Amesbury, MA Car Accident Lawyer

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Auto accidents are not only damaging in the moment but might cause long-lasting harm to victims, entitling them to compensatory damages from negligent drivers.

When calculating your losses from a car accident, our attorneys will consider economic and non-economic damages. Your economic damages include lost wages, medical bills, property damage, and other concrete expenses from a crash. Your non-economic damages include compensation for pain and suffering, which our lawyers can quantify using the appropriate calculation methods. To prove you incurred injuries and need compensation, you need to submit medical evidence, and our lawyers can help you request records from hospitals and keep them organized. We can use those records to confirm if you pass the serious injury threshold and, if so, file your lawsuit within three years of the accident.

Call the Law Office of John J. Sheehan at (617) 925-6407 for a confidential and free case analysis from our car accident lawyers.

Calculating Damages from Car Accidents in Amesbury, MA

Victims who do not know the true value of their claims could risk accepting lowball settlement offers that fail to compensate them for economic and non-economic damages.

Tangible Damages

Tangible damages include victims’ financial losses from an accident. Victims incur many expenses from collisions, including property damage, hospital costs, and lost wages. Because presenting proof of all medical treatments is necessary to get compensation for them, our attorneys will track your care and its cost throughout your physical recovery.

Those unable to work because of injuries caused by negligence can be compensated for their lost wages. Our car accident lawyers may use your recent paychecks and income statements to quantify these losses. If doctors advise against returning to work soon after an accident, follow their guidance and inform our attorneys you cannot work so we can estimate your lost wages.

Victims may continue incurring tangible damages for weeks, months, or even years after an accident, especially if their injuries require prolonged care. When estimating future financial losses, our lawyers may rely on experts who can testify about upcoming treatments or when you might be able to return to work and earn an income, if ever.

Intangible Damages

Intangible damages refer to the emotional distress victims experience after sustaining traumatic injuries in auto accidents. Victims not only feel physical pain from injuries but emotional pain and suffering as well, which might continue for years or the rest of a victim’s life.

Quantifying intangible damages requires our lawyers to use one of two calculation methods: the per diem or multiplier methods. The former works by assigning a daily rate to a victim’s emotional distress and multiplying that amount by the number of days we anticipate them to experience pain and suffering.

The multiplier method considers the severity of a victim’s injuries when choosing a multiplier, generally between 1.5 and 5. After picking an appropriate multiplier, which we may have to support in court with evidence of your injuries, we will multiply it by your total economic damages. We can pick the calculation method that maximizes your recovery of non-economic damages, provided you meet the serious injury threshold under Mass. Gen. Laws Ch. 231, § 6D.

Getting Hospital Records to Use as Evidence in Amesbury, MA Car Accident Cases

Victims need medical records to prove another driver’s negligence injured them, and our lawyers can help victims obtain and organize these records from hospitals and providers while preparing their claims.

The first set of medical records we will need is from paramedics. Always call 911 after a car accident, even if you feel okay physically. Stress, shock, and adrenaline could make you ignore underlying or internal injuries for several hours or days, and paramedics can quickly assess you and take you to the hospital. We can use medical records from first responders to prove you were injured at the scene during the car accident involving the defendant.

We will also need your emergency room records, which detail the immediate treatment you received. These records will help set the foundation of your case and confirm your damages from the accident. We can continue requesting medical records from providers throughout your physical recovery to offer a clear timeline of your injuries and progress.

Suppose you miss any scheduled visits with doctors or specialists after an accident. In that case, that will be reflected in your medical records and could raise questions about your injuries or need for compensation, so do not allow for any gaps to form in your medical records.

Limits on Filing Car Accident Lawsuits in Amesbury, MA

In most situations, victims must file a lawsuit against an at-fault driver within three years of an accident. Furthermore, victims must show that their injuries or damages are serious enough to sue, and our lawyers can confirm if you meet the threshold at the start of your case.

Any injury that causes death, whole or partial loss of a body member, whole or partial permanent or serious disfigurement, sight or hearing loss, or a fracture enables victims to bring claims for all damages due to a car accident. However, if you have not sustained any of these injuries, our lawyers can prove your need for compensatory damages by showing you have incurred more than $2,000 in necessary medical expenses. One visit to the emergency room could put victims over the threshold to sue, especially if they sustain serious injuries.

In addition to limiting who can file car accident lawsuits, Massachusetts restricts how long victims have to sue negligent drivers. According to Mass. Gen. Laws Ch. 260, § 2A, the deadline to file is typically three years from an accident, and missing it could totally block victims from getting compensation from negligent drivers.