Riverside Personal Injury Lawyer

Have you or a loved one sustained any kind of loss due to the negligence or wrongdoing of others in Riverside, California? Maybe you were on Magnolia when a car ran a red light and sideswiped you. The other person claims it is your fault for making a right on red without looking. If it is your word against their insurance company, you may want to hire a Riverside personal injury lawyer. Perhaps you were hiking Mount Rubidoux and another hiker’s dog bit you. That car you bought at a dealership downtown was defective and had a factory recall you should have been told about. Whatever the nature of your loss, you may be entitled to compensation. Perhaps the responsible party is not claiming fault and is refusing to supply sufficient reimbursement. Whether your losses are physical, financial, psychological or related to loss of reputation, the injury attorneys at Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP can research your situation and determine how much compensation you are owed.

Our personal injury law firm offers free consultations and you won’t pay a dime unless you win!

How Can a Personal Injury Lawyer Help With My Case?

Hiring a personal injury lawyer can resolve many of the problems that you may be facing after a serious accident, such as finding the right doctor to treat your injuries and protecting your rights during conversations with an insurance claims adjuster. Your lawyer will take immediate steps to help you recover physically, emotionally and financially from a bad accident in Riverside. Retaining an attorney can come with many important benefits, including:

• Greater peace of mind during a difficult time in your life.
• A professional taking care of complicated claims paperwork for you.
• A team of expert investigators on your case.
• Stronger negotiation capabilities.
• Connections to qualified experts.
• A higher settlement offered by an insurance company.
• The ability to go to trial in Riverside County, if necessary.

A Riverside personal injury lawyer can help you obtain the compensation that you need using aggressive legal tactics, such as submitting a counteroffer to an insurance company or arguing your case before a judge and jury. A lawyer can also support your lawsuit with evidence that the defendant is at fault. Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP operates on a contingency fee basis, meaning you won’t pay your lawyer any legal fees unless we win your case.

Cases Represented by the Law Firm/Examples of Settlements Won

At Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP, our personal injury lawyers have years of experience representing individuals and families in the fight for fair financial compensation. We know the strongest tactics and legal strategies to use to achieve the best possible case outcomes for our clients. Our past case results speak for themselves:

1. Anderson v. General Motors $4,907,632,000
2. Blair v. Moreno Valley Unified School District $135,000,000
3. Lampe v. Continental General Tire $54,000,000
4. Doe v. Private Charter Company $30,000,000
5. Dominguez v. San Francisco $27,394,567
6. Barber v. Mossy Ford $22,765,864
7. Nelsen v. Hillyard, Inc., et al $21,067,093
8. Jun v. Chaffey Joint Union High School District $20,500,000
9. Zastanwik v. Asplundh $19,466,000
10. Yoon v. United States $17,845,000
11. Tilton v. Southern California Gas & Electric $15,000,000

Many of these wins were landmark cases that broke records for the highest personal injury settlements or verdicts of their kind. Our personal injury attorneys are willing to do what it takes to achieve top results, even if that means taking on large and powerful adversaries in court. Although we never guarantee positive results, we do promise to work tirelessly on behalf of you and your family for the results that your injuries demand.

How Can a Riverside Personal Injury Attorney Help?

If you have sustained a sizable loss of any kind, an injury lawyer may represent your case against other individuals, companies, agencies, government entities, or other groups. Special tort laws govern damages and losses of any kind and personal injury lawyers exhaustively research these laws to provide their clients with the best possible defense. When injury attorneys gather information from their clients, they determine which personal injury laws are directly related to the situation and can provide a case for gaining maximum compensation. A Riverside personal injury lawyer will also handle all negotiations with the insurance companies and fight for a fair settlement.

