There were over five and a half million car accidents within the United States in 2009. Of those car accidents, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that 33,808 traffic fatalities occurred. Many more people who were involved in car accidents were lucky and walked away alive, but over two million of those living victims suffered injuries as a direct result of the collisions they were involved in. Head on collisions were the number one source of fatalities in the US, but other collisions such as T-bone or side impact collisions and even single vehicle crashes also caused their fair share of injuries and deaths. When you get into a car accident, you first need to do everything in your power to make sure all involved people are OK. You do, however, also need to be cognizant of the fact that a car accident can lead to significant financial loss and to financial liability as well.
Understanding Car Accident Cases
When a car accident occurs, there are laws in place stipulating who has to pay for resulting damages and injuries. The laws are different from state to state but can broadly divided into a few different sets of rules. The approaches that states take to car accident cases include:
Pure Comparative Fault States
In these states a driver can be held responsible for any portion of car accident damages he or she is at fault for. For example, if a driver is two percent responsible for causing an accident, he can technically be held responsible for two percent of the resulting bills and damages.
Modified Comparative Fault States
In these states, a driver can be held responsible for car accident damages incurred by another if he is at least 50 percent at fault for causing the accident.
No Fault States
In no fault states, each driver is simply responsible for paying his or her own damages that result from a car accident, no matter who actually caused the accident. In the no fault states (there are 12), drivers must buy something called personal injury protection, or PIP, when they purchase car insurance. PIP kicks in after an accident to pay for medical bills and for lost income or wages that result from car-accident related injuries. It is important to note that PIP pays only medical bills and actual losses; damages for pain and suffering and emotional distress are not paid by PIP. The only way that a person can recover for his or her pain and suffering and non-economic damages in a no fault state is if the injuries are serious enough to fall within the state's defined exceptions to no fault rules.
A person who suffers an injury after a car accident, therefore, must first determine what the rules are for his or her state.
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