Tyler Personal Injury Attorney

Tyler Injury Attorney Michael Grossman Discusses Personal Injuries in East Texas

• What is a Personal Injury?
• Can I File a Personal Injury Lawsuit?
• Elements of a Successful Case
• Why We Can Help

Experienced Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman helps victims, survivors and families of individuals who have suffered personal injuries. We help you navigate the process so that you can concentrate on healing and putting your life back in order.

With more than 20 years experience, Tyler personal injury attorney Michael Grossman and the other attorneys of Grossman Law Offices have a lengthy track record of fighting for their clients and winning thousands of personal injury cases. We may be able to help you, too.

What is a Personal Injury?

A "personal injury" is any type of physical injury and any accompanying or resulting suffering, such as emotional distress, that is caused due to the acts or omissions of another person or entity. Texas law says that the individual who suffers a personal injury (the plaintiff) enjoys the right to seek compensation from the person who caused the harm (the defendant).

Texas personal injury laws flow from the Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code. It’s important to be aware that Texas personal injury law does not state that the defendant owes the plaintiff anything. Rather, the law allows the plaintiff the right to seek fair and equitable compensation from the defendant, in order to make the plaintiff whole after a personal injury has occurred. Texas personal injury laws do not compel a defendant to pay money damages to a plaintiff. Plaintiffs have to pursue defendants, prove that the defendants were liable and prove the amount of their damages before they can obtain justice in the courts. Defendants are typically only liable for the amount of damages they proximately caused, and only to the extent suffered by the plaintiff, so it is critical that a case be prepared with a focus on showing not just liability, but also cause and damages.

How Do I Know Whether I Can File a Personal Injury Lawsuit?

Anyone can sue anyone. For your case to survive, and for your claims to succeed, you must prove Duty, Breach, Cause and Damages. First, you must show that the defendant owed you a legal duty. Then you must show that the defendant breached this duty, for example by taking an action or by failing to act. You must next show that the defendant’s breach of the duty caused you harm. Finally, you must prove that you were damaged. It is best to quantify your damages and reduce them to a monetary amount.

The duty of care owed by one person to another varies from situation to situation. For example, drivers are charged with the duty to operate their vehicles in such a way that they do not cause accidents. Reckless driving that harms another is a breach of the duty not to harm another. The level of care can vary depending on the identity of the parties. For example, your doctor owes you a greater standard of care than your neighbor owes you.

Determining whether a legal duty has been violated can be complex. In a set of facts, there may be more than one defendant who violated a duty from whom or which a plaintiff can seek money damages. Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman is available to consult with you to determine whether you may have a viable claim for personal injury.

More on the Elements of a Successful Case

As mentioned above, a successful personal injury case includes 3 elements: liability, damages and a solvent defendant.

Liability

A defendant is liable to a plaintiff if the defendant violates a legal duty owed to the plaintiff. The defendant is liable for the damages the plaintiff incurs. Usually a defendant violates his or her duty through negligence. "Negligence" means conduct that is careless, or even reckless, and that results in an accident of some type. Inattention is a common form of negligence. A defendant may also commit an act of "gross negligence." This standard is higher than a mere accident, and typically involves the defendant doing something that the defendant knows will or is likely to cause harm. For example, driving drunk is an act of gross negligence. Sometimes defendants commit "willful" or "intentional" acts that give rise to liability. These terms mean the deliberate infliction of harm on another, such as assault. Regardless of the level of the defendant’s conduct, the plaintiff must establish that the defendant acted at least negligently in some fashion that makes them liable for the plaintiff’s injury.

Damages

"Damages" in the personal injury arena refers to the monetary loss a plaintiff has suffered as a result of the defendant’s negligence, gross negligence, willful or intentional act. Damages must be distinguished from injury. If the defendant breaks your arm and you spend $5,000 at the hospital to have it treated, then the injury is the broken arm and your damages are $5,000 (or more).

It is not always easy to put a dollar amount on a plaintiff’s personal injury damages. For this reason, damages are split into General Damages and Special Damages. General Damages are non-economic damages that are subjective and difficult to prove, including pain and suffering, loss of consortium, disfigurement, emotional suffering and physical impairment.

General or non-economic damages can be difficult to prove. One reason to use an attorney for your personal injury case is for assistance with this. Attorneys such as Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman have years of experience quantifying and proving non-economic damages. It is extremely hard for an individual to represent themselves and adequately prove non-economic damages like pain and suffering. Attorneys like Michael Grossman know what questions to ask, how to amass proof, and how to present the case to the judge and jury so that plaintiffs are presented in their best light. Every situation is different and an attorney can help a plaintiff craft an appropriate, well supported demand for non-economic damages suffered by that plaintiff.

