So you’ve been injured in a Maryland automobile collision, and you want to get a settlement or verdict. What can you expect from the process? How long does it take? When will you get your money? There are two possible phases–the steps leading up to a pre-lawsuit settlement, and the…
In some Maryland auto accidents, there is simply a limited insurance available. We see this frequently in bus accident cases and collisions involving multiple vehicles. If there are many people with injuries, the at-fault driver’s insurance policy may not be large enough to pay for those injuries. How is the…
A permanent injury lawsuit is different from a garden variety injury case. In most cases (which are typically filed in the district courts), there is a car accident, an injury, discrete treatment for a up to about 6 months, and then the victim has fully recovered. In a permanent injury…
As a nation, we are concerned with ambulance-chasing lawyers, frivolous lawsuits, and the increased costs of doing business. Much of the dialogue, however, comes from insurance companies, big-business, and soundbyte-seeking media. Of course, lawmakers get into the act. A North Carolina bill recently proposed limiting lawsuits under certain circumstances, including…
I lived in Charles Village for most of Maryland life–we recently moved to Hampden, but Charles Village was where I lived during law school, two apartments, my first new home, and the infancy of our oldest daughter. By now, everyone knows about the collapse of the street at 26th Street…
The final piece of the puzzle is the attorneys’ fees. Attorneys’ fees don’t have anything to do with the full value of the case, but they have more to do with your take-home–with the final net value of your settlement. There are a number of different types of attorneys’ fees…
Payment of your medical bills is an important issue in a Maryland automobile collision case. There are a few possibilities: You pay out-of-pocket You pay with health insurance, Medicare or Medical Assistance You pay with PIP (personal injury protection) You don’t pay, and the bills are still outstanding Some combination…
Personal injury protection (PIP) is insurance that comes from the car you are in when you are hurt. It is sometimes referred to as no fault, and if you have PIP coverage it will provide benefits regardless of whether you caused the accident, or the accident was caused by someone…
Your auto case value is affected by the courts and counties where you are permitted to file the lawsuit. The reason is that (1) some courts have different limits on the amount of money you can recover; and (2), in general, the decision makers (judges and juries) have attitudes toward…
We’ve discussed how the strength of your case (liability and negligence) affects your case value, and we’ve discussed how the economic damages, like medical bills and lost wages, impacts your case value. Now we’ll talk about non-economic damages. Most people think of non-economic damages as “pain and suffering.” Each state…