Houston Truck Accident Attorney

Houston Texas Attorney Michael Grossman Can Help You If You’ve Been Injured in a Truck Accident

Trucks rumble down I-45 and I-10 through Houston all of the time, and accidents will unfortunately result as the inevitable price of doing business.

Truckers are paid an hourly wage and often struggle through long days on the monotonous road to meet schedules. Occasionally, truckers will make errors in judgment or suffer lapses in concentration, and in other instances will even drive recklessly under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Due to the immense size of many commercial trucks, the damage and injuries caused by truck accidents can be catastrophic. If you have been injured or a loved one has been killed in a truck accident, then you need the help of an experienced attorney. After 20 years litigating cases involving 18-wheelers, Houston truck accident attorney and his team of associated at Grossman Law Offices know how to protect your rights and secure the compensation you deserve for the injuries and property damage that you have sustained.

In our experience, we’ve learned about not only the devastation caused by the accident, but also the stress and strain the process to obtain compensation can sometimes be. However, our attorney can use our experience to help guide you through the compensation process and ease the pain and strain you will incur.

Assigning Blame for the Wreck

While you may think you know who was to blame for your accident, the issue of fault can sometimes be tricky. Moreover, in many truck accident cases, more than one party may have caused or contributed to the cause of the wreck. Texas law recognizes a legal concept called respondeat superior, which states that employers are responsible for the negligent actions or inaction of their employees. Therefore, while the truck driver may have been the person at fault for your accident, the trucking company he or she worked for is also liable. Thus, truck accident cases usually involve at least two defendants – the truck driver and the company that employed the trucker.

However, our Houston truck accident lawyers at Grossman Law Offices understand that there may even be more liable third parties, and we’re dedicated to helping our clients pursue compensation from all of those who cause their injuries. That company that planned the route may have sent the truck onto a street or under a bridge that was not zoned for trucking. The company that loaded the cargo may have failed to secure it, resulting in a load shift that caused the truck to wreck. A mechanical malfunction could have been caused by a design error, with the manufacturer being responsible, or a maintenance error, with the mechanic being held accountable. As soon as we’re hired, our attorneys will investigate thoroughly to determine all of the negligent parties, so you receive the compensation you deserve and they get the punishment they deserve. We know where to look and the right questions to ask to get down the bottom of any accident’s cause.

Do You Need Legal Assistance?

The simple answer to this question is yes – definitely. Just determining liability in truck accident cases can be perplexing to an inexperienced attorney and downright dumbfounding to someone with no legal experience at all. Truck accident cases are much more complex from standard passenger vehicle claims. You need the help of a seasoned Houston truck accident attorney, if you want the fair compensation to which you are entitled.

Enormous Insurance Policies

Federal law mandates that trucking companies carry some form of insurance to protect against the inevitable accidents and injuries involving 18-wheelers, and these policies dwarf the normal car insurance policy. However, just because there is a large insurance policy doesn’t mean that you will be compensated adequately for your injuries. In fact, quite the opposite can be true. With more money to lose in the policy, commercial truck insurance companies often defend their policies vigorously. The larger the policy, the harder the insurance company will try to defend it.

In order to receive the compensation you deserve, you must be able to prove that the trucking company owed you the legal duty of not causing you harm and then violated that legal duty in the form of the accident. Then, the victim, also known as the plaintiff, must be able to prove he or she suffered a financial setback as a result of this harm, and that his or her assessment of the degree of that financial setback is fair and equitable. Since determining the value of concepts like pain and suffering can be highly subjective, you need the help of an experienced Houston truck accident attorney to make sure you are being compensated fairly and adequately. Insurance companies will try to short-change you to protect their assets, and they may even try to deny your claim. Grossman Law Offices can offer you the competent legal help to protect you from stingy insurance companies.

Beware Tricky Insurance Adjusters

You probably have fond memories of dealing with your local insurance agent. They count on you for business, so they try to accommodate your needs. However, the commercial insurance adjuster is not your friend. The insurance company is in business to make money, not to help you. With large sums of money on the line in truck accident cases, insurance companies often reserve their shrewdest insurance adjusters to handle these cases, and they know how to take advantage of unsuspecting victims. They will tell you that they want to help you, but they just need you to answer a few questions. Then, they attack you with questions, waiting for you to admit your own liability. If they can prove an accident victim was solely responsible for his or her own accident, then they can void the claim. If they can prove partial responsibility by the victim, then they can lessen the amount of compensation owed. When we’re hired, the Houston truck accident attorneys at Grossman Law Offices serve as a buffer between you and the insurance adjuster, protecting you from their misleading questions.