Special or economic damages are often objective and verifiable. Many financial losses that result from a personal injury are relatively easy to quantify. If a plaintiff suffers an injury and does not recover rapidly, however, calculating and proving special damages can be tricky. If a plaintiff is partially disabled as a result of an injury, for example, calculating lost wages is not as simple as multiplying the plaintiff’s current income by the number of years she or he is expected to remain in the workforce. The time value of money, expected raises due to merit, educational achievements, inflation and other factors, must be taken into account. The benefits the plaintiff would have enjoyed, including medical, dental, retirement, and similar benefits, must also be analyzed and reduced to a dollar amount.

It is critical that all damages be accounted for, analyzed and developed as part of a personal injury case. Many plaintiffs who represent themselves in personal injury cases unfortunately sell themselves short and let defendants get away without paying adequate compensation by failing to account for and demand payment for all aspects of their damages. Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman knows how to develop your case so that you can prove all of your damages, including both tangible and intangible damages, including damages that are incurred before settlement as well as those that will continue in the future.

Solvent Defendant

It is true that you can’t squeeze blood from a turnip. Neither can you necessarily recover money damages from a bankrupt defendant. No matter how reckless or willful a defendant’s bad acts were, no plaintiff will enjoy compensation unless the defendant has the means to pay. Unfortunately some plaintiffs will never be fairly compensated because the defendants who harmed they are not, and will never be, solvent.

One of the most important ways a personal injury attorney can help an accident victim is in this area. Sadly, some defendants who cause accidents will try to avoid their responsibilities by hiding assets. Experienced attorneys like Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman know how to hunt for hidden assets. One of the first things we do in a new personal injury case is trace the assets of the defendant, so that we can uncover hidden assets and also try to prevent the defendant from hiding any additional assets in the future.

Why an Attorney Would Help

Many people erroneously believe that the laws of the State of Texas adequately protect them and guarantee them fair compensation when they are injured by another. Unfortunately this is not the case. Texas law, as enacted by the Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code, allows plaintiffs to seek compensation for personal injuries. Plaintiffs must prove each and every element of their case in order to succeed with litigation. It is not enough to prove that defendant breached a duty and plaintiff was injured. If the plaintiff does not prove the amount of damages, the plaintiff will not win any money at trial. Conversely, a plaintiff can prove a million dollars in damages, but if he or she does not demonstrate, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the damages were proximately caused by the defendant, the plaintiff will take nothing.

Many people inaccurately believe that knowing the law is enough to prevail in a personal injury case. This is not true. Developing the facts of a case to support each and every element of a plaintiff’s claim, following the correct court procedure, adequately proving causal links, and presenting the facts in a light most favorable to the plaintiff (and most negative to the defendant) are critical items that must be done in order for a plaintiff to obtain justice in court.

Unfortunately, some plaintiffs call a personal injury attorney so late in the case that the attorney cannot help them as fully as they might have, had the attorney been consulted earlier in the case. Plaintiffs sometimes believe that insurance companies and defendants will compensate them because they have been injured and have suffered damages. The interests of the insurance company, however, are not aligned with the interest of the plaintiff. Insurance companies want to maximize their profits. That means they want to deny claims wherever possible, and settle claims that they can’t deny for low-ball, sometimes insulting, amounts, which do not even begin to cover a plaintiffs economic damages. It is very difficult for a plaintiff to get any special or non-economic damages out of an insurance company when the plaintiff is representing himself.

Plaintiffs are benefited when they get personal injury attorneys involved early in cases. The attorney can oversee development of the case, and head off any unscrupulous acts by the insurance company or their agents. For example, an attorney can insist that an insurance company doctor adequately test a plaintiff, rather than just conclude the plaintiff isn’t injured without sufficient inquiry. The attorney can also help protect a plaintiff’s case by responding to and propounding discovery. It’s very important to get an attorney involved before being faced with Requests for Admissions, Interrogatories, or other legal documents. A plaintiff’s answers to these discovery items can come back to haunt them, and many plaintiffs answer these documents in plain English, when they would be better served answering in legalese with the assistance of an attorney. It’s also important to uses the discovery tools against defendants, and to phrase your requests in such a way as to effectively force a defendant to actually answer the question, rather than use tricky words and phrases that sound impressive but don’t answer any question or convey any content. Finally, procedural devices such as motions to dismiss, motions to compel, summary judgments, interlocutory appeals, counter-claims, cross-claims and similar devices can frustrate plaintiffs who represent themselves, and can lead to final disposition of a case in favor of a defendant.

Your Personal Injury Case is Important to Us

Tyler injury attorney Michael Grossman and the other attorneys at Grossman Law Offices know your personal injury case is important to you. Your case is important to us, too. We can use our expertise to help you make the most of your personal injury case. We have the experience, track record, knowledge, passion and will to help you maximize the value of your claim and get the compensation and justice you deserve. Call us anytime, 24/7, for a consultation at 1-855-258-1111 (toll free).