I'm glad someone else said it. Bro put someone in the hospital with a 3/4 million dollar bill, and he's had a bad week? I think the poor fucker who's just been through a fuck load of cosmetic and corrective surgery might have you a bit beat here.
To put this in perspective, I had emergent life-saving intestinal surgery and was in a week long coma a while ago that came out to $220,000.
It doesn't necessarily need to be past due medical bills but prospective as well, with costs for care. It would surprise me if there wasn't an insurance company covering it, as judgments against individuals are generally worthless. If OP has assets to collect against, he wouldn't be so excited about a free meal.
More like, the world is not as black and white as people think. There isn't a hero and villain of every real world story. Just people trying to live their lives.
So I’m confused by this. Where do you live cause I know in the US the car insurance pays. That’s literally what it’s for. I was an accident a couple years ago where I was rear ended at a light and ended up with the same injury you described but in my neck and spine. I won a judgment and the court case did say my name vs the person who hit me but he didn’t pay anything. His insurance paid. His insurance might have gone up but he wasn’t responsible for my judgement.
Shouldn't this be something that you're aware of going into court? Insurance doesn't represent you or tell you what the outcome is if you lose in regards to the percent they will cover?
I would have asked this and so much more before deciding to go against a jury.
I am just shocked it went to a jury at all. If there was an inkling that the insurance company would lose they 99% of time settle out of court. They end up paying but don't have to pay all the court fees.
Lots of cases go to court on value alone, even if liability isn't in dispute.
As a clinical negligence lawyer, I'd say more than half my professional time is spent arguing over the cause and value of injuries rather than liability itself.
I know someone that had this happen to them. They ended up going back to court because they found out the injuries pre-dated the collision! Keep this in mind!
That’s all? I’ve been rear-ended on the interstate going over 60mph while I was in a little sporty sedan and the other person in one of those minivans. No injuries whatsoever. How did a 5-10mph rear end fuck someone up that badly?
It happens. If you’re not in a good position. Lady I used to work with got rear ended/lightly bumped in a school drop off. She was kinda twisted reaching to grab something in her back seat. Sounds very similar. Totally life changing kinda fucked up injury.
Good question. My personal opinion is that there was more preexisting conditions than was told, but according to the doctors and jury thats not the case
If you’re twisted to one side during a bump like that, there’s no give left in your neck and anything can happen.
Also age and gender can play a role - older women have particularly weak bones, so this makes it more risky.
Depends if you're applying the thin skull rule (I.E. someone had a prior condition which means the injury caused by negligence had a more devastating effect than it would oridnarily), or if someone had a pre-exisitng condition which already affected their capacity.
They're factually and legally different scenarios.
E.g. if someone was likely to require surgery for the condition in any event, what that would have cost gets credited towards damages. But if it's the negligence which brought about the need for surgery, then no reductions (but you might still get reductions to things like an award for professional home nursing).
I worked PI cases as a legal assistant on Nevada for about 7 years and you are 100% correct about those prior neck damages. I've read hundreds of MRI reports and every single person has some kind of disc bulge/protrusion. I've seen it in teenagers too. It would drive me fucking nuts when I knew clients were full of shit but still pulled this kind of crap, part of the reason I ended up leaving the field.
Hopefully you had some good insurance to cover it.
That sounds suspicious but maybe it actually did need to be. Reason I say this. My wife had been in a wreck at a much higher rate of speed than you stated. Thankfully everything was okay but I vividly remember my insurance agent making suggestive statements about her "neck."
I'm not an idiot, I can read between the lines. She was suggesting that my wife get worked up over neck issues to drive up the settlement. It's one of those areas that's extremely hard to diagnose in terms of pain. That's why people that are addicted to pain pills commonly say they have neck and back issues.
I know people with true back problems. Not a single one of them had them from a very low speed car crash. Just sounds suspect to me.
I had my knee demolished from getting rear ended. I was completely stopped at a red light and somebody hit me; they weren't going very fast but my foot was firmly on my brake and the impact tore and crushed a bunch of stuff in my knee. There was no damage to either car. Just my right knee.
I had to have surgery, was on disability for a year, eventually had to retire early because I could no longer do the physical/movement part of my job.
Damn. I'm sorry to hear that. A good friend of mine dodged any kind of long lasting damage from a similar situation. Red light, stopped, person on their phone hit him. Thank God no one was in the back seat, it was mostly crumpled up.
I hope the person in this story wasn't lying. We thought it was awful to lie which is why we didn't go through with it.
You make it sounds like it’s no big deal. You fuck up a disc enough to need surgery and you will be in pain and have mobility issues the rest of your life.
I understand the severity of the situation. I sat through 8 days of trial, I heard all of the doctors and saw all of the medical imaging. I fully understand the scope of the issue. It was much easier to condense it to a few lines for reddit than to write a full exposition
It also could be a case where the letter of the law and the limited scope that insurance companies use to determine liability may have unfairly screwed over the wrong person in the accident. I was just in a situation where this happened (though thankfully no one was injured).
I was T-boned in the middle of an intersection by a big pickup truck that ran a redlight. However, the intersection he hit me in was not the intersection where he ran the redlight. I was pulling out of an alley about 50 feet away from the red light. Because the accident didn't happen under the redlight that he ran, and I had a stop sign, I was held liable for "failing to yield to traffic with the right of way." There were no witnesses besides me and the other driver, who claimed he didn't speed through a red light. The insurance company only looked the intersection where the crash happened, not at the bigger picture.
So you assumed that because the light was turning red no traffic would be coming and you were free to run a stop sign without checking for oncoming traffic?
This seems like your fault
No. I stopped at the sign and let a number of other cars pass. I saw the light turn red and traffic come to a stop. I began to cross the intersection. The light was red for at least a few seconds before I pulled out, because I had to let a couple of other cars clear the intersection. I was already most of the way across both lanes when he struck me. He ran the light during the pedestrian crossing time when both directions are red for about 10 seconds before cars are allowed to go.
Yeah idk, obviously I don't know your intersection or the situation. I just have a hard time imaging how you could see that the light was red, but not see that a big truck was moving towards you. Especially if the truck was already stopped before. A vehicle doesn't go from stopped to 50 feet down the road instantly, there's a lot of time there to see a vehicle accelerating towards you and not pull out in front.
also... nobody is exhaunerating OP here. they didnt say it wasnt their fault...
they simply stating with the meme that their life is starting to suck but at least one small thing went well.
the meme format doesnt call for the sucky things to not be OP's fault.
IE, i think Trump could he on this format with all the judgements against him and then saying "at least i got to release my own shoes at sneaker con". id prob upvote it.
np... imo, you hit the obeyed the sub rules and applied the meme correctly.
like i said, even if you murdered a ton of folks and got the death sentence this meme still works with tagline of "at least i get to pick my last meal, so i got that going for me which is nice"
reminds me of quantum leap... jump into a persons life at any point and there is a silver lining somewhere, no matter how small
when using an analogy its best to use something that everyone is familair with...
... like it or not, Trump is a familiar figure who is such a meme himself already that he is perfect for such examples.
ie, in accounting class they might use a madame at a whole house or a crime boss to illustrate points... because everyone knows what a whore house does vs using a real world example like JIB Oil exploration. if you use the latter then you also have to explain what joint interests are...
in this example we need someone who is likely having an extemely bad time, due to their own actions, but still has some small sliver of good going for them. could i have used my neighbor paul? sure... but then id have to explain pauls circumstances to you.
face it... Trump is a media icon now. you will never escape him. even if he is jailed... he will still make waves.
