek compensation for your losses by filing a personal injury lawsuit.

If your lawsuit is successful, you could receive a settlement that would cover your medical bills, any legal bills, bills for damage to property, lost wages or lost potential future income and pain and suffering. This, however, is not any easy process. Personal injury law is complicated and the defendants attorneys can be expected to put up a vigorous defense. This is most certainly not the kind of case for a novice law firm to take on, let alone a non-lawyer attempting self-representation. An experienced injury attorney in Houston like Michael Grossman can, however, make all the difference in the world on your case. Grossman Law Offices has had over 20 years of experience litigating personal injury cases and can help you in securing a fair settlement for your injuries.

Explaining Personal Injuries

In order to file a personal injury lawsuit a person must have suffered a physical , mental or emotional injury. This injury must also have been caused by the negligence of another person or entity. If a person has been injured, he or she may seek compensation for injuries suffered because of that accident. While people most often think of auto accidents or on-the-job accidents as the most common personal injury cases, there are many other types of accidents as well.

Defendants, no mater how negligible they may be, do not automatically owe a victim any compensation. Rather, it is up to the victim … or plaintiff ... to seek compensation for his damages. Here, damages refers to the monetary value put on the actual injuries. In other words, if you are run over by a car and suffer a broken leg, then the amount of costs that you suffer because of that injury would be your damages.

The victim must prove that the defendant was responsible for the accident that caused his injuries. It is up to the plaintiff to show the defendant's negligence. The defendant is assumed to be innocent, with the burden of proof on the victim.

Do I Have A Personal Injury Case

If a person violated their legal duty to another person and this negligence on their part caused an accident in which the other person was injured, then a personal injury lawsuit may be brought against the negligent party. Example: In an auto accident the responsible driver is said to be negligent because he has violated the legal duty of care owed to the injured drive. The injured driver may seek compensation via a lawsuit.

In order to be successful in this lawsuit, the victim must show both that the defendant owed the plaintiff a duty of care and then that the defendant broke that duty of care. The burden of proof is upon the victim, not the defendant\. Proving this duty of care can be difficult since the level of care can vary from situation to situation depending on the circumstance involved and the relationships between the parties involved. Example: A surgeon operates on you at your request, and in the operation makes an incision. The surgeon is showing an appropriate level of care to you, his patient. In the next scenario, the same surgeon approaches you at a restaurant and proceeds to make an incision on your body. This is clearly breaching the level of care between two people at a restaurant. The same two people have been involved, and the injury is similar. But the circumstances and the relationships between the two people have changed, and therefore the duty of care. This is admittedly difficult to comprehend easily; contact a Houston personal injury lawyer to learn more.

In addition, there can be more technicalities involved depending on the details of the accident. Example: At a construction site a worker is injured when scaffolding collapses. The employer is negligent in this scenario because he broke his duty of care to provide a safe work environment. Now lets imagine a second scenario where the worker is not a regular employee but rather a contract, or temp, worker. In this case it doesn't matter that the employer was negligent because under Texas law there exists no contract between employer and contract worker; the employer in this case would not have to make any restitution to the worker or his family. Michael Grossman of Grossman Law Offices has been litigating personal injury cases for over two decades and can help assess liability in your case as well.

The Three Key Elements in a Personal Injury Case

There are three key elements that need to be proved in order to win your personal injury case. These are liability and negligence; damages; and solvency. Let's examine them in more detail.

• Liability and Negligence - If a person violates a duty of care to a person and consequently the victim has an accident that causes injuries and financial losses (damages) then that person is said to be liable for those damages. In simpler words, the defendant has liability which means that he or she was at fault for the accident. In most cases there is but one defendant, although in others there may be multiple defendants, all sharing partial liability.

  The most common cause of a breach in duty of care owed is because of standard negligence, often called carelessness. Example: A driver becomes distracted while reading a text message and crashes into another driver.

