Why You Should Consult an Attorney Immediately After a Serious Injury

Sophisticated companies and their insurers have teams of well-paid attorneys and other professionals that immediately respond to incidents in an effort to protect the company and help them avoid liability.  And they do not play fair.  Many, many cases are lost simply because the injured person did not consult a lawyer sooner.

It is important to act fast.  Response teams working for companies and their insurers have been known to travel to the scene of the accident, and will approach injured persons to get them to sign releases for low sums of money without the person speaking with a lawyer first.  For example, in the case Garcia v. LumaCorp Inc., the president of a company and two other persons went to the house of an injured employee, without attorneys present, and offered the injured person $24,000 on the spot if he would sign a release right then.  The person needed the money, because he had more than $10,000 in medical bills, and he signed the release despite it being in English and him speaking only Spanish.  He later hired attorneys, who attempted to help him, but it was too late.  The court refused to undo the release, and ruled that the claims had been released.  See Garcia v. LumaCorp Inc., 429 F.3d 549 (5th Cir. 2005).

Following an incident — especially a catastrophic incident — the company responsible will also move quickly to ensure that evidence disappears.  This can frequently happen in the most severe of cases, such as 18-wheeler incidents.  Indeed, our firm has handled and won cases in which 18-wheelers fled the scene and did not stop.  The drivers later claim they did not hit anyone, or that the impact was so slight they did not feel it.  

For that reason, it is critical to preserve data and vehicles immediately following an incident to be able to prove what really happened.  Not everyone knows that 18-wheelers usually have data recorders showing how fast the 18-wheeler was going, whether brakes were applied and how hard, whether the wheel was turned and how, whether cruise control was on or off, sudden changes in motion, whether seatbelts were on, the exact time and location of the incident, and more.  18-wheelers are also often equipped with video cameras.  And, of course, following an incident the 18-wheeler itself will often be damaged, which can demonstrate how severe the wreck was.  The best way to prevent this evidence from being destroyed is to have a lawyer—immediately—send a letter demanding that it be preserved.  Without such a letter, the company will falsely claim they did not believe the incident was a big deal, and that they did not feel it was important to keep the evidence. 

There are other steps the 18-wheeler companies take to help evidence disappear, in addition to simply deleting or destroying it.  They will promise to take care of you.  They may even give you some money right there on the spot to assist with car repairs, or to pay for your hotel room for the night, or to take care of the ER bill with cash.  A private investigator may come to the scene, or the hospital, or your home to talk you out of calling a lawyer, promising you that they will have to fight the claim if you do, but they will treat you very fairly if you do not.  In the meantime, as you wait to call a lawyer, they are quickly working to get the 18-wheeler and its driver far enough away in the next several hours and days so that the data that was recorded can be deleted or overridden.  They are hoping that they can quickly get the truck repaired, and the brakes fixed, and the tires replaced, so that the causes of the crash and the nature of the crash can be disputed.  And most of all, they are hoping that a lawyer does not send a letter immediately insisting that everything be preserved.

We see these tactics everyday, and we know how to beat them.  Moving fast immediately following an incident is the best way to fight against them.  The big companies and their insurers have teams immediately working for them.  So should you.