Riverside Personal Injury Cases We Handle

Common accidents that occur in the Riverside area and that we represent include:

• Spinal Cord Injuries
• Catastrophic Injuries
• Brain Injuries
• Burn Injury
• Car Accidents
• Dog Bites
• Drunk or DUI Accidents
• Truck Accidents
• Medical Malpractice
• Motorcycle Accidents
• Pedestrian Accidents
• Product Liability
• Premises Liability
• Wrongful Death
• Work Injuries
• And much more!

Riverside Personal Injury Statistics

Riverside County is home to approximately 2,470,546 people, according to the latest U.S. Census data. The county has seen a 12.8% increase in population since 2010. With that many citizens, accidents with serious injuries are bound to occur. So how many injury cases is this really? Below you will find a visual chart of the total non-motor vehicle-related personal injury case filings in Riverside County. The date range is from 2010 to 2020. Source: California Courts Reports

What is the Statute of Limitations on Riverside Personal Injury Claims?

The length of personal injury lawsuits in Riverside is also determined by many factors, including if the case goes to trial or not. Each injury claim is unique and a general timetable cannot be defined as they can range from a few months to a few years. When you are providing evidence under oath, you will be asked about the types of losses you have sustained, whether there were witnesses, if you have had any previously related circumstances, what your job history is, your personal injuries, and more. The answers to each of these questions can potentially simplify or complicate your case.

How Much is Your Personal Injury Case Worth?

Your personal injury lawyer will look at a number of factors to determine how large your settlement claim can be. These factors include your current and future medical expenses and bills, lost income due to disability or hospitalization, loss of ability to work, physical or emotional pain, property loss, reputation loss, and other factors. There is no formula for figuring out the value of your case. Personal injury attorneys must take all the elements of your situation into consideration while researching laws and previous cases.

How Much Does a Personal Injury Lawyer Charge?

At Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP, our Riverside injury attorneys take their clients’ cases as their own. We front the costs of the claim so that our clients can benefit from high-quality legal representation at no financial risk. As we partner with our clients, we do not charge attorney’s fees and work on a contingency fee basis where costs for legal representation are not due until financial compensation is obtained for the client in the case.

If we succeed in securing financial compensation for your personal injury case, we will charge our fees as an agreed-upon percentage of the final settlement or judgment award obtained. If we do not win your case, you won’t owe us anything for the services rendered – guaranteed.

Fault Laws in California

In California, the fault for an accident is generally assigned to the person or party most responsible for causing the hazardous condition. In a car accident case, for example, fault will go to the driver or party that committed an error, such as distracted driving. This is because California is a fault-based car accident state, rather than a no-fault state. In a no-fault state, all drivers would recover from their own insurance providers, regardless of who caused the wreck.

It is possible for more than one party to share fault for an accident, injury or death. California’s joint and several liability law states that multiple defendants are held jointly responsible for a victim’s economic damages. This means that even if each defendant alone does not have enough to pay for a victim’s losses, together they can fully compensate the victim. Multiple defendants are held individually liable for their share of noneconomic damages, however, such as pain, suffering and anguish.

Some personal injury cases in California invoke the doctrine of strict liability. Strict liability means that a party is at fault for an accident even if they were not careless or reckless. Strict liability often applies in a product liability lawsuit, as a manner of protecting a consumer from a powerful manufacturing company. If the strict liability law applies, you generally do not have to prove negligence to qualify for financial compensation.

Can I Recover Compensation if I Was Partially at Fault for the Accident?

Even if you were at fault, you may still have a case, depending on the nature and geographic location of the incident. Some areas do not allow victims to file for personal injury losses if the victim’s negligence contributed to the incident. However, most places support victims by holding that the partial fault of the victim may not nullify the greater fault of the defendant. This is called comparative negligence.

California is a pure comparative negligence state, meaning that an injured victim can still recover some financial compensation with any degree of fault for an accident. If you are found to be partially liable for your own injuries, your recovery award will be diminished by your percentage of fault.

Possibilities depend on the jurisdiction and the details of the case so be sure to contact a personal injury attorney in Riverside to explore your options.

What is Negligence in a Personal Injury Case?

