The losses you suffer after an accident might extend past medical bills. Those intangible harms, like physical pain and mental suffering, are just as worthy of compensation. We can document all your damages so you do not lose track or underestimate your claim’s value.
We can start this right away by organizing medical bills and working with experts to calculate your long-term lost wages. If you think your case is worth less, you might settle too fast. Settling ends cases, so we will only advise you to sign a favorable agreement. You have two years to file a case, and we need time to prepare your case, so do not delay.
For a free case review, call the personal injury lawyers of Agrapidis & Maroules, P.C. at (201) 777-1111.
Damages You Can Claim in Lodi Personal Injury Cases
You can claim compensatory damages in a personal injury lawsuit. These include any economic and non-economic losses, such as medical costs and emotional distress.
Emergency Medical and Continuous Care Costs
Bad accidents, like car crashes and falls, call for immediate medical attention. If you need to, call 911. Paramedics can attend to you at the scene and take you to the hospital.
Your lawsuit should cover the cost of the ambulance ride and any bills from emergency room treatment. This includes diagnostic tests, physical evaluations, surgeries, prescription medications, and more.
Additional care costs are also compensable. Whether you suffered a head injury or a displaced fracture, you may need follow-up appointments with doctors and specialists.
Our personal injury lawyers can handle compiling medical bills, keeping them organized, and ensuring we have an accurate tally of your rehabilitative expenses.
During trials, physicians can testify about victims’ continuing treatment plans. Spinal cord injuries might require years of physical therapy and several surgeries. If your treatment plan will continue after your lawsuit is over, you will keep incurring medical damages.
To ensure you do not foot the bill for those upcoming damages, we can seek compensation for them in your lawsuit.
Lost Wages and Lowered Earning Capacity
You can also claim damages for your lost wages. We can calculate them using tax returns and paychecks. Your physicians can testify about your expected return to work, too. They can explain how your injuries physically limit you and prevent you from resuming your job.
Some injuries permanently lower victims’ earning capacities. We can factor that into our requests for lost wages as well. Doing so can yield compensation for future lost wages in personal injury lawsuits.
Pain, Suffering, and Other Intangible Harms
Physical pain and mental suffering are real consequences of personal injuries. These are intangible harms since they do not have any inherent monetary value. Victims can express their pain and suffering when they testify in court. They can also keep journals to document their daily struggles.
Mental health experts can support victims’ statements with their own testimony. They can evaluate victims and look for signs of anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, or depression and report their findings in court.
The following factors affect victims’ non-economic damages:
- The severity of their injury
- Their age at the time of injury
- Whether the injury is permanent
- The injury’s impact on daily life
What Happens if You Settle a Lodi Personal Injury Lawsuit?
While settling sometimes involves concessions, aggressive negotiations can yield good results for injury victims. If you settle a case, it ends, often without a trial. Though this is some victims’ preference, accepting settlements just to end cases sometimes has drawbacks.
For example, if you settle too fast, you might leave damages on the table. Defendants generally send low settlement offers initially. Do not let a low offer discourage you, as this is only the start of negotiations.
We will respond to lower offers with counters backed up with evidence. As we receive and evaluate offers, we will compare them to your total damages. If offers are still too low, we will refuse them.
Some defendants give better offers when they realize a trial is imminent. Still, if you stand to claim greater damages at a trial, we can go to court. You might get settlement offers during a trial. If an offer is fair, you can accept it mid-trial.
Once you sign the settlement agreement, you cannot change your mind. So, we will ensure you are comfortable with the settlement amount and payment structure before that happens.
When to File Personal Injury Lawsuits in Lodi
Get started on your personal injury case right after an accident. Waiting puts you at risk of missing the filing deadline. If that happens, you cannot file a lawsuit or get compensation.
Generally, victims have two years from an accident to file a lawsuit in New Jersey. Our lawyers know the several exceptions to this rule and can see if any apply to your case.
For example, minor victims have two years from turning 18 to bring claims themselves. When victims have mental disabilities, the countdown does not begin until their disabilities are lifted. Furthermore, if the defendant leaves the state, the statute of limitations may not run for that time under N.J.S.A. § 2A:14-22(a).
Not immediately discovering your injuries could also push back your filing deadline. Instead of the statute of limitations starting to run on the accident’s date, it would start on the date of discovery.
Despite the exceptions, assume you only have two years to file. Some evidence is fleeting. Eyewitnesses might forget what they saw, and relevant video footage might get deleted. The sooner we start investigating cases and preserving evidence, the better.
This can help ensure we not only file by the deadline, but we file a strong case.
Call Our Lodi Injury Lawyers for Help Today
Call the personal injury lawyers of Agrapidis & Maroules, P.C. at (201) 777-1111 for a free case assessment.