Aggressive Defense Attorneys

Since you are reading this, then you obviously have begun looking for an attorney, but you also haven’t found one yet. The trucking company and its insurance provider need not waste time searching for legal representation because they keep attorneys on staff to deal with problems like trucking accidents. As soon as the accident is reported, they race to the scene for the sole purpose of finding evidence to suggest that the victim caused the accident with his or her own negligence. In many cases, the defense attorneys have completed their investigation and devised a legal strategy before the victim has even hired an attorney. By securing a lawyer quickly, you give your legal counsel the best opportunity to prove your case.

Don’t Rely on the Lying Truck Driver

If you are depending upon the sense of decency and honesty of the truck driver who caused your accident, then think again. If the truck driver is found to have been liable for your accident and causes the insurance company to dole out a sizable settlement, then the trucker will be fired. Moreover, finding work elsewhere will not be easy. Thus, many people would lie in order to protect their jobs and abilities to provide for their families – especially given the current state of the economy and the job market.

For example, we once handled the case of a client who had been injured in a wreck with an 18-wheeler at night only to have the truck driver add insult to injury by claiming that he was driving without his headlights. Our attorneys raced to the scene and located a security camera on a nearby store. The video footage revealed our client had his lights on, shining a light on the truth and the trucker’s lies. Lies and misrepresentation in truck accident cases are commonplace. A skilled lawyer will be able to reveal the truth with thorough investigation and a well-conceived deposition strategy. The Houston truck accident attorneys at Grossman Law Offices will help you get to the truth of what happened in your accident.

Treacherous Self-Insured Companies

In some cases, trucking companies decide to reserve a portion of their assets to insure against accidents as opposed to purchasing a standard insurance policy. The federal government regulates insurance companies, but self-insured companies are not held to the same standards. Thus, self-insured companies have developed a reputation for behaving unethically and mistreating the people who have been injured by their trucks. If you’ve been injured by a self-insured company, then you will likely be negotiating with an office of the company instead of an insurance adjuster. This officer likely derives at least part of his or her salary from profit sharing. Thus, if he or she agrees to compensate you adequately, then he or she will be doing it at his or her own expense. They have no incentive to compensate you fairly. Our attorneys have seen self-insured companies tamper with evidence, threaten witnesses and intimidate victims. If you are being harassed by a self-insured company, then we can take legal action to compel them to negotiate in good faith.

What Should You Do Now?

First, it’s vitally important to the success of your case that you contact a Houston truck accident attorney as soon as possible. Evidence fades very quickly after a wreck – videos are erased, witnesses forget what they saw or disappear and the physical state of the accident scene evolves. Only by investigating quickly, can a lawyer find the evidence you need to prove your case. Our firm turns over every stone – examining video or photographic evidence, reviewing police reports, gathering forensic proof, locating and interviewing witnesses, and sequestering and inspecting all of the vehicles involved.

To illustrate the importance of a quick and thorough investigation, consider the case of another of our former clients. The families of two men hired us after one was killed and the other severely injured in a wreck with an 18-wheeler. The driver in this case committed a negligent maneuver that often leads to truck accidents. The trucker attempted to make an awkward turn and managed to get his truck’s trailer stuck in the middle of the road at night. Since it was dark, oncoming traffic could only see the trailer’s taillights by the side of the road, leaving the body of the trailer virtually invisible. Our client’s loved ones rounded a bend in the road and slammed into the trailer, ripping off the roof of the car, killing the driver instantly and leaving the passenger in intensive care. By the time our attorneys arrived at the scene, our client’s car had already been towed to a nearby salvage yard. When our investigators inspected the totaled car, they found it was missing headlights. No, they weren’t broken but gone altogether. Fearing for the fate of our client’s claim, our attorneys checked the salvage yard’s surveillance system, which revealed an agent of the trucking company stealing our client’s headlights. Only through a timely and diligent investigation were we able to thwart the trucking company’s unethical act and preserve our client’s right to compensation.

This is Not a Do-It-Yourself Job

If you haven’t figured it out yet, you need competent legal assistance if you want to secure the compensation you deserve for injuries sustained in truck accident. Granted, you can do a Google search to find out some information about the laws involved in your case, but that simple knowledge is not enough to litigate your case. You need an experienced Houston truck accident attorney like the ones at Grossman Law Offices to prove fault, identify all of the responsible parties and then devise and execute an effective legal strategy to convince the jury. Insurance companies and defense lawyers don’t fear inexperienced attorneys and people with no legal experience, but they do quail from the threats of an experienced attorney with a long track record of success. Over the past 20 years, we’ve taken on every major insurance company in the country and won millions and millions of dollars for our injured clients, so insurance companies often offer our clients pretrial settlements rather than risk facing us in court.

If you or a loved one has been injured in an 18-wheeler accident in or around Houston, then call us today at 1-855-392-0000 (toll free) for a free consultation. We can answer any questions you may have and tell you how we can get you back on the road to recovery just like we’ve done for so many other injured Texans.