In order to have a case for personal injury compensation, the victim’s injuries must be directly related to the negligence or wrongdoing of another person or group. Negligence is when a person or organization does not follow required policies or laws or does not follow a reasonable standard of expected behavior. If a person fails to act reasonably, he or she may be considered at fault.

Elements to Establish Negligence

Unless the doctrine of strict liability applies to your case or there is another exception, you or your personal injury attorney will have to establish negligence to recover financial compensation in California. Establishing negligence requires evidence of four main elements:

1. The at-fault party owed you a duty of care. A duty of care is an obligation placed on the defendant to use a reasonable degree of care for the situation. What is reasonable is based on what a prudent party would do in the same or similar circumstances.
2. The at-fault party was negligent in their actions. Negligence is a breach or violation of the duty of care. It can refer to any action or failure to act that falls short of the accepted level of care.
3. The at-fault party’s negligence caused your accident or injuries. There must be proof that without the defendant’s act of negligence, your accident or injury most likely would not have taken place.
4. The at-fault party’s negligence gave you compensable losses. Finally, you must have evidence of specific losses suffered due to the incident, such as medical bills or lost wages.

Keep in mind that some personal injury lawsuits in California do not require proof of all four of these elements of negligence. A case involving strict liability or negligence per se, for example, may have a lesser burden of proof on the plaintiff. Discuss your case in more detail with an attorney to better understand what you must prove to qualify for financial compensation.

Evidence for Your Case

Evidence refers to the records, facts, documents and information that support your claim. Evidence is the backbone of your lawsuit. It is a critical element that must meet the burden of proof imposed on your case. As the party claiming damages in a personal injury claim (the plaintiff), it is your burden of proof to establish negligence. You must do so based on a preponderance of the evidence, or enough evidence to show that the defendant is more likely than not at fault for your accident or injury.

The evidence that is often needed in personal injury cases to support your claim and improve your chances of recovering compensation are:

• Photographs and videos taken at the scene of the accident
• Official reports by law enforcement agencies or investigators
• Signed eyewitness and victim statements
• Your medical reports and examination results
• Expert testimony
• Cell phone records
• Physical evidence, such as the clothes that you were wearing
• Medical bills, invoices and repair receipts

You may be too overwhelmed by your injuries and the stress of an accident to preserve and collect evidence yourself. If so, it is important to speak to a lawyer for assistance with evidence collection without delay. An attorney can help you collect evidence by revisiting the scene, subpoenaing records from the at-fault party, filing motions and letters of preservation, making requests for the production of documents, conducting interviews and depositions, hiring expert investigators, working with accident reconstructionists, and more.

What is the Time Limit to File a Personal Injury Lawsuit?

If you believe you have a personal injury lawsuit, act quickly to consult with an attorney and initiate your claim. You must bring your claim within the statute of limitations – California’s legal time limit to file. Each state has its own statutes of limitations, and they often differ based on the case type.

In California, you have two years from the date of your accident to bring a personal injury cause of action. If you wish to file a wrongful death claim, you have two years from the date of your loved one’s death. There are special circumstances that may extend or shorten California’s statute of limitations. If you have hidden injuries that do not reveal themselves until days or weeks after your injury accident, for example, the discovery rule will toll (pause) the clock until the date you discover or reasonably should have discovered your injuries.

If you wish to bring a claim against the government in California, on the other hand, you will have a shorter deadline – just six months from the date of your accident – to file. With only some exceptions, the civil courts will refuse to hear a case that is filed too late. This is why it is important not to wait to consult with an attorney about a potential personal injury lawsuit in Riverside.

Contact a Top-Rated Personal Injury Lawyer in Riverside

Our Riverside personal injury lawyers has a track record of securing compensation for injured clients, we offer free, no-obligation legal consultations. Contact us online or give us a call to schedule a case evaluation with our experienced legal team.

Call our law firm for a free consultation at (951) 363-2410.