Articles Posted in Personal Injury

I was riding in my friend’s car and he crashed because he was texting while driving and now I’m hurt. I heard that Idaho has a guest statute that precludes me from suing my friend for my damages. Is that true?

It’s not true! Idaho’s guest statute is found in Idaho Code 49-2415. The statute states that a guest in the motor vehicle cannot bring an action against the owner or operator of the motor vehicle unless the accident was intentional or caused by intoxication or gross negligence. However, Idaho’s appellate courts ruled this statue unconstitutional in Thompson v. Hagan, 96 Idaho 19 (1974). Yes, you can sue the owner and/or operator for the negligent conduct that caused your damages.

I am over 18 years old and I borrowed by friend’s car. I then lent the car to a 15 year old friend to drive. My 15 year old friend crashed, am I liable?

Yes! Idaho Code 49-2416 provides that every owner of a motor vehicle who knowingly permits a minor to drive and any person who gives or furnishes a motor vehicle to a minor under 16 years old, shall be jointly and severally liable with the minor for any damage caused by the negligence of the minor in driving the vehicle.

Every personal injury attorney in Idaho has heard this from a client. “I was injured in a wreck, but I know the guy. I don’t want to sue him, just his insurance company.”

Unfortunately, as understandable as that desire is, insurance doesn’t work that way. A person who injures another through negligence is liable to pay damages to the injured person. This is so whether or not he has insurance. Most people, however, don’t have the ability to pay for the injuries they might cause. This was true throughout history, but it became a big problem when we invented the automobile. Henry Ford invented the most efficient method ever for causing major injury through negligence. Cars were creating so many injured people, and so many were never getting compensated for those injuries, that we finally required that all car owners carry liability insurance.

Liability insurance is a contract between the car owner and the insurance company. The insurance company agrees to pay any amounts, up to the limits of the policy, that the car owner or driver is legally obligated to pay as a result of his negligence in operating the car. If you get injured through the negligence of a driver with insurance, it is the driver that owes you the money, not his insurance company. You must prove that the driver was negligent and owes you damages; then, and only then, is the insurance company required to pay.

The most important thing is, go see a doctor and get better.　 There is time later to worry about the legal issues surrounding your accident. Also, getting to the doctor quickly may help your case.

It is common for certain kinds of injuries in relatively minor accidents to go unnoticed at the time. Just as sometimes your muscles don’t hurt until the day after a workout, sometimes the symptoms of a soft-tissue injury, a whiplash, or a brain injury don’t appear until the next day, or even longer. This is a well-established fact, and it should not hurt your case at all if you said at the time you were not injured.

That is, so long as your doctor is able to relate your injury to the accident. In an Idaho personal injury case, your lawyer must be able to prove that your injuries were caused by the accident. This requires that a doctor testify that the accident caused the injury.

Husband and wife were driving/riding on a motorcycle and were involved in a collision with a car; wife sustained fatal injuries.　 Through a series of additional very unfortunate events, not all of wife’s medical bills were timely billed to her insurance company for payment.　 The at-fault driver of the car only had $50,000.00 in insurance to cover wife’s damages.　 Wife’s unpaid medical bills were approximately $90,000.00 and the insurance company that paid the bills that were timely submitted had a subrogated interest of approximately $50,000.00.　 Any recovery for wife’s estate seemed dim.　 I was able to get the entire $90,000.00 written off and the $50,000.00 was compromised to $10,000.00.　 The wife’s survivors were tearfully grateful for the recovery and compromises obtained.　 This result will forever be with me as a case where I made a big difference for my client.　 Stephen Muhonen

You took a car trip over the holidays, and got in a wreck. Now you are recovering from personal injuries caused by someone who lives in another state. It looks like you will have to sue to get compensation. What do you do?

You will probably have to sue in some other state. In all likelihood, the courts in your home state lack “jurisdiction” over the responsible driver. The U.S. Constitution and state laws make it difficult to drag someone into court in a distant state with which she has few connections.

If you must sue, you will have to find a court that has jurisdiction over the responsible person. Under the laws in almost every state, that means the state in which the responsible person resides, or the state where the accident occurred. Every state has a law which allows its courts to exercise jurisdiction over persons who come into the state and cause an injury there.

Clients should look for and retain an attorney who they feel they can freely and openly communicate with on all aspects of their case.　 The case should be viewed and handled as a team; the process requires teamwork and candid communication, with all involved working together towards an understood and concerted goal.　 Stephen Muhonen

Ever heard of the quip, “It’s not what you know, but who you know.”　 In many respects this rings true in the law as well.　 Because I have been a Pocatello Police Officer and an Idaho State Police Trooper, I have developed relationships within the field of law enforcement that have been extremely helpful to many of my personal injury cases.　 A lot of officers are wary of attorneys and are reluctant to speak freely to them.　 However, because of the relationships I have with these officers, many of them are willing to speak to me freely about their thoughts and insights of their cases or even cases they weren’t involved in but may have expertise in.　 Knowing the people involved in the investigation of collisions has been extremely important to the success of many cases.　 Stephen Muhonen

Most people are aware that their places of business may have to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, which requires meeting accessibility standards determined by the federal government. What about websites? If a website cannot be accessed by a person with, say, sight or hearing impairments, does it violate the law? Courts have said yes, in some circumstances.

The ADA requires that any no person be discriminated against in the “full enjoyment” of any “place of public accommodation” on the basis of a disability. The ADA can be enforced by affected individuals or by the U.S. Department of Justice. Violations can result in injunctions and monetary damages. In some circumstances, websites have been found to be “places of public accommodation” subject to the ADA. For instance, colleges are clearly places of public accommodation, and their websites are generally necessary to the “full enjoyment” of their services. So colleges are obliged to make their websites comply with the accessibility standards.

If your business is not a physical “place of public accommodation,” but instead exists only on the Web, it gets a little more complicated. The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the ADA does not apply to websites that are not affiliated with a brick-and-mortar place of accommodation. Ninth Circuit decisions are binding on federal courts in Idaho, Oregon, Washington, California, Hawaii, Alaska, Nevada, Montana, and Arizona. But, a federal court in Vermont recently held that it might apply to the online service Scribd, because the internet is now so central to a person’s participation in public and economic life. Similar holdings are likely in the future.

Even when it is crystal clear that it was the other guy’s fault, most of the time, his auto liability insurance won’t voluntarily pay your bills. That is because his liability insurance doesn’t insure you for your injuries or property damage. It insures him for any amounts (up to policy limits) he is legally obligated to pay as a result of his negligent operation of his vehicle. You may think it was his fault, and he may even agree with you, but until his actual fault, and the amount of your damages, are legally established, his insurance company technically does not have to pay.

Most cases involving auto liability insurance get resolved without going all the way to trial. They frequently get settled without even a suit being filed. When that happens, though, it is because the injured party made a compelling case to the insurer why the other guy was at fault, and what the damages are. That is the job of your lawyer: to make the case for you so that you are reasonably compensated for your damages.

A personal injury lawyer will usually take a case like this on a contingency fee basis, which means the lawyer’s fee is an agreed-on percentage of any money that is recovered for the client. An injured person is more likely to recover, and to recover greater amounts, if represented by a good personal injury attorney.