About Personal Injury Law
Tucson, Arizona
Commonly known as “tort law”, personal injury law gives you the right to file a lawsuit in an attempt to collect compensation for your damages. This compensation may be needed to cover things like medical expenses, lost wages, or pain and suffering that resulted from your personal injury.
What Is Tort Law?
A “tort” is the legal term used when the negligence of an individual or product results in personal injury to you. The possibilities of tort are far-reaching and can involve scenarios such as a reckless driver, a fall off of your neighbor’s front porch, or a defective product purchased at your local hardware store.
If you are the victim of a tort, you have the legal right to seek compensation in an attempt to make you “whole” again, or bring you back to the position you were in prior to the incident. A serious car accident, for example, can leave you out of work and with mounting medical bills.
If you are thinking of filing a personal injury lawsuit, you need an attorney who can help you prove your damages and get you the compensation that you deserve. We, at the Moore Law Firm, invite you to contact our Tucson, AZ office to get the legal representation needed for a successful tort case.
4 Elements to a Successful Tort Case
For your tort case to be successful, you will need to be able to prove the following 4 key elements:
Duty
To have a successful tort case, you will first have to prove what the duty was and how it was failed to be provided to you. For example, the driver of another vehicle has a duty to operate that vehicle in a safe and responsible manner.
Doctors have a duty to provide safe care to you that is in compliance with reasonable medical practices and laws, and so on.
Breach of Duty
If you can establish that a duty was neglected to be provided or exercised, you will be one step closer to a successful tort case. If the defendant can be clearly shown to have not acted according to their respective duty, you will move on to the causation of your tort case.
Causation
Now comes the part of the case in which you must be able to show that the responsible party’s breach of duty resulted in harm to you. All of the available evidence must also show that your injury was “reasonably foreseeable.”
This basically translates to the belief that the defendant was well aware of the risks involved by their negligence and should have been more careful in their actions.
Injury
After the prior three aspects have been established, it’s time to show the extent of your injuries and any suffering that occurred as a result. This can include things like lost wages, medical bills, emotional damages, and so on.
Situations Where Personal Injury Rules Apply:
Personal injury can occur in a seemingly endless array of circumstances. Whether it is a car accident, an explosive toaster, or the harm caused by something someone said about you, personal injury knows no bounds.
As such, it’s important to seek an experienced attorney who can guide you through the process of collecting compensation for your damages.
Accidents
Unfortunately, car accidents happen far too often. In the modern era, there are more distractions than ever, from stereos to cell phones. Factor in an inability to drive safely and you have a recipe for disaster.
Accidents aren’t limited to just vehicles, however. From medical malpractice to a fall in a retail store, accidents can happen under a variety of circumstances.
Intentional Acts
Personal injury can also occur when someone knowingly sets out to do you harm.
Defective Products
Whether it is a bad batch of medicine or a faulty component of one or more vehicles, defective products can result in your personal injury. After discovering a defective product, a recall will usually take place and owners will be cautioned of its potential harm.
Defamation
If someone says something about you that causes you to lose your job, for example, you have a tort case on your hands due to defamation.
What Is the Statute of Limitations?
This is a law that establishes an amount of time that you have to seek damages from a personal injury. The statute of limitations varies by state and must be strictly adhered to.
For example, a car accident that carries a 2-year statute of limitations must be acted upon no longer than 2 years after the date of the accident. Waiting just a day after the 2-year deadline will void your ability to file a lawsuit.
Who Makes Personal Injury Laws?
A lot of personal injury laws became such following the ruling of a judge. Cases that had no legal precedence prior to the ruling became known as “common law.”
As such, many judges are responsible for many of the personal injury laws that are commonly followed and practiced today.