Personal Injury Attorney – Drunk Driving
Imagine that one of your children is driving home from school one day when another car comes out of nowhere, strikes your child’s car, and knocks it into a roadside ditch. The other driver, who is clearly drunk, drives off without bothering to see if your child is okay. Your child survives, but she is severely injured, and must receive extensive medical care and physical therapy to recover. The car is seriously damaged, forcing you to spend thousands of dollars on repairs. You end up going into debt to cover the cost of car repairs, medical bills, and the many hours of work that you have had to miss.
DUI in California
As tragic as this scenario is, it is not even close to the worst thing that can happen when you or a loved one encounters a drunk driver. Between 2003 and 2012, over 10,000 people were killed in DUI-related car crashes in California, with a death rate of 0.9 per 100,000. The death rate is particularly high among those between the ages of 21 and 34, at 4.5 per 100,000; it is also higher among men and boys, who are more than three times more likely to die in a DUI-related car crash than women and girls. Although California has taken steps to reduce these fatalities, impaired driving is still too common. 1.8% of California drivers report having driven in the past 30 days after drinking too much to do so safely.
Protect your rights. Talk to a Personal Injury Attorney.
If a drunk driver has injured you or a loved one, a personal injury attorney can help you claim compensation. The attorney will begin by assessing the injury’s full physical, medical, and financial impact on you. Drunk driving injuries carry many costs, including missed work, medical and physical therapy bills, insurance premiums, and car repairs. A personal injury lawyer knows to keep track of these from day one, adding up all of the costs that you can viably blame on the driver. This increases your chances of succeeding in court and ensures that the driver’s final payment will be as large as possible.
Beyond demanding compensation, a personal injury lawyer may be able to earn you even more money through punitive damages. If the driver had a history of illegal or reckless conduct, the court may order him or her to pay you an additional fine as a criminal punishment. Personal injury lawyers look deeply into the driver’s history, uncovering any information that strengthens the case for punitive fees.
Eric Wagner is an experienced personal injury attorney and helps people just like you to recover the money you need to pay the expenses relating to your injury from a drunk driving accident. From our offices in Richmond California, we proudly serve clients in Contra Costa, the San Francisco Bay Area, and the surrounding cities. If you are involved in an auto accident due to a drunk drive, the law allows us to help you receive compensation for a multitude of losses due to negligence. Please contact a us today at (855) 529-4465, for a free initial consultation.