Atlanta Injury Attorney Blog

I have handled over 1,000 cases through the years and one of the more frustrating scenarios involves having to explain to a client with a major injury like a cervical or lumbar disc herniation that the at fault driver only has minimum limits. As I have explained in my discussion on Georgia Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist Insurance, this is one of the major reasons why clients should carry $100,000 in UM insurance at a minimum. That said, many clients come to me after the crash and they only carried $25,000.00 in UM themselves. Herniated Disc cases in Georgia are worth more than $100,000.00 in most cases so the issue of available insurance coverages is a critical one for case evaluation.

For crashes that occurred prior to January 1, 2009 (when Georgia law changed) or for people that buy non-stacking UM coverage, the challenge became getting past the at fault driver’s $25,000.00 limits.

One argument that is gaining traction is the argument that if the client has to reimburse an outside party such as Medicare, Federal Workers Compensation Liens, Medical Liens etc., then to the extent that a check has to be written to those entities out of the recovery from the at fault driver, because those liens are not subject to the Georgia “made whole doctrine”, that dollar amount may be recovered against the Uninsured Motorist Coverage above and beyond the at fault driver’s limits. Toomer v. Allstate 292 Ga.App. 60 (2008) Toomer makes it clear that the argument is viable for Medicare liens and Federal Workers Comp claims, but it is still unclear if the Court of Appeals will apply the same logic to Medical Liens and Health Insurance Reimbursement Claims.

It will be interesting to see if Medical Liens and ERISA Self Funded Health Insurance Reimbursement claims will also qualify to allow older claims to dip into the uninsured motorist coverage that would otherwise be in the shadow of the torfeasor under the Bohannon decision. I will post updates as the issues are ruled on.

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Two clients recently came to me with compression fractures in the vertebrae of their spine as a result of car accidents, and they were both women. As a lawyer, this accident got me wondering whether compression fractures from car accidents are more common in women than men. Indeed, I have come to find that after experiencing car accidents, women are more vulnerable to compression fractures.

Since women are more likely to have osteoporosis, and as a result, their spinal vertebrae can be weaker and more vulnerable to the compression forces that can occur in car crashes in Georgia. It turns out that forty percent of women will suffer a vertebral compression fracture by the time they are eighty. (Source: University of Maryland Medical School www.umm.edu/spinecenter ) because compression fractures can result from trauma, and/or they can be a result of trauma that has affected an already weakened vertebrae (which may not be known by the individual at the time of the accident), it is essential to have an understanding of the possible effects of a car crashes on the spine.

As with all my cases, I delve deeply into the medicine behind the injuries to maximize the recovery. Therefore, I think it is important to explain what happens in a compression fracture injury here. The normal human spine resembles the diagram below with the vertebrae being separated by the intervertebral discs which act as shock absorbers and allow flexibility.Compression fractures in car accidents occur when too much force is exerted on the spinal column while it is being flexed in an unnatural way. Vertebral compression fractures usually occur at T11 and T12, which is the bottom of the thoracic region and at L1, the first vertebra of the lumbar region. These vertebral compression fractures that occur are due to the natural curve of the spine.

Let’s us assume that you have decided that your Atlanta injury case is small enough that it would not make sense for a lawyer to handle it. This assumes you have already read the article on should you hire an accident lawyer or not. We will also assume that you are either in a situation where the insurance company is making a low offer or they are fighting you on the issue of whose fault the crash is. Assuming you have the backbone for the fight…what is next?

First understand that you will be suing the other driver, not their insurance company. You will need to locate the other driver by looking at the crash report. Know that sometimes the address is wrong or the person has moved away so never ever wait until just before the statute of limitations (two years for Georgia injury cases and four years for property damage cases) because you may file the suit and then get a notice back from the sheriff saying that they were unable to serve the defendant ( a “non est”)

In Georgia, you must sue the defendant in their home county unless you are dealing with a non-resident of the state or you have a trucking company as a defendant. You can do this by mail, but I suggest going to the clerk’s office and picking up the summons and the return of service and sending your complaint. Click on this Georgia injury lawsuit that I recently filed. You will have to pay around $125.00 to file the suit.

Georgia drivers that are hit by hit and run drivers face unique challenges in handling their injury and property damage claims. We will break the discussion into two key subtypes; where the driver is eventually found and where they remain a phantom vehicle.

Hit and Run Driver is Eventually Located
These are great cases in that leaving the scene is a basis for an award of punitive damages in Georgia. This normally occurs when the driver flees the scene after the crash and someone is able to get the license plate number and the police track them down. If you are hit in a crash in Georgia and there is some basis for tracking the hit and run driver, work on the investigating officer to pursue the lead on the scene because many of these hit and run drivers leave because they are drunk or stoned. In the eventual civil case, we would be unable to introduce speculative evidence of intoxication, but hard evidence developed from the officer’s investigation that very night can be powerful.In a case involving a located hit and run driver in Atlanta, you should get a copy of the accident report and get in touch with the other driver’s insurance company immediately. They will advise you if there are any coverage defenses (unauthorized driver, named driver exclusion, etc.) If the coverage is valid, you should have an easy time bargaining for a high dollar value on your car if it has been totaled out as the threat of punitive damages gives you leverage. Remember to also ask for diminution in value if your car is repaired.

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As a Georgian, I was saddened to see that CDC officials have confirmed that there is salmonella contamination at a Blakely, Georgia factory that ships peanut paste and other products to 85 different companies. The outbreak of Salmonella has caused illness in over 40 states and has caused at least six deaths among the elderly.

