If you have been injured or lost a loved one in a car accident, Texas laws allow you to file a civil case for compensation. You stand a chance to recover monetary compensation for lost wages, medical expenses, loss of quality of life, pain, and suffering among others. However, you must meet certain criteria to qualify for compensation. Unfortunately, meeting some of these requirements may be impossible without the counsel of a qualified Katy auto accident lawyer.
At Lone Star Injury Attorneys, we offer our clients unparalleled legal advice to help them prove liability in Katy car accident cases. We enjoin the services of experts to ensure that no aspect of your case is left uncovered. All this is done at absolutely no upfront costs. Our contingency fee arrangement allows you to get legal representation without paying any amount. We only get paid if your case is successful and you get your case settled or are successful in trial.
As the injured person (the plaintiff), it’s your responsibility to ensure that you show proof that your version of events is actually what transpired. The defendant will only need to counter or admit the claims against them, but the burden of proof lays on you. In simpler terms, the burden of proof means you must convince the judge or jury presiding over your case that you met the set requirements by the preponderance of the evidence.
You must understand the implications of this concept in your accident case before taking any legal action. A qualified and experienced car accident attorney can be your guide through this complex process. To a large extent, the burden of proof basically revolves around negligence. This means someone else failed in their legal obligation as a driver, and you suffered harm as a result. Typically, you must prove the existence of a duty of care, breach of duty, causation, and damages to establish fault in a car crash case.
This first step in proving liability is showing that a duty of care existed at the time of the car accidents. Duty refers to the legal obligation that one party has over another. In your car accident case, it means that the other driver has a duty of obeying traffic rules and carefully operating their vehicle in a manner likely not to cause you harm.
If your case accident was caused by a rogue truck driver, the same duty applies to the trucking company or truck owner. They are bound by Texas laws to hire experienced drivers. State and federal governments, as well as road construction companies, also have a duty to ensure that Texas roads and highways are in good condition.
Showing that the other party owed you a duty of care is not enough to establish negligence in your car wreck case. You need to show that they breached that duty through negligence or basic recklessness. This could be something unlawful or generally risky to your well-being. The elephant in the room when litigating a personal injury claim has always been establishing how the duty of care was breached. Some of the most common ways that the duty of care could be breached include:
Retaining a qualified attorney is the best way of establishing how your duty of care was breached.
After proving that there existed a duty of care, and it was breached, you must also show that the breach was the direct or proximate cause of the accident. Some examples to prove causation include:
You should talk to your attorney about how causation impacts negligence in a vehicle collision claim.
This is the final element you need to establish to prove fault in a car accident. It means that you suffered tangible and intangible losses that the party at fault should compensate you for. The most common types of damages are:
There is so much that goes into proving liability in Katy car accident cases. If you need legal assistance, please contact us today to schedule a FREE CASE EVALUATION with one of our legal professionals.