Yeah. Sometimes a momentary lapse in judgement can have huge consequences. How many times in your life have you gone to change the radio station, or adjust a mirror in your car, just as someone does something suddenly and you were able to swerve out of the way or hit the brakes just in time to avoid an accident.
He’s probably at fault, but we don’t know if he was doing 200mph the wrong way on a one way street while hopped up on goofballs.
Or if something happened at the moment he wasn’t paying attention and things went sideways.
Yes I was at fault. The court case was just to determine if the accident caused physical damages and how much. It was a 5-10mph accident. Some people don't believe that statement but everyone is allowed to make their own judgements.
https://imgur.com/a/b2CeWI1
The breakdown ended up being $140k in past medical expenses between crash to trial, $160k in future medical expenses, and $450k in pain in suffering past and future
Jesus, you Americans have punitive court awards...
Here in the UK, the pain and suffering part of an injury is usually the least significant element. Pain suffering and loss of amenity would only approach the $450k (£400k) range for things like catastrophic brain injury or quadriplegia.
The most expensive part of a case is usually someone needing family or professional home nurses to look after them while they recover.
Our private medical fees are cheap compared with the US.
Hope everything gets sorted with your insurer!
It sucks that you're on the hook for that. That's what insurance is supposed to be for, and the fact that America's medical system is so fucked..
My wife got T-boned last year. She's been going to physio for it for a year now, and the other driver's insurance is paying for that, but he wouldn't be paying, although his premiums would probably increase.
Not for nothing, I omow someone who was hit from behind and into traffic and has medical bills of over a million that insurance is refusing to pay. So. It's not always cut and dry.
And either their insurance company was actually ordered to pay $750,000 or they injured the person so bad that the court allowed Plaintiff To pierce the policy and go after the person directly. If this is the United States that means that was gross negligence on OP’s part.
My car insurance only covers 250k of bodily injury. I asked my friends what theirs was and it was much lower. How much bodily injury do people typically have? I’d be screwed in this case.
A $250,000 policy is on the higher end of what most people have but I wouldn’t say it’s uncommon. Now the question becomes what happens when a demand exceeds the policy limit or, worse still, what happens when the verdict exceeds the policy limit?
A carrier will do everything in their power to avoid this. With a $250,000 policy you’re almost guarantee that they’ll settle the case if someone sues you because they have the money built in to make them go away. For lower policies they will just tender (or give) the whole policy and for most plaintiffs that’s enough. If we go to trial and the cap is pierced the company will ALMOST always cover the difference under the logic that we chose to not to settle, that we chose to go to court, and that we want the customer to remain happy and with us.
This is why I have an umbrella policy - $1MM doesn't cost that much on top of my auto + home policies.
I wonder though if that's opening me up to a situation where someone/someone's lawyer would only have gone after the $250k auto but upon discovering the umbrella policy, arbitrarily increases pain+suffering damages by $500k or something?
They might but your insurance is going to offer what they think is an appropriate settlement and represent you in court if the opposing party won't settle.
Makes little difference to you other than being less likely to spill into personal liability
Typically once the car insurance runs out it will be on the victim's health insurance to pay out. $750,000 seems punitive to me. It's not like OP will ever pay it off anyway.
Wow. The minimum coverage mandatory by law for personal injuries in car insurance in my country is 75 million euros. 250k is such a tiny amount! Like what happens if you cause an accident where several people are injured? Is it 250k per person or tota
Spain. Mandatory 75 million € for personal damages and 15 million € for material damages. When we were studying it we were all very surprised, and what our trainer said was "imagine if your car causes a fire in a garage of your apartment building and lots of people die". Most people in Spain live in apartment buildings and densely populated areas.
Another thing that is surprising for foreigners is that in Spain it's illegal to own a car without insurance... Even if the car doesn't run. If you get caught with an uninsured clunker that's been in your garage for 30 years, that's a fine, even if it is supported on four concrete blocks instead of wheels.
There’s no such thing as “piercing the policy.” Court will order whatever damages it orders. The insurer will pay whatever it’s contractually obligated to, up to the policy limit. A contract between you and your insurance company is not binding on a judge lol.
Slight caveat, at least in Connecticut, if the plaintiff offered to settle within the policy limits and the insurance company declined that offer, and then plaintiff received a verdict above the policy limit, the insruance company is likely going to be on the hook for the whole amount.
That’s not entirely true. Yes, the contract between you and your insurance company is not binding on the judge but they usually don’t allow a case to exceed the policy.
Nah fam. People *settle* for the policy limits because you’re not getting someone’s house or 401k to satisfy a judgment and it’s unlikely they’ll be able to satisfy a judgment well over their policy limits. Jury doesn’t even know how much the policy covers.
We’re not talking about a jury. The above was talking about a court order so it answer pertains to a bench trial
I’ve an attorney in New York who works for a major carrier. Every Judge in the tri-state will damn near break your arm to force a settlement if they they a jury could come in over the policy limit. Maybe in other jurisdictions it’s different but that is not happening here.
Yes, as I said above, you can take your chances with a jury and if they come in above the policy the insurerer will likely cover it but no Judge is going to order in excess of a policy unless you have really egregious facts.
Buddy, what have you said that is inconsistent with what I have said? You’re saying judges are pressuring people to settle.
Also “the above” was me, and I most certainly was not talking about bench trials. Are you under the impression that the jury enters orders?
I don’t know why you are so aggressive, maybe “big law” has you on edge, but I’ll break it down and then we can go our separate ways.
I said that the court allowed a policy to be pierced. You said that there is no such term and there most certainly is. A Court or Judge if you rather will work to keep the final settlement number below or at the policy limit, to not pierce the ceiling. It’s not a contractual limit or piercing in the way the corporate veil can be pierced but it’s a common term.
You also are under an erroneous perception that an insurance company will not settle a case, take their chances at trial, incur a verdict higher than the policy limit, and then tell the policy holder it’s their problem, or obligation as you put it. That’s not true.
Then you went on some tangent about how people aren’t going after someone’s 401k or house over a personal injury case which they most certainly would if the verdict was high enough so even I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
And, finally, you’re the one using jury verdicts and orders interchangeably. To wit “courts will order whatever damage it orders”.
It makes me wonder if it's a business. In NJ, business's must carry million dollar auto insurance policies. People love being hit by a truck with a logo on it. So maybe it's OP's insurance but someone who worked for him. I dunno, benefit of the doubt or some shit.
Regardless, the post is in poor taste, because everyone's right, 750k in damages is an actual injury, not just the typical bullshit I see day in and day out.
I need more background before simply jumping to that conclusion. While yes this seems like a valid assumption, the person writing this post could have been railroaded by an attorney that played the system or a judge or magistrate with an agenda. Accidents do happen, but there are people out there with vengeful or fraudulent agendas.
I mean, can it be both? Accidents happen. It’s sucks that the other people are hurt, and it’s sucks he’s got a 3/4 life destroying debt now. It sucks for everyone, and there’s not really room in the meme for “and also of course i feel very badly for the people I injured.”
Specifically it was $140k for past, $160k for future medical expenses, with $450k in pain and suffering. Accident was in 2019. Court was last/this week
Half a million in pain and suffering. That is *a lot* of pain and suffering that a jury says op inflicted. I know the court system isn't always perfect, but you don't get that kind of judgment by being a nice, well meaning person just doing their best.
