Why is it important to have a lawyer to help you with a trucking accident case?

If you have been involved in a trucking accident case, you may think the case is straightforward and doesn’t merit the use of a lawyer. We disagree. Having a lawyer help you navigate the case will be beneficial to you for many reasons. Some of our readers have outlined some of those reasons below. Keep reading to find out what they are.
Kevin Biniazan

Kevin Biniazan

Kevin Biniazan, Partner at Breit Biniazan.

Defend You Against the Company

Oftentimes, prosecuting a case for a client who has suffered life-altering injuries in a trucking accident involves more than determining the fault of the crash itself. Trucking companies and carriers are notorious for playing shell games with company names to avoid responsibility for hiring bad drivers by claiming the drivers are independent contractors.

This means that a lawyer pursuing these cases must be familiar with these defenses and prepared to overcome them while also playing offense by finding all responsible people and companies. When a catastrophic injury is caused by a tractor-trailer, carrying minimum insurance coverage becomes even more important.

An experienced trucking accident attorney will know how and where to find the right defendants to maximize insurance and other coverages to compensate a catastrophically injured person fully.

You Have an Advocate

I think the most important reason for having a lawyer’s help with a truck accident case is that they can prevent you from misspeaking or unintentionally harming your case. If you aren’t familiar with legal proceedings, there can be lots of processes to go through that you won’t know anything about. This can be overwhelming, stressful, and can lead to miscommunication between you and the insurance company or other parties. Having a lawyer present simply reduces this risk, making sure that you receive the best possible outcome.

Daniel G. Leone

Daniel G. Leone

Daniel G. Leone, Personal Injury Lawyer at NJ Law Results.

Ben Michael

Ben Michael

Ben Michael, Attorney, Michael & Associates.

Be Well Represented

Trucking accidents typically cause significantly more damage and/or injury than your average vehicle accident. The more damage and injury, the more you want a lawyer. Lawyers can help you get the maximum value and best possible outcome for your case. Commercial truckers will typically have decent legal representation through their company and will have a lawyer right from the get-go, so if you’re the injured party, you want to make sure that you are just as well represented.

Trucking Accident Cases are Complex

It is important to have a lawyer help you with your trucking case because trucking cases are incredibly complex both in terms of proving liability (fault) and in proving damages (the amount of money you get for your injuries).

Trucking companies are used to getting sued because collisions happen, and they know that trucking cases are high-exposure cases so they will spend the money to hire the best lawyers to defend them. You do not want to be the person going up against those lawyers alone or with a lawyer who doesn’t know what he or she is doing.

Also, many times trucking companies will blame the victim to avoid liability. That means you have to immediately hire the right investigators to immediately go out and preserve evidence such as photographing tire tracks or debris in the road so that evidence is not lost forever.

Trucking companies have their own complex vocabulary and organizational structure, which can affect how and who you pursue in the litigation for recovery. The obvious claims are against the truck driver and the trucking company.

However, the not-so-obvious potential defendants could include logistics companies, maintenance companies, or others involved as carriers or forwarders. Being able to identify and locate these companies or individuals can directly affect how much insurance is available to resolve your claims.

This is why it is so important to hire an experienced lawyer to assist you on the case. You are leaving money on the table if you try to do it yourself. A true professional will give you a return of multiple times what you are paying them.

Parag L. Amin

Parag L. Amin

Mr. Parag L. Amin, Esq is an experienced litigator, personal injury lawyer, and managing attorney at the Law Office of Parag L. Amin, P.C.

Alex Uriarte

Alex Uriarte, Personal Injury Attorney at 1-800 Injured.

Preserve Potentially Vulnerable Evidence

As a qualified personal injury attorney, I believe that hiring a personal injury attorney right away enables the lawyer to preserve potentially vulnerable evidence, such as the truck’s black box and driver logs. It also allows them to speak with any witnesses while their memories are still recent. They might also look into the trucking firm and everyone else liable for the accident.

The attorney can look for evidence of negligence and patterns of negligence by reviewing the driver’s and the trucking company’s records. They can also examine the data from the truck’s data recorder to check for indications of mechanical breakdown. If you think the motorist was using a cell phone while driving, the attorney may also demand records.

This is a crowdsourced article. Contributors' statements do not necessarily reflect the opinion of this website, other people, businesses, or other contributors.