When the dust settles on the crushed metal and broken glass of a car accident, it can be difficult to know where to turn especially if you or a family member suffered serious injuries. Taking on a car accident claim in a fault-based insurance state like Texas quickly becomes overwhelming, especially when you’re also dealing with medical procedures and lengthy recovery periods.
Instead of dividing your focus and taking attention away from your physical and emotional recovery, call the Rio Bravo personal injury attorneys at Wawi Tijerina Law at (956) 489-1300 to assertively manage your financial recovery while you focus on your physical well-being.
Why You Should Select Wawi Tijerina as Your Car Accident Attorney In Rio Bravo
Wawi Tijerina has deep compassion for injury victims, including those who’ve suffered the terror and trauma of an accident caused by another driver’s careless or recklessness behind the wheel. We provide the following advantages in your Rio Bravo car accident case:
- A free case consultation and no upfront fees for our legal service. Instead, we only collect a fee after we recover your compensation
- The personalized attention of an attorney devoted to your case and the efforts and resources of a complete legal team on your side
- Bilingual legal services from a law firm that does not consider any client’s legal status
- Availability and open communication so you’re always informed and included in every step of your case
Our history of exceptional results puts a respected voice behind your claim, even against insurance companies that seek to protect their profits at your expense.
What Causes Rio Bravo Car Accidents?
Texas has a fault-based insurance system requiring car accident victims to prove an at-fault driver’s responsibility for the accident and their liability for damages. Common causes of car accidents in Rio Bravo and the surrounding Texas area include the following:
- Speeding
- Distracted driving
- Failure to yield the right of way
- Aggressive driving
- Tailgating
- Unsafe lane Changes
- Improper merging
- Traffic violations
- Improper passing
- Intoxicated driving
- Fatigued driving
Proving the cause of an accident and the at-fault driver’s liability requires an in-depth investigation into all aspects of the accident to document compelling evidence of negligence. Wawi Tijerina Law will craft a carefully calculated list of the injury victim’s damages to present to the responsible driver’s insurance company before beginning settlement negotiations.
Is Texas a “No-Fault” State for Car Accidents?
A handful of states in the U.S. have no-fault car accident laws that require drivers to file claims against their own insurance regardless of who caused the accident, except in catastrophic, permanent injury cases. On the other hand, Texas is a fault-based car accident state. Under the Texas Civil Liability Code Sec. 33.001, each party involved in a Texas car accident has a proportionate percentage of fault. In some cases, one driver could be 100% at fault for the accident, and the other driver or injured passenger is 0% responsible. In this case, the injury victim files a claim against the at-fault driver and recovers the full value of their claim within the limits of the other driver’s insurance policy.
In other cases, the insurance investigator could assign an injury victim a percentage of fault, such as in the following example:
Suppose one driver rolls through a stop sign and hits another vehicle already in the intersection, but the insurance company discovers that the driver with the right of way didn’t have their headlights on, and it was a foggy morning. They could potentially assign 80% fault to the driver who ran the stop sign and 20% to the driver in the intersection. In this example, if the injury victim who had the right of way suffers $100,000 in damages, they’d still be able to collect $80,000. If an injury victim is more than 51% at fault for an accident, they cannot recover compensation for their damages, and liability shifts to them.
While this system benefits an injury victim whose actions contributed to the accident by allowing them to recover a portion of their damages, it also gives the insurance company an incentive to assign an undue percentage of fault to an injury victim with substantial damages. An assertive car accident lawyer protects their client against this and other unfair insurance company tactics.
Understanding Liability for Car Accidents In Rio Bravo
In Texas, a car accident victim seeking compensation has the burden of evidence in the case, requiring them to prove the other driver’s liability. In civil law, the person or entity responsible for the accident is liable for the damages due to their negligence. Car accident negligence includes any careless, reckless, or wrongful behavior that causes an accident. To meet the standard of liability, the evidence in a car accident claim must demonstrate the following:
- The driver owed a duty of reasonable care to others on the road, including the injury victim, such as the duty to avoid distraction or to follow traffic laws
- They breached this duty through negligence
- The negligent breach of duty caused the accident
- The accident victim suffered damages from the injury
Damages from car accidents are categorized into economic damages, such as accident-related expenses, and non-economic damages, such as pain and suffering and permanent injury.
In most car accident claims, the liable party is one of the drivers, but in some cases, other entities can cause or contribute to an accident. For example, an accident may result from a defective tire or auto part. In other cases, a negligent road maintenance agency could be responsible for an accident due to its failure to repair a dangerous pothole.