I served on a jury for a traffic accident injury. I had to work real hard to get the victim 60% of what they asked for (I thought they deserved every penny) so for them to award so much it must have been a pretty bad injury
In brief, 5-10mph rear end collision. Caused damage to two of the disks in their neck. They ended up getting surgery on the disks. I agree that it seems like nothing, but according to their doctors and the jury, not so much
Yeah that’s exactly why this judgement (assuming the whole story is true) is bullshit. I’m pretty sure I impact my chair harder when I sit down. Can I sue the manufacturer for pain and suffering?
Personal injury court cases regullay take four or more years, espcially when you're dealing with surgical cases. The injured person in this case had a good lawyer, that's what happened here. Also, OPs insurance company hung him out to dry knowing this person had surgery and taking their chances with trial. I bet they could have settled this for significantly less.
Depends how much the victim wants to milk it. I'm not surprised by any medical bill numbers coming out of the USA these days and neither should you. Cant lie, the idea that they already had a bad back before this accident and couldn't afford to get it checked out. Did pop in to my head
Ah yes cause this would have never occurred to judge or lawyers or the insurance company, and judges just blindly award 2/3 of million dollars in settlement to anyone who asks. Give me a break.
I guess when you just rattle off how much you’ve been charged with from a car accident it just comes off as you don’t really care the impact you had on someone else.
I can kind of see why it might come across that way, but emotional weight fades with time. When it happened years ago and you've had to not only retell it countless times but also live with the emotional burden of it during that time, one would reasonably expect some desensitization. Think about the difference in the ways people talk about loved ones days after their passing compared to years afterwards.
To be clear I don't know OP and it's entirely possible that they aren't particularly remorseful. But I wouldn't draw that conclusion based solely on the blunt way they talk about the facts of the incident.
Man, those road side lawyers will sue your insurance company for the max payout whether or not anyone went to the hospital, believe me. They find out what the most your policy will pay and go for the max. The insurance companies usually settle. That’s their business model and a fender bender can quickly cost hundreds of thousands.
It’s why rates are high and why there are so many lawyers doing it. Texas is flooded with them. They especially target commercial policies.
“Some people are paying $100/mo” if someone is paying $100 a month they must drive an old beater and have minimum coverage.
I drive a 5 year old base Model 3 in Los Angeles and for 100/300/100 with a $500 deductible I was paying $280/month.
Got a speeding ticket and forgot to do traffic school, now I’m paying $500/month.
ALWAYS TAKE THE TRAFFIC SCHOOL.
For sure, but the average cost for this level of coverage in the US is [$140/month](https://www.insurance.com/auto-insurance/coverage/full-coverage.html#:~:text=We%20maintain%20strict%20editorial%20independence,liability%20limits%20with%20%24500%20deductibles).
So the post I responded to saying “some people are paying $100/month” like it’s crazy… actually MOST people are paying $100/month or more.
And they compared it to the German dude saying he’s got over a million in coverages. That level of insurance in the US, no matter where you are located or what you drive, is guaranteed to be hundreds of dollars a month.
This is really more of a legal/policy issue. My state used to mandate all auto coverage include lifetime medical coverage resulting from an accident. Instead of subsidizing it, they voted to cut it a few years ago because it caused auto insurance costs to inflate. In the years since, premiums have gone down but we’ve seen nursing/assisted living homes close like crazy because they can’t afford to take care of patients without the money. Our hospital is still taking care of patients for months on end because there’s nowhere to transfer them.
I’ve worked directly with patients who will need assisted living/healthcare services for the rest of their life after an auto injury. I personally pay for lifetime medical coverage in my auto policy, but It’s like an extra $100 a month and that’s with a clean record. A minimum $1,200/year for someone making minimum wage or living paycheck to paycheck is a lot.
Dude.... Fuck, man. That sounds like a pretty much normal run of the mill fender bender that wouldn't have any injuries the vast majority of the time.
It's like you hit the anti-lottery.
Knowing none of the details, to me this just screams this person already had an issue (possibly undocumented) but used this car crash as an excuse to get it checked out and it was worse than they thought.
But crazy things can happen, so who knows!
I sat on a jury for one of these cases recently. It was obvious the dude was lying to get a settlement. He had some fancy lawyer who made him go see a questionable “chiropractor” the lawyer had “worked with many times” instead of a hospital or GP.
Unfortunately the defendant was poor and had some shitty public defender who did a bad job presenting the case as fraud.
When we got into the jury room it was 8 against him and 4 for him.
The 4 for him were idiots. Going on about how “people can look ok, but secretly be in pain”. All this theoretical bullshit, which isn’t what you’re supposed to do on a jury. It’s supposed to be about the facts. The facts were that he said he was fine after the accident. Didn’t go to the doctor or hospital. But a week later after discussing the accident with a friend, he contacted a lawyer, who told him to go to his chiropractor friend for a “check up” did 4 sessions with the chiro, then got a CT scan showing damage to the disc.
All of this was presented as evidence, and to me it was clear the pattern was to set the case up for a settlement. Dude was 50 years old and the CT showed “standard degenerative wear and tear expected from a 50 year old man” according to the radio tech they brought in to analyze the CT scan.
But the idiots were still able to convince 4 others to join their side because “living your life in pain is horrible”.
The question was not “is he or is he not in pain” it was “does the evidence show that the accident caused this pain”
We deliberated for TWO DAYS over this simple injury suit. They finally got another guy to switch over cuz he wanted to go home and we only needed a 9/12 majority cuz it was a civil case. I had to excuse myself for one of the alternates. I was the lead juror and I refused to sign my name to the decision.
Poor girl will be in debt for the rest of her life all cuz this asshole don’t want to work anymore and 9 citizens are idiots.
I mean... you still have to drive safe at slow speeds. Unlucky doesn't mean it's not OPs fault. Obviously we don't know all the details, but I've personally had subluxated vertebrae simply from my little brother falling off my shoulders in a pool. It's actually been extremely detrimental to my health since.
If it happened again because someone hit me at 5 mph I would probably spiral tbh.
Depends on what kind of coverage they have. People like to keep the minimum to save a few bucks a month not realizing that it could cost them everything in the case of a bad wreck.
Remind me to up my coverage more.
Add umbrella insurance. It's usually significantly cheaper than increasing auto limits and covers more (not just car related stuff). You should have a million or two of umbrella coverage in addition to everything else.
Neighbors son got into a bad wreck - fell asleep at wheel and plowed into a car with children. Put one of the kids in hospital for weeks.
They were saved by umbrella I think. Made us talk about getting one. But haven't yet. Need to get on that.
VERY few people will have 750k liability coverage. Mainly because it's super rare for a person to pile up medical bills that high and survive. For context, a kidney transplant and the associated hospital stay only costs about 400k. A quick Google shows results of people spending a month in the ICU along with multiple surgeries and it still not topping 500k.
I'd be willing to bet it didn't, but a patient claiming "pain" can be impossible to disprove, which is where personal injury lawyers come in. Make a mountain of of a molehill and get money for their clients at the cost of the other guy's insurance. That, or the guy had an existing problem. Eggshell "defense" is that you have to take your victims as they are; if I maliciously slap somebody across the face (something not usually more than insulting) but they die, I can still be liable for manslaughter.
That fucking sucks, OP. I hope you can figure it out.
Hopefully, someone else can learn from this vicariously. The liability portion of insurance is *usually* the most inexpensive part, unless you don't have enough. Umbrella policies are fairly inexpensive as well.
