Dallas Lawyers Dedicated to Helping Car Accident Victims Head-on collisions often result in catastrophic harm, such as paralysis or traumatic brain injury, and they may sometimes lead to death, especially if the accident occurs at high speeds. Since the consequences are so severe, drivers should do everything possible to avoid these accidents, including swerving away if possible. If another driver crashes into you in a head-on collision in the Dallas area, you should enlist a car accident attorney at Feizy Law Office to protect your legal rights.
Seek Compensation through a Negligence Claim In a lawsuit based on a head-on collision, most injured individuals will assert the other driver’s negligence. To prove negligence, a person bringing a claim needs to show by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant owed him or her a duty of reasonable care, the defendant breached the duty by acting carelessly or recklessly, the breach led directly to the accident, and the victim incurred damages.
The duty of care is usually defined as using the degree of precautions when handling a vehicle that an ordinary person would use in a similar situation. Anyone behind the wheel is expected to act in a manner that avoids posing foreseeable risks of harm to those around them. Often, when a car crosses the median or drives the wrong direction on a one-way street, the driver of the car is impaired due to distractions, alcohol, fatigue, or speeding. A driver who is applying makeup, texting, or intoxicated, among other careless or reckless behaviors, likely will be found to have breached the duty of care.
In some cases, both drivers are at fault for a head-on collision. For example, if one person is driving 30 miles above the speed limit on a dark, rainy night, and a drunk driver accidentally turns down the wrong way down the same road, they may wind up in a collision that is partially the fault of both.
Texas follows the rule of modified comparative negligence. This means that a jury can find one driver up to 50 percent responsible for a head-on collision, and that person can still recover damages from the other driver involved. However, any damages would be reduced by his or her percentage of fault. This means that if a jury awards the speeding driver above $100,000, but finds that he was 30 percent at fault, that individual can only recover $70,000 from the drunk driver. If the speeding driver were found to be 51 percent or more at fault, he or she would be barred from recovering any compensation.
Economic and non-economic damages following an accident can provide compensation for medical bills, lost wages, lost earning capacity, property damage, pain and suffering, and a range of other costs arising from it. However, a claim must be brought within a certain time period, known as the statute of limitations, or the victim’s right to compensation likely will be barred.
Discuss Your Motor Vehicle Collision Claim with a Fort Worth Attorney If you are seriously injured in a head-on collision, you likely have substantial medical bills and need to take time off from work. In most cases, even when the other party was at fault for the accident, that individual’s insurer will try to place some or all of the blame on you. It is important to seek guidance from a knowledgeable motor vehicle collision lawyer following a crash in Fort Worth or elsewhere in the region. Contact Feizy Law Office at (214) 651-8686 or via our online form. We represent victims of head-on collisions in Garland, Plano, Arlington, and Irving, among other cities around Dallas.