Personal injury law, commonly referred to as tort law, ensures every injured person’s legal rights to file a lawsuit and receive compensation for all losses arising from an accident that happened due to someone else’s fault. The personal injury system is purposefully designed to allow the injured persons to be “made whole” or compensated financially after the victim has suffered harm owing to someone’s else’s intentional or careless action.
Basics of Personal Injury
Personal injury rules apply to a wide variety of situations as follows:
Defamation: Personal injury laws apply when someone’s defamatory statement harms another person’s reputation.
Accidents: Personal injury laws apply to situations where someone’s carelessness or negligence harms another person. Examples – medical malpractices, slip and fall incidents, car accidents and other types of cases.
Intentional Acts: These laws also apply to situations where someone’s intentional conduct harms another person. Examples – assault and other intentional torts.
Defective Products: There are few situations where a defendant might be found responsible for injuries despite doing nothing wrong or no negligent action on his or her part. Examples – certain kinds of product liability claims stemming from a defective product.
Personal Injury Laws – Who Made Those?
Many personal injury laws can be traced back to old days’ “common law rules”. Common Laws refer to the judge-made laws, contrary to legislature-made laws or laws sanctioned in bills and statutes.
When a judge, after hearing a particular case, takes a stand on the issue and aspect of law, it becomes a binding example on all the “lower” courts in the state. The other courts are almost obliged to apply the first judge’s explanation and verdict and eventually, all these binding models make a body of “common law”.
Common laws may differ from one state to another. Restatement of Torts, which serves as a guidebook explaining the rules, contains much of the common law and many states take guidance from the ‘guidebook’ on personal injury disputes.
Personal injury law does not stem from only common law. Some legislatures have enacted statutory laws or formal obligations that allude to personal injury issues.
‘Statute of Limitations’ is another state law that needs a mention in the context. The law sets a particular timeframe for the victim to file a personal injury lawsuit in the civil court system of the victim’s residential state.
Working Procedure of a Personal Injury Case
No two personal injury cases are same. Therefore, they won’t follow the same path. At the same time, it’s also true that most personal injury cases share some common points.
Defendant Responsible for Plaintiff’s Injury: It can be almost anything wrong on the defendant’s part, with contractual breaches being an exception as these are handled under “contract law”, a separate body of law.
Plaintiff Alleges Defendant of Breaching a Legal Duty: The particular legal duty largely depends on the situation in which, the accident or injury happened. For example, the cabbies must drive the vehicles responsibly; doctors must provide necessary and excellent medical attention; manufacturers and distributors must not launch defective or dangerous products in the market – all these professionals have a duty to do the right thing expected of them.
Settlement Talks: If it becomes evident to everyone involved that the defendant was in breach of his or her duty, the defendant may wish to go with out-of-the-court settlement. It usually involves monetary compensation decided after negotiation between the parties, their insurance companies and lawyers and what is agreeable to the plaintiff and the Hialeah personal injury attorney representing him or her.