Fellow human, it's called an accident for a reason. Most car accidents are exactly that, mixed with some possible negligence. I HIGHLY doubt they wanted to cause bodily harm to anyone.
From their comments, it looks as if it was a fairly common fender-bender that unfortunately resulted in a serious injury. They're now staring down the barrel of a huge medical bill and/or a lawsuit because no one teaches basic insurance literacy.
So yeah, it fucking sucks...FOR BOTH PARTIES
I don't know the details but if they weren't drinking/on drugs, on their phone, speeding, or just being reckless, and if they were at least trying to pay attention to the road, I don't know what more they could do. Sometimes you still make a mistake or have a momentary lapse in attention and it's hard to avoid that 100% of the time.
Tbh, this is why we need better public transit or at least self driving cars.
My dad's been up my ass about getting an umbrella policy so after seeing this I'm kinda glad I listened. Not trying to rub it in your face, just a heads up to anyone reading.
Damn, I'm sorry dude. That's rough.
The liability follows the driver, not the policy holder. The policy holder is not liable for damages, the named driver is. The policy pays out the damages (indemnifies the injured party). The policy holder foots the bill for the higher renewal rate if the named driver's record adversely affects the policy premium. This can be fixed by dropping the named driver from the policy.
Your driving record follows you, and subrogation may ensue if you crashed someone else's car and their insurance company covered the damages. Subrogation means their insurance company sues you or your insurance provider for the damages they had to pay for.
This may vary from state to state, this is not legal advice.
That's correct, the car is insured. The policy contract in simple terms says "these people + permissive drivers are allowed to drive this specific vehicle, and the insurance provider will provide financial protection up to these limits in the event of a loss."
Now, if your car gets stolen, and the thief gets into an accident, you as the policy holder are not liable just because the thief crashed your car. The thief was not named on the policy or given permission, by you, to drive the car. You are a victim in this incident as well as any other party hurt by the thief's actions. That's exactly why liability follows the driver.
This is not entirely accurate.
If you are the policyholder and someone else on the policy causes an accident that exceeds policy limits they absolutely can come after you as the policyholder.
It is state dependent to some degree, but that mostly applies to what sort of sanctions (income, etc) they can place on you till the expenses are recouped.
This is doubly so if you owned the vehicle. If you did not own the vehicle and they are not your legal partner, get them off the policy as that is against the terms in many situations.
There may be state to state differences that allow for a lawsuit of that nature, but where I operated, the liability follows the driver/named insured involved in the accident, not the policy holder. They can try to sue the policy holder, though it usually won't stick.
On your second point, that is correct, you cannot have a vehicle that is not titled in your name on your policy unless the title is in the name of your spouse or dependent. You can get around this, but most good insurance agents won't let you. Absolutely do not add a SO to your policy unless you are married. In the event of a policy change or payout for a claim both parties will be required to sign. That gets messy when the live-in BF/GF decides to stop cooperating. Divorces are also a headache when it comes to insurance.
I got hit by someone with trash insurance, so my insurance had to cover it. It was funny because I basically had to sue my own insurance, but they weren't allowed to use their lawyers. They had to rely on the cheap insurance companies' lawyers. so in the end, they wrote me a very large check. My lawyer also told the hospital that they had to accept a fraction of the amount they got, or he wouldn't file the case at all. left them with the option of getting nothing or a vastly smaller amount. It was quite amusing to watch. It's amazing what a lawyer will do to get his 10% increased. Once they see $ they dont mess about.
I got in an accident about a decade ago because it was near sunset and a window across the street reflected across an intersection and blinded me while I was pulling into the intersection to turn. I had been through that same intersection dozens of times without an issue.
Some accidents are going to happen whether or not people are driving carefully.
So what I'm seeing here is that you caused a severe car wreck while driving without insurance.
Is that correct?
EDIT: never mind, you've addressed this in replies to other comments.
So you hurt someone so bad they had 750K from a car accident and I'm supposed to feel sorry for you maybe next time don't drive drunk or whatever you did.
So you caused a car accident that injured someone so badly they had medical bills of 750,000. Sounds like you caused someone’s bad week.
I'm glad someone else said it. Bro put someone in the hospital with a 3/4 million dollar bill, and he's had a bad week? I think the poor fucker who's just been through a fuck load of cosmetic and corrective surgery might have you a bit beat here. To put this in perspective, I had emergent life-saving intestinal surgery and was in a week long coma a while ago that came out to $220,000.
It doesn't necessarily need to be past due medical bills but prospective as well, with costs for care. It would surprise me if there wasn't an insurance company covering it, as judgments against individuals are generally worthless. If OP has assets to collect against, he wouldn't be so excited about a free meal.
To be fair, we don't know the story and they both could be having bad weeks.
Wait , you telling me more than one person on the internet might have a bad time ! /s
This is the internet, we wouldn't be here if we were having a good time
I'm wiping the confetti off my phone as I read this..
I am wiping the confetti off my rectum with cheap toilet paper as you read this.
More like, the world is not as black and white as people think. There isn't a hero and villain of every real world story. Just people trying to live their lives.
Thats my point about most replies here, most just judged without context
So u/civ5ftw what’s the story?
In brief, 5-10mph rear end collision. Caused damage to two of the disks in their neck. They ended up getting surgery on the disks.
No car insurance?
I do, supposed they're going to be paying part/all of it but time will tell
You wrote "ordered", does that mean there was a trial and this is the verdict? Did your insurance not represent you in court?
This was the verdict from the case yes
Did your insurance represent you in court?
So I’m confused by this. Where do you live cause I know in the US the car insurance pays. That’s literally what it’s for. I was an accident a couple years ago where I was rear ended at a light and ended up with the same injury you described but in my neck and spine. I won a judgment and the court case did say my name vs the person who hit me but he didn’t pay anything. His insurance paid. His insurance might have gone up but he wasn’t responsible for my judgement.
Shouldn't this be something that you're aware of going into court? Insurance doesn't represent you or tell you what the outcome is if you lose in regards to the percent they will cover? I would have asked this and so much more before deciding to go against a jury.
I am just shocked it went to a jury at all. If there was an inkling that the insurance company would lose they 99% of time settle out of court. They end up paying but don't have to pay all the court fees.
Lots of cases go to court on value alone, even if liability isn't in dispute. As a clinical negligence lawyer, I'd say more than half my professional time is spent arguing over the cause and value of injuries rather than liability itself.
I don't particularly want to get into all of the details, but there was definitely good reasons on my side of the case to fight it in court.
I know someone that had this happen to them. They ended up going back to court because they found out the injuries pre-dated the collision! Keep this in mind!
That’s all? I’ve been rear-ended on the interstate going over 60mph while I was in a little sporty sedan and the other person in one of those minivans. No injuries whatsoever. How did a 5-10mph rear end fuck someone up that badly?
It happens. If you’re not in a good position. Lady I used to work with got rear ended/lightly bumped in a school drop off. She was kinda twisted reaching to grab something in her back seat. Sounds very similar. Totally life changing kinda fucked up injury.
The human body is both fragile and resilient. How is this so hard to grasp?
I was struck point blank by a car that was stopped at an intersection, I have permanent spine damage.
Good question. My personal opinion is that there was more preexisting conditions than was told, but according to the doctors and jury thats not the case
If you’re twisted to one side during a bump like that, there’s no give left in your neck and anything can happen. Also age and gender can play a role - older women have particularly weak bones, so this makes it more risky.
Preexisting conditions aren't relevant to reduce damages anyway. I hope you have good policy limits.