What Types of Car Accidents Happen In Rio Bravo, Texas
Car accidents happen in an instant, but the effects can last for months or cause long-term harm such as disability or wrongful death. Rio Bravo residents lead active, productive lives, which sometimes results in congested roads and frustrated drivers, increasing the risk of accidents. Common types of car accidents in Texas include the following:
- Rear-end collisions, often caused by tailgating
- T-bone accidents (angle or side-impact collisions) are typically caused by one car entering an intersection and hitting a vehicle traveling on a road running in a perpendicular direction
- Head-on collisions, which happen when a driver deviates from their lane and hits an oncoming vehicle or when a driver enters a one-way street or divided highway in the wrong direction
- Roadway departures, or running off the road
- Rollover accidents
Most of the above common types of accidents directly result from driver negligence. Contact a wrongful death attorney in Rio Bravo to get the justice your loved one deserves.
The Most Common Injuries Caused By Car Accidents In Rio Bravo
A car accident causes injuries in multiple ways. First, the crash force of a collision propels the motorist’s body forward at the speed the car was traveling before the collision, and then the seatbelt abruptly snaps them back against the seat, placing the body’s structural support system of spinal column, bones, and muscles under tremendous strain. Meanwhile, the organs inside the body collide from the force, and the car’s hard structures collapse forcefully inward at collision points, causing the body to suffer multiple blunt-force traumas. Common injuries resulting from car accidents include the following:
- Neck injuries
- Back injuries
- Traumatic brain injuries
- Bone fractures
- Soft-tissue injuries to muscles, tendons, and ligaments
- Lacerations, contusions, and abrasions
- Internal organ injuries
- External head, facial, and dental trauma
- Spinal cord injuries
- Burns
- Traumatic amputations
Injuries are not only painful and emotionally traumatic, but they are also expensive, causing medical bills and out-of-pocket costs at the same time that they often prevent a return to work. These physical, emotional, and economic consequences of a car accident are the damages in a car accident claim against the responsible party.
What Damages Can I Recover In a Rio Bravo Car Accident Claim?
Car accident injuries such as fractures, back and neck injuries, traumatic brain injuries, and more quickly become expensive as well as painful and temporarily or permanently debilitating. Common damages recovered in Rio Bravo car accident claims include the following:
- Medical expenses
- Future medical costs
- Lost wages
- Future lost earnings or diminished earning capacity due to disability
- Out-of-pocket expenses
- Compensation for pain and suffering
- Compensation for other damages that apply in individual claims such as disfigurement, loss of limb, the loss of one of the senses, diminished quality of life, or PTSD
- Wrongful death compensation to the family members of a fatally injured car accident victim in Texas
Compensation doesn’t undo the pain or repair the disruption to your life, but it does relieve financial hardship and brings a sense of financial accountability and justice.
How Does Having a Texas Car Accident Lawyer Benefit My Case?
Insurance companies are not on an injury victim’s side, even if the insurance adjuster assigned to your case sounds compassionate. Instead, they are on the side of protecting profits, which is in direct contrast with your goal of achieving a fair settlement to cover your financial damages, pain, and suffering. An experienced car accident attorney protects your best interests by doing the following:
- Handling all communication with the insurance company to protect you against insurance company tactics meant to save the company money at your expense
- Conducting a thorough investigation into all aspects of the accident to prove the at-fault party’s liability or to pursue compensation from all parties that caused or contributed to the accident
- Presenting their findings to the appropriate defendant and their insurance company
- Negotiating with the insurance adjuster to obtain the highest possible settlement for your damages
- Filing a petition for a lawsuit and taking your case to court if the insurance company unfairly undervalues your claim, tries to shift liability to you, or delays the claim’s progress as the two-year statute of limitations moves closer
Most car accident claims end with a settlement, especially when a skilled attorney navigates the case; however, Wawi Tijerina prepares as if for court throughout the process so your case is court-ready should the insurance company fail to offer an acceptable settlement.
Call Wawi Tijerina to Speak to a Rio Bravo Car Accident Lawyer Who Can Help
Insurance companies may try to shift liability to you or dispute aspects of your claim to minimize the amount they have to pay out on your claim. The best defense is to have an assertive attorney on your side, safeguarding your best interests throughout the claim process or lawsuit in court should the insurance company fail to offer an acceptable settlement.
Call Wawi Tijerina at (956) 489-1300 or contact us online for the experienced legal counsel you need to recover the maximum available compensation in your Rio Bravo car accident case.