This is Springfield, Missouri, personal injury attorney, Jason Krebs. In today’s video, we thought we would share 4 ways to ruin your Missouri Car Accident case.
I used to do insurance defense for a number of years. When on the defense side, for the insurance company, there were certain things that if we saw them, it basically helped make our case a lot better and hurt the person that was injured in the accident “or so they claimed” is kind of how we would look at it because they would make one of these mistakes early in the case.
First and foremost, the first major mistake is, they would fail to make a police report. Missouri law requires that you make a police report if there’s an injury in the accident. If you don’t make that police report, first you’re obviously in violation of the law, but it hurts your credibility with the insurance company, including your own insurance company. If you don’t make that police report, that creates problems. The reason is, the police are going to come out, they’re going to investigate and insurance companies, as well as jurors if you have to take it to trial, they put a lot of faith and credibility in what the police says.
Second major problem that we see, failing to go to the doctor. Medical bills, medical records, medical treatment are the foundation for any sort of personal injury case. Whether it’s car accident, slip and fall, anything like that. That shows how badly you’re hurt. If you’re not going to the doctor, it would indicate that you’re not hurt terribly bad otherwise you would find a way to get to the doctor, even if you don’t have insurance, you need to figure out a way to treat with a physician. It’s just one of those things. You’ve got to have it. If you don’t … We do offer a free report on that one, how medical bills themselves and the medical treatment are so important.
The third major mistake that we see, and this one is getting worse all the time, is using social media. Continuing to use social media or failing to stop using social media. If you’re posting stuff on Facebook or whatever else is out there now, it’s hard to keep up with, there’s always something new, but you can be assured that the insurance company or their lawyers are going to look for it, and find it and spin it in the worse possible light for you as they can. If you post a picture of yourself smiling on Facebook, they may … or you’re at the lake doing something, even if you were just there for a few minutes, it’s going to come back to haunt you potentially. You need to stay off of that.
The last thing that we see a lot of is where somebody tries to settle their case before talking to a lawyer. Now there are some cases where you probably aren’t going to need a lawyer. If it’s a very small case, but if you have major damages or have had several thousand dollars worth of medical bills, you need to talk to a lawyer, a personal injury lawyer, sooner than later because you can make a lot of mistakes and get the insurance company dug in, and that’s going to be very hard for them to come off of that. Now, you talk to a lawyer and they may say, “Well I think you could settle this on your own.” That’s fine, but it’s something you need to know before you go and kind of screw up your personal injury case.
We do offer a book. You can get it on our website, KrebsLawOffice.com or give us a call at 1-800-345-0535 or 417-883-5886. Thanks for watching and best of luck. Thanks.
If you want more information about what you should do after a Missouri Car accident and learn more about common missteps (and how to avoid them