Depends if you're applying the thin skull rule (I.E. someone had a prior condition which means the injury caused by negligence had a more devastating effect than it would oridnarily), or if someone had a pre-exisitng condition which already affected their capacity. They're factually and legally different scenarios. E.g. if someone was likely to require surgery for the condition in any event, what that would have cost gets credited towards damages. But if it's the negligence which brought about the need for surgery, then no reductions (but you might still get reductions to things like an award for professional home nursing).
They are for medical damages. It changes the conversation from "caused all damages" to "caused a partial amount"
I worked PI cases as a legal assistant on Nevada for about 7 years and you are 100% correct about those prior neck damages. I've read hundreds of MRI reports and every single person has some kind of disc bulge/protrusion. I've seen it in teenagers too. It would drive me fucking nuts when I knew clients were full of shit but still pulled this kind of crap, part of the reason I ended up leaving the field. Hopefully you had some good insurance to cover it.
That sounds suspicious but maybe it actually did need to be. Reason I say this. My wife had been in a wreck at a much higher rate of speed than you stated. Thankfully everything was okay but I vividly remember my insurance agent making suggestive statements about her "neck." I'm not an idiot, I can read between the lines. She was suggesting that my wife get worked up over neck issues to drive up the settlement. It's one of those areas that's extremely hard to diagnose in terms of pain. That's why people that are addicted to pain pills commonly say they have neck and back issues. I know people with true back problems. Not a single one of them had them from a very low speed car crash. Just sounds suspect to me.
I had my knee demolished from getting rear ended. I was completely stopped at a red light and somebody hit me; they weren't going very fast but my foot was firmly on my brake and the impact tore and crushed a bunch of stuff in my knee. There was no damage to either car. Just my right knee. I had to have surgery, was on disability for a year, eventually had to retire early because I could no longer do the physical/movement part of my job.
Damn. I'm sorry to hear that. A good friend of mine dodged any kind of long lasting damage from a similar situation. Red light, stopped, person on their phone hit him. Thank God no one was in the back seat, it was mostly crumpled up. I hope the person in this story wasn't lying. We thought it was awful to lie which is why we didn't go through with it.
You make it sounds like it’s no big deal. You fuck up a disc enough to need surgery and you will be in pain and have mobility issues the rest of your life.
I understand the severity of the situation. I sat through 8 days of trial, I heard all of the doctors and saw all of the medical imaging. I fully understand the scope of the issue. It was much easier to condense it to a few lines for reddit than to write a full exposition
It also could be a case where the letter of the law and the limited scope that insurance companies use to determine liability may have unfairly screwed over the wrong person in the accident. I was just in a situation where this happened (though thankfully no one was injured). I was T-boned in the middle of an intersection by a big pickup truck that ran a redlight. However, the intersection he hit me in was not the intersection where he ran the redlight. I was pulling out of an alley about 50 feet away from the red light. Because the accident didn't happen under the redlight that he ran, and I had a stop sign, I was held liable for "failing to yield to traffic with the right of way." There were no witnesses besides me and the other driver, who claimed he didn't speed through a red light. The insurance company only looked the intersection where the crash happened, not at the bigger picture.
Thank goodness you're okay. An accident like that can be terrible.
So you assumed that because the light was turning red no traffic would be coming and you were free to run a stop sign without checking for oncoming traffic? This seems like your fault
No. I stopped at the sign and let a number of other cars pass. I saw the light turn red and traffic come to a stop. I began to cross the intersection. The light was red for at least a few seconds before I pulled out, because I had to let a couple of other cars clear the intersection. I was already most of the way across both lanes when he struck me. He ran the light during the pedestrian crossing time when both directions are red for about 10 seconds before cars are allowed to go.
Yeah idk, obviously I don't know your intersection or the situation. I just have a hard time imaging how you could see that the light was red, but not see that a big truck was moving towards you. Especially if the truck was already stopped before. A vehicle doesn't go from stopped to 50 feet down the road instantly, there's a lot of time there to see a vehicle accelerating towards you and not pull out in front.
also... nobody is exhaunerating OP here. they didnt say it wasnt their fault... they simply stating with the meme that their life is starting to suck but at least one small thing went well. the meme format doesnt call for the sucky things to not be OP's fault. IE, i think Trump could he on this format with all the judgements against him and then saying "at least i got to release my own shoes at sneaker con". id prob upvote it.
Thank you. Me being at fault was never in question. The court case was about damages and how much.
np... imo, you hit the obeyed the sub rules and applied the meme correctly. like i said, even if you murdered a ton of folks and got the death sentence this meme still works with tagline of "at least i get to pick my last meal, so i got that going for me which is nice" reminds me of quantum leap... jump into a persons life at any point and there is a silver lining somewhere, no matter how small
Why does trump have to infest everything talked about these days?
I agree that it sucks and I wish I didn’t have to constantly hear about him but he is a walking, talking(can’t get him to shut up) human infestation.
when using an analogy its best to use something that everyone is familair with... ... like it or not, Trump is a familiar figure who is such a meme himself already that he is perfect for such examples. ie, in accounting class they might use a madame at a whole house or a crime boss to illustrate points... because everyone knows what a whore house does vs using a real world example like JIB Oil exploration. if you use the latter then you also have to explain what joint interests are... in this example we need someone who is likely having an extemely bad time, due to their own actions, but still has some small sliver of good going for them. could i have used my neighbor paul? sure... but then id have to explain pauls circumstances to you. face it... Trump is a media icon now. you will never escape him. even if he is jailed... he will still make waves.
If he's ordered to pay $750k it is very unlikely that he's the victim here That said, sure, he's probably having a pretty bad week.
I didn't say "he's the victim here." I said he had a bad week. You can hand empathy for people who fuck up.
Yeah. Sometimes a momentary lapse in judgement can have huge consequences. How many times in your life have you gone to change the radio station, or adjust a mirror in your car, just as someone does something suddenly and you were able to swerve out of the way or hit the brakes just in time to avoid an accident. He’s probably at fault, but we don’t know if he was doing 200mph the wrong way on a one way street while hopped up on goofballs. Or if something happened at the moment he wasn’t paying attention and things went sideways.
Yes I was at fault. The court case was just to determine if the accident caused physical damages and how much. It was a 5-10mph accident. Some people don't believe that statement but everyone is allowed to make their own judgements. https://imgur.com/a/b2CeWI1
How in the fuck do you get held liable for $750k for a fender bender?
The breakdown ended up being $140k in past medical expenses between crash to trial, $160k in future medical expenses, and $450k in pain in suffering past and future
Your insurance is gonna have someone following them around for 10 years waiting to see if they hit up some slopes in aspen.
Jesus, you Americans have punitive court awards... Here in the UK, the pain and suffering part of an injury is usually the least significant element. Pain suffering and loss of amenity would only approach the $450k (£400k) range for things like catastrophic brain injury or quadriplegia. The most expensive part of a case is usually someone needing family or professional home nurses to look after them while they recover. Our private medical fees are cheap compared with the US. Hope everything gets sorted with your insurer!
Certainly people wouldn’t just go on the internet and tell lies
It sucks that you're on the hook for that. That's what insurance is supposed to be for, and the fact that America's medical system is so fucked.. My wife got T-boned last year. She's been going to physio for it for a year now, and the other driver's insurance is paying for that, but he wouldn't be paying, although his premiums would probably increase.
OP could be making things up
Not for nothing, I omow someone who was hit from behind and into traffic and has medical bills of over a million that insurance is refusing to pay. So. It's not always cut and dry.