Kellogs is recalling Austin and Keebler brand Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers and some Famous Amos Peanut Butter Cookies and Keebler Soft Batch Homestyle Peanut Butter Cookies.

It is still unclear if the salmonella strain in the Blakely plant matches the strain that has sickened people across the US. If the strains do match though, it is apparent that the peanut paste and peanut butter produced by the Peanut Corp. of America will have to be tracked down in every product it was baked in. Before I became an injury lawyer, I practiced as an insurance defense lawyer and handled food poisoning cases for Taco Bell, Olive Garden and Red Lobster. The key to prosecuting these cases is identifying the bacterial agent responsible for the illness and determining if there is a DNA match with the strains causing the outbreak. For the time being, Peanut Corp. has made a voluntary recall of all peanut butter made since Aug. 8 and all peanut paste produced since Sept. 26.

If you have been injured by a drunk driver, it almost always makes sense to hire an injury attorney because punitive damages are recoverable and they can multiply the value of an injury case ninefold. Although I have advised many prospective clients with minor injuries that you are capable of handling a Georgia injury claim on their own, when it comes to injuries from being hit by a drunk driver in Georgia, even modest injury cases can have significant value because punitive damages may be recovered.

Prospective clients often want to know if it is worth their while to hire an attorney given that 1/3 of the recovery goes to the lawyer and the answer is, sometimes. However, when the collision was caused by a drunk driver, juries take this very seriously and regularly return significant punitive damages awards. If you try and handle an Atlanta DUI crash case on your own though, the adjuster will use your inexperience against you.

For example, in a case involving emergency room care and a few follow up visits to the family doctor, where the crash was serious and caused by a drunk driver, an Attorney can research the criminal background of the other driver and lock down the dash camera recording from the arresting officer. Armed with that information we are able to maximize the client’s recovery in cases with modest medical bills. Even in cases with medical bills totaling less than $3,000.00, I have been able to recover the $25,000.00 policy limits because of the punitive damages aspect of the case. I have made significant recoveries in Georgia DUI cases against Farm Bureau, Liberty Mutual, Traveler’s Insurance, Farmers Insurance and State Farm.

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One of the most commonly asked questions is whether an injured client without health insurance can expect the at fault driver in a Georgia car crash to pay their medical bills. On a simple trip to the emergency room in Georgia, an average ambulance ride is $500.00, the ER physician is $250 and the ER itself is another $500.00.

The short answer is the other driver’s insurance will not pay your medical bills soon but eventually they will. When people are injured in a car wreck in Atlanta and they speak with the other driver’s insurance company, they are usually asked if they are hurt and then the adjuster will dissuade the client from getting any follow up medical care with a statement like this “we will only pay for medical care that we think is reasonable.”

To put it simply, if you have an injury and are seeing a doctor, the other driver’s insurance will not pay the bills as you go, even though they may give you that false impression by telling you to send over the bills. Do not become confused with your own vehicle’s Georgia medical payments insurance provisions as they will pay as you go.

As we have been discussing, the new Georgia Uninsured Motorist laws that went into effect on January 1, 2009 are drastically different. Check out this video for more details

When you are injured in a Georgia collision, you need to put your Georgia Uninsured Motorist Insurance carrier on notice as soon as possible because the failure to do so can void coverage. Problems usually arise with these coverages when you are covered under your parent’s or grandparents policy and you don’t realize that until a year down the road when you finally hire a lawyer.

Depending on the facts of the case and the Uninsured Motorist Insurance policy language, you can be required to give notice in as few as 30 days of the crash. See Flamm v. Doe, 167 Ga. App. 587 (1983). In Manzi v. Cotton States Mutual Insurance Company, 243 Ga. App. 277 (2000), the Court of Appeals ruled that the insured’s failure to give notice within 60 days voided the coverage. Keep in mind that if the policy is worded correctly, you can lose thousands of dollars of potential insurance coverage just by not asking the right questions. Failing to hire an injury attorney when there are serious injuries involved can have dire consequences.

What are some other sources of Georgia Uninsured Motorist coverage? If you have multiple car policies even with the same carrier, so long as there are separate policy numbers, these policies likely stack under OCGA Sec. 33-7-11(b)(1)(D(ii)

As a car accident lawyer, I receive numerous calls from clients that have had their cars totaled out in a crash only to learn that their car has depreciated tremendously since the time they purchased it. Most people are aware that if you buy a new or used car from a dealership, you are paying a premium price. With most new cars, 50% of the value you paid for is gone after three years. It is less true with used cars, but many of my clients that bought SUVs in the last 3 years cannot believe how much value has been lost. For most people though, the drop in value is on paper only as they don’t plan to sell the car; what happens when it is in a crash and totaled out though?

When your car is totaled out in a car crash in Georgia, the at fault party(and their insurer) owes the current market value of the vehicle and that is it. If you are upside down on the loan, there is no way to recover that from the other guy’s insurance company. Why not? The truth is you were upside down on the car 5 minutes before the car crash too and the crash only brought the situation into reality. Georgia Courts will not hold the other driver liable for anything beyond loss of use (rental) and the total current market value of the car if it is totaled.

Due to plunging resale values, the smartest thing you can do is buy gap insurance coverage when you purchase the vehicle. This coverage fills in the gap between the market value of the car and what you owe on the loan. In these tough times I cannot recommend this strongly enough.