  A legal duty of care may also be violated by what is called gross negligence. Gross negligence is behavior that the defendant knew could cause an accident and consequent injury to another person,. Example: Drivers who drink and then drive and subsequently cause an accident are guilty of gross negligence since they do know that their behavior may cause accidents and injuries to others. Even more extreme are what are referred to as intentional or deliberate torts. An example of this would be assaulting someone with a weapon.

• Assessing Damages - In order to win your case you must next be able to show that the victim suffered damages as a result of the accident. Many people confuse the term damages with the term injuries. Damages are simply the monetary value placed upon your injuries. In other words, if I drive recklessly and crash into you and you suffer injuries of a broken leg, then the damages would be the bills you incurred for medical care and for car repair.

  There are two principal types of damages: general damages and special damages. Let's examine them in more detail.

  • General Damages: - General damages are quite subjective because of their intangible nature. Examples of general damages would include emotional pain and suffering, loss of consortium, disfigurement, physical impairment as well as others. Since each personal injury case is different, general damages are always subjective. Example: A firefighter is rescuing a child trapped in a burning building when both are injured, receiving the same types of injuries and receiving the same medical treatments. The child could well receive a larger settlement since it could be argued that the firefighter was well aware of the potential for injuries in his job while for the child would suffer greater emotional pain and suffering from his experience. A Houston personal injury lawyer can shed additional light on this complex topic. Michael Grossman from Grossman Law Offices has the knowledge and experience to fully assess and calculate general damages in the most technically complicated cases.

  • Special Damages: - Special damages are much more objective and thus are more straightforward to calculate. Some common examples of special damages would include medical bills, lost wages, future lost potential income, legal costs and physical property damages. While some components of special damages such as medical bills may be quite simple to calculate, others .. like lost future potential income …. are much more difficult to estimate. While it may seem initially fairly easy … multiply annual salary times the number of anticipated years remaining to work … that does not take into consideration the potential of raises over the years or bonuses or any other financial increments that now will be voided because of the accident.

The Issue Of Solvency In Personal Injury Accident Cases

Solvency means that the defendant has the financial resources to be able to pay the compensation that you are requesting, should you be successful in winning your lawsuit. If the defendant is insolvent - with no financial resources … then there is little reason to initiate a lawsuit, even if the defendant was full liable and if real injuries occurred to the plaintiff.

Unfortunately, sometimes a unscrupulous defense attorney will have the defendant attempt to hide his assets in order to appear insolvent. In this way the defendant wouldn't be held accountable for compensating the victim. When the meticulous attorneys at Grossman Law Offices represent a client we always investigate the defendant thoroughly, and conduct a comprehensive asset check. If there are financial resources hidden, we will most definitely find them.

Contact Grossman Law Offices if You Have Been Injured in an Accident

It is rarely ever a wise idea to attempt to represent yourself in a personal injury case. Sometimes a person will believe that he or she has a good grasp of the law as it relates to that individual's case. Knowing a bit about law and being able to competently apply the law are two totally different things. Understanding all the required courtroom processes, knowing which piece of evidence is crucial, handling challenges from the defendant's lawyers, obtaining expert testimonies to substantiate aspects of a case … all of these occur on a daily basis in personal injury cases and are just too complicated for the non-lawyer or even for the novice attorney.

The attorneys at Grossman Law Officers have been litigating personal injury cases for over 20 years. During that period we have won millions of dollars in settlements for hundreds of clients, from major insurers nationwide. These giant insurance companies are only too well-aware of out stellar reputation and today often prefer to settle out of court rather than meet out tenacious lawyers in front of a jury. This can translate into a shorter period of time for you to be tied up in the whole legal process and can also lead to receiving a settlement faster. This, in turn, would allow you to get back to enjoying your life once again.

For a completely free consultation, contact Grossman Law Offices today at 1-855-392-0000 (toll-free). We are available 24 hours a day and would be pleased to discuss your case with you and to answer all of your questions.