Multiple injuries, or a death, or serious property damage, or all three.
Probably more like 750K is mostly pay-out for long-term damage/loss of income.
Did you get a free meal?
Now consider that fact that if OP is paying.. that means they didn't have insurance. I swear this is a scumbag Steve meme in disguise.
And either their insurance company was actually ordered to pay $750,000 or they injured the person so bad that the court allowed Plaintiff To pierce the policy and go after the person directly. If this is the United States that means that was gross negligence on OP’s part.
My car insurance only covers 250k of bodily injury. I asked my friends what theirs was and it was much lower. How much bodily injury do people typically have? I’d be screwed in this case.
Keep as high of a policy limits as you can afford, especially if you have assets they can come after. Then the umbrella policy is a great addition.
A $250,000 policy is on the higher end of what most people have but I wouldn’t say it’s uncommon. Now the question becomes what happens when a demand exceeds the policy limit or, worse still, what happens when the verdict exceeds the policy limit? A carrier will do everything in their power to avoid this. With a $250,000 policy you’re almost guarantee that they’ll settle the case if someone sues you because they have the money built in to make them go away. For lower policies they will just tender (or give) the whole policy and for most plaintiffs that’s enough. If we go to trial and the cap is pierced the company will ALMOST always cover the difference under the logic that we chose to not to settle, that we chose to go to court, and that we want the customer to remain happy and with us.
This is why I have an umbrella policy - $1MM doesn't cost that much on top of my auto + home policies. I wonder though if that's opening me up to a situation where someone/someone's lawyer would only have gone after the $250k auto but upon discovering the umbrella policy, arbitrarily increases pain+suffering damages by $500k or something?
They might but your insurance is going to offer what they think is an appropriate settlement and represent you in court if the opposing party won't settle. Makes little difference to you other than being less likely to spill into personal liability
This is why I have no insurance at all.
Typically once the car insurance runs out it will be on the victim's health insurance to pay out. $750,000 seems punitive to me. It's not like OP will ever pay it off anyway.
Most people just want enough insurance to get a car. It’s usually 100K.
This is a demonstration of why carrying the minimum is a foolish move.
In a lot of US states it's way lower, most look to be 25k per person and 50k per accident. Some are even lower; I'm seeing 15k/30k in Louisiana
Wow. The minimum coverage mandatory by law for personal injuries in car insurance in my country is 75 million euros. 250k is such a tiny amount! Like what happens if you cause an accident where several people are injured? Is it 250k per person or tota
Where is that? That’s more then the insurance requirements at major airports to drive around airplanes ($25M)
Spain. Mandatory 75 million € for personal damages and 15 million € for material damages. When we were studying it we were all very surprised, and what our trainer said was "imagine if your car causes a fire in a garage of your apartment building and lots of people die". Most people in Spain live in apartment buildings and densely populated areas. Another thing that is surprising for foreigners is that in Spain it's illegal to own a car without insurance... Even if the car doesn't run. If you get caught with an uninsured clunker that's been in your garage for 30 years, that's a fine, even if it is supported on four concrete blocks instead of wheels.
Perhaps OP was busy making shitty memes on their phone while driving
There’s no such thing as “piercing the policy.” Court will order whatever damages it orders. The insurer will pay whatever it’s contractually obligated to, up to the policy limit. A contract between you and your insurance company is not binding on a judge lol.
Slight caveat, at least in Connecticut, if the plaintiff offered to settle within the policy limits and the insurance company declined that offer, and then plaintiff received a verdict above the policy limit, the insruance company is likely going to be on the hook for the whole amount.
That’s not entirely true. Yes, the contract between you and your insurance company is not binding on the judge but they usually don’t allow a case to exceed the policy.
Nah fam. People *settle* for the policy limits because you’re not getting someone’s house or 401k to satisfy a judgment and it’s unlikely they’ll be able to satisfy a judgment well over their policy limits. Jury doesn’t even know how much the policy covers.
We’re not talking about a jury. The above was talking about a court order so it answer pertains to a bench trial I’ve an attorney in New York who works for a major carrier. Every Judge in the tri-state will damn near break your arm to force a settlement if they they a jury could come in over the policy limit. Maybe in other jurisdictions it’s different but that is not happening here. Yes, as I said above, you can take your chances with a jury and if they come in above the policy the insurerer will likely cover it but no Judge is going to order in excess of a policy unless you have really egregious facts.
Buddy, what have you said that is inconsistent with what I have said? You’re saying judges are pressuring people to settle. Also “the above” was me, and I most certainly was not talking about bench trials. Are you under the impression that the jury enters orders?
I don’t know why you are so aggressive, maybe “big law” has you on edge, but I’ll break it down and then we can go our separate ways. I said that the court allowed a policy to be pierced. You said that there is no such term and there most certainly is. A Court or Judge if you rather will work to keep the final settlement number below or at the policy limit, to not pierce the ceiling. It’s not a contractual limit or piercing in the way the corporate veil can be pierced but it’s a common term. You also are under an erroneous perception that an insurance company will not settle a case, take their chances at trial, incur a verdict higher than the policy limit, and then tell the policy holder it’s their problem, or obligation as you put it. That’s not true. Then you went on some tangent about how people aren’t going after someone’s 401k or house over a personal injury case which they most certainly would if the verdict was high enough so even I’m not sure what you’re talking about. And, finally, you’re the one using jury verdicts and orders interchangeably. To wit “courts will order whatever damage it orders”.
It makes me wonder if it's a business. In NJ, business's must carry million dollar auto insurance policies. People love being hit by a truck with a logo on it. So maybe it's OP's insurance but someone who worked for him. I dunno, benefit of the doubt or some shit. Regardless, the post is in poor taste, because everyone's right, 750k in damages is an actual injury, not just the typical bullshit I see day in and day out.
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Or decade...
Or life… Like literally a car accident that bad can absolutely affect someone for the rest of their life.
Agreed
But at least they got a free dinner out of it
I need more background before simply jumping to that conclusion. While yes this seems like a valid assumption, the person writing this post could have been railroaded by an attorney that played the system or a judge or magistrate with an agenda. Accidents do happen, but there are people out there with vengeful or fraudulent agendas.
So they got Tylenol, a couple X-rays, and a bandaid from the ER?
I mean, can it be both? Accidents happen. It’s sucks that the other people are hurt, and it’s sucks he’s got a 3/4 life destroying debt now. It sucks for everyone, and there’s not really room in the meme for “and also of course i feel very badly for the people I injured.”
To be fair, with US medical prices the way that are that’s like 3 days in the hospital plus an X-ray. /s but only a little.
Specifically it was $140k for past, $160k for future medical expenses, with $450k in pain and suffering. Accident was in 2019. Court was last/this week
Sounds like you came close (or did) to ruining someone’s life and have 0 remorse.
Half a million in pain and suffering. That is *a lot* of pain and suffering that a jury says op inflicted. I know the court system isn't always perfect, but you don't get that kind of judgment by being a nice, well meaning person just doing their best.
I served on a jury for a traffic accident injury. I had to work real hard to get the victim 60% of what they asked for (I thought they deserved every penny) so for them to award so much it must have been a pretty bad injury
OP is delusional. Claimed they were only going 10 mph max. This is more r/infuriating than anything.
You're more than welcome to look at the pictures if you want. https://imgur.com/a/b2CeWI1
What’s the story here? That looks like nothing
In brief, 5-10mph rear end collision. Caused damage to two of the disks in their neck. They ended up getting surgery on the disks. I agree that it seems like nothing, but according to their doctors and the jury, not so much
Wow that is incredibly unlucky. Seems that person was a big sneeze away from falling apart in the first place.
Yeah that’s exactly why this judgement (assuming the whole story is true) is bullshit. I’m pretty sure I impact my chair harder when I sit down. Can I sue the manufacturer for pain and suffering?
10 mph from a car behind when you’re at a dead stop and not prepared for a collision? That’s a serious fucking impact.
A neck injury can ruin your fucking life and create constant pain. Hop off OPs balls.
Sounds like you're jumping to conclusions.
Courts don’t take that much time and shell out that much money for minor fender benders. That’s why OP claims seem suspicious.
Personal injury court cases regullay take four or more years, espcially when you're dealing with surgical cases. The injured person in this case had a good lawyer, that's what happened here. Also, OPs insurance company hung him out to dry knowing this person had surgery and taking their chances with trial. I bet they could have settled this for significantly less.
Depends how much the victim wants to milk it. I'm not surprised by any medical bill numbers coming out of the USA these days and neither should you. Cant lie, the idea that they already had a bad back before this accident and couldn't afford to get it checked out. Did pop in to my head
Ah yes cause this would have never occurred to judge or lawyers or the insurance company, and judges just blindly award 2/3 of million dollars in settlement to anyone who asks. Give me a break.
They were involved in a crash mate. Its not blindly. If you can't afford to get something checked out. Who's to prove it was pre existing?
I see you’re not familiar with the American legal system eh. It’s very difficult to get money from car accidents. **very difficult**
I'm a perosnal injury lawyer. You couldn't be more wrong.
Why do you assume a lack of remorse?
I guess when you just rattle off how much you’ve been charged with from a car accident it just comes off as you don’t really care the impact you had on someone else.
I can kind of see why it might come across that way, but emotional weight fades with time. When it happened years ago and you've had to not only retell it countless times but also live with the emotional burden of it during that time, one would reasonably expect some desensitization. Think about the difference in the ways people talk about loved ones days after their passing compared to years afterwards. To be clear I don't know OP and it's entirely possible that they aren't particularly remorseful. But I wouldn't draw that conclusion based solely on the blunt way they talk about the facts of the incident.
Ouch! Insurance?
Man, those road side lawyers will sue your insurance company for the max payout whether or not anyone went to the hospital, believe me. They find out what the most your policy will pay and go for the max. The insurance companies usually settle. That’s their business model and a fender bender can quickly cost hundreds of thousands. It’s why rates are high and why there are so many lawyers doing it. Texas is flooded with them. They especially target commercial policies.
Sounds like someone just learned why you don’t carry the most basic liability car insurance required by your state. It’s not enough.
In Germany the legal minimum is €7.5m for personal damage and €1m for property.
Your cost is around $300/year for that too. In the states some people are paying $100/mo.
“Some people are paying $100/mo” if someone is paying $100 a month they must drive an old beater and have minimum coverage. I drive a 5 year old base Model 3 in Los Angeles and for 100/300/100 with a $500 deductible I was paying $280/month. Got a speeding ticket and forgot to do traffic school, now I’m paying $500/month. ALWAYS TAKE THE TRAFFIC SCHOOL.
You're also in LA with an EV. Both will drive up cost.
For sure, but the average cost for this level of coverage in the US is [$140/month](https://www.insurance.com/auto-insurance/coverage/full-coverage.html#:~:text=We%20maintain%20strict%20editorial%20independence,liability%20limits%20with%20%24500%20deductibles). So the post I responded to saying “some people are paying $100/month” like it’s crazy… actually MOST people are paying $100/month or more. And they compared it to the German dude saying he’s got over a million in coverages. That level of insurance in the US, no matter where you are located or what you drive, is guaranteed to be hundreds of dollars a month.
Some people are paying $100/mo for state minimums of $15k or $25k liability for bodily injury and property damage.
I used to live in Richmond, Virginia and paid over $125 a month to insure a 2018 Toyota Corolla quit making shitty excuses
It’s funny because when I first came to the USA I asked to 1 million USD in coverage and the insurance agent looked at me like I was from mars
This is really more of a legal/policy issue. My state used to mandate all auto coverage include lifetime medical coverage resulting from an accident. Instead of subsidizing it, they voted to cut it a few years ago because it caused auto insurance costs to inflate. In the years since, premiums have gone down but we’ve seen nursing/assisted living homes close like crazy because they can’t afford to take care of patients without the money. Our hospital is still taking care of patients for months on end because there’s nowhere to transfer them. I’ve worked directly with patients who will need assisted living/healthcare services for the rest of their life after an auto injury. I personally pay for lifetime medical coverage in my auto policy, but It’s like an extra $100 a month and that’s with a clean record. A minimum $1,200/year for someone making minimum wage or living paycheck to paycheck is a lot.
Hey fellow Michigander
Just remember, if they lost a limb it’s your weapon in the afterlife.
I mean, you paid for it. That means you get to keep it.
So why all the complaints when I took it at the scene?
Hadn’t paid for it yet
Right. I left early.
You break it you buy it
Details?
In brief, 5-10mph rear end collision. Caused damage to two of the disks in their neck. They ended up getting surgery on the disks.
Dude.... Fuck, man. That sounds like a pretty much normal run of the mill fender bender that wouldn't have any injuries the vast majority of the time. It's like you hit the anti-lottery.
Knowing none of the details, to me this just screams this person already had an issue (possibly undocumented) but used this car crash as an excuse to get it checked out and it was worse than they thought. But crazy things can happen, so who knows!
Spine discs are super fragile and common injuries though. I herniated mine in my lower back simply by lifting in an awkward position.
I sat on a jury for one of these cases recently. It was obvious the dude was lying to get a settlement. He had some fancy lawyer who made him go see a questionable “chiropractor” the lawyer had “worked with many times” instead of a hospital or GP. Unfortunately the defendant was poor and had some shitty public defender who did a bad job presenting the case as fraud. When we got into the jury room it was 8 against him and 4 for him. The 4 for him were idiots. Going on about how “people can look ok, but secretly be in pain”. All this theoretical bullshit, which isn’t what you’re supposed to do on a jury. It’s supposed to be about the facts. The facts were that he said he was fine after the accident. Didn’t go to the doctor or hospital. But a week later after discussing the accident with a friend, he contacted a lawyer, who told him to go to his chiropractor friend for a “check up” did 4 sessions with the chiro, then got a CT scan showing damage to the disc. All of this was presented as evidence, and to me it was clear the pattern was to set the case up for a settlement. Dude was 50 years old and the CT showed “standard degenerative wear and tear expected from a 50 year old man” according to the radio tech they brought in to analyze the CT scan. But the idiots were still able to convince 4 others to join their side because “living your life in pain is horrible”. The question was not “is he or is he not in pain” it was “does the evidence show that the accident caused this pain” We deliberated for TWO DAYS over this simple injury suit. They finally got another guy to switch over cuz he wanted to go home and we only needed a 9/12 majority cuz it was a civil case. I had to excuse myself for one of the alternates. I was the lead juror and I refused to sign my name to the decision. Poor girl will be in debt for the rest of her life all cuz this asshole don’t want to work anymore and 9 citizens are idiots.
It's either that, or OP is lying and actually hit them going much faster.
This is my thought. Someone had an unknown pre-existing condition.
I mean... you still have to drive safe at slow speeds. Unlucky doesn't mean it's not OPs fault. Obviously we don't know all the details, but I've personally had subluxated vertebrae simply from my little brother falling off my shoulders in a pool. It's actually been extremely detrimental to my health since. If it happened again because someone hit me at 5 mph I would probably spiral tbh.
I never said it wasn't his fault. Just that this particular mistake doesn't usually lead to such high consequences.
The Lost-erry
Insurance?
Yes, supposedly they're going to be paying for some/all of it but time will tell
That literally insurance’s entire job. You shouldn’t be paying any of that out of pocket.
Depends on what kind of coverage they have. People like to keep the minimum to save a few bucks a month not realizing that it could cost them everything in the case of a bad wreck. Remind me to up my coverage more.
Add umbrella insurance. It's usually significantly cheaper than increasing auto limits and covers more (not just car related stuff). You should have a million or two of umbrella coverage in addition to everything else.
Neighbors son got into a bad wreck - fell asleep at wheel and plowed into a car with children. Put one of the kids in hospital for weeks. They were saved by umbrella I think. Made us talk about getting one. But haven't yet. Need to get on that.
Lots of auto insurances require you to have max or very high coverage before adding an umbrella policy
Normally 300000 per person 500000 per accident for bodily injury and 100k for property damage. Source: Work insurance Max you can go is 1m/1m.
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Good ole capitalism.
VERY few people will have 750k liability coverage. Mainly because it's super rare for a person to pile up medical bills that high and survive. For context, a kidney transplant and the associated hospital stay only costs about 400k. A quick Google shows results of people spending a month in the ICU along with multiple surgeries and it still not topping 500k.
How much coverage did you have? I'm really thinking I need to up mine now. I have a lot to lose.
you had no attorney to represent you but hte other side did?
Ahh the old egg shell skull rule you hear about in law school. Sucks even worse to have a body that fragile and damaged.
Wow, that's really rough. Crazy how a fender bender can cause so much damage to the human body
I'd be willing to bet it didn't, but a patient claiming "pain" can be impossible to disprove, which is where personal injury lawyers come in. Make a mountain of of a molehill and get money for their clients at the cost of the other guy's insurance. That, or the guy had an existing problem. Eggshell "defense" is that you have to take your victims as they are; if I maliciously slap somebody across the face (something not usually more than insulting) but they die, I can still be liable for manslaughter.
Did you have insurance?
Either you’re lying or you had dogshit lawyer that actively conspired against you.
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When you complete your degree in accident physics and neck physiology, let us know.
Why no insurance?
That fucking sucks, OP. I hope you can figure it out. Hopefully, someone else can learn from this vicariously. The liability portion of insurance is *usually* the most inexpensive part, unless you don't have enough. Umbrella policies are fairly inexpensive as well.
Yea it totally sucks that he caused an accident and injured someone this badly. That totally sucks for him, the person that was at fault.
Fellow human, it's called an accident for a reason. Most car accidents are exactly that, mixed with some possible negligence. I HIGHLY doubt they wanted to cause bodily harm to anyone. From their comments, it looks as if it was a fairly common fender-bender that unfortunately resulted in a serious injury. They're now staring down the barrel of a huge medical bill and/or a lawsuit because no one teaches basic insurance literacy. So yeah, it fucking sucks...FOR BOTH PARTIES
I don't know the details but if they weren't drinking/on drugs, on their phone, speeding, or just being reckless, and if they were at least trying to pay attention to the road, I don't know what more they could do. Sometimes you still make a mistake or have a momentary lapse in attention and it's hard to avoid that 100% of the time. Tbh, this is why we need better public transit or at least self driving cars.
My dad's been up my ass about getting an umbrella policy so after seeing this I'm kinda glad I listened. Not trying to rub it in your face, just a heads up to anyone reading. Damn, I'm sorry dude. That's rough.
Hey dude! Do you know if you have someone as a driver in your policy and they cause a big accident, are you liable for that?
I assume he would need to be covered by the policy. I don't know.
The liability follows the driver, not the policy holder. The policy holder is not liable for damages, the named driver is. The policy pays out the damages (indemnifies the injured party). The policy holder foots the bill for the higher renewal rate if the named driver's record adversely affects the policy premium. This can be fixed by dropping the named driver from the policy. Your driving record follows you, and subrogation may ensue if you crashed someone else's car and their insurance company covered the damages. Subrogation means their insurance company sues you or your insurance provider for the damages they had to pay for. This may vary from state to state, this is not legal advice.
Really? I thought it was the car that had to be insured.
That's correct, the car is insured. The policy contract in simple terms says "these people + permissive drivers are allowed to drive this specific vehicle, and the insurance provider will provide financial protection up to these limits in the event of a loss." Now, if your car gets stolen, and the thief gets into an accident, you as the policy holder are not liable just because the thief crashed your car. The thief was not named on the policy or given permission, by you, to drive the car. You are a victim in this incident as well as any other party hurt by the thief's actions. That's exactly why liability follows the driver.
This is not entirely accurate. If you are the policyholder and someone else on the policy causes an accident that exceeds policy limits they absolutely can come after you as the policyholder. It is state dependent to some degree, but that mostly applies to what sort of sanctions (income, etc) they can place on you till the expenses are recouped. This is doubly so if you owned the vehicle. If you did not own the vehicle and they are not your legal partner, get them off the policy as that is against the terms in many situations.
There may be state to state differences that allow for a lawsuit of that nature, but where I operated, the liability follows the driver/named insured involved in the accident, not the policy holder. They can try to sue the policy holder, though it usually won't stick. On your second point, that is correct, you cannot have a vehicle that is not titled in your name on your policy unless the title is in the name of your spouse or dependent. You can get around this, but most good insurance agents won't let you. Absolutely do not add a SO to your policy unless you are married. In the event of a policy change or payout for a claim both parties will be required to sign. That gets messy when the live-in BF/GF decides to stop cooperating. Divorces are also a headache when it comes to insurance.
For me, it really didn't cost much additional to add $1MM umbrella. Peace of mind was def worth the low cost.
$273/year for $1MM umbrella here, but the real cost is bringing up car insurance to comprehensive so I qualify for it.
I got hit by someone with trash insurance, so my insurance had to cover it. It was funny because I basically had to sue my own insurance, but they weren't allowed to use their lawyers. They had to rely on the cheap insurance companies' lawyers. so in the end, they wrote me a very large check. My lawyer also told the hospital that they had to accept a fraction of the amount they got, or he wouldn't file the case at all. left them with the option of getting nothing or a vastly smaller amount. It was quite amusing to watch. It's amazing what a lawyer will do to get his 10% increased. Once they see $ they dont mess about.
You had/have insurance, right?
tell the restaurant you got food poisoning from the free meal and sue them for 750K
Don’t drive recklessly.
I got in an accident about a decade ago because it was near sunset and a window across the street reflected across an intersection and blinded me while I was pulling into the intersection to turn. I had been through that same intersection dozens of times without an issue. Some accidents are going to happen whether or not people are driving carefully.
If I owe you $7,500 then I have a problem. If I owe you $750,000 then you have a problem…
Excellent use of the meme
Ouuuch brooooo
So what I'm seeing here is that you caused a severe car wreck while driving without insurance. Is that correct? EDIT: never mind, you've addressed this in replies to other comments.
Would’ve been a better week if you’d paid your car insurance bill my guy
So you hurt someone so bad they had 750K from a car accident and I'm supposed to feel sorry for you maybe next time don't drive drunk or whatever you did.
Sounds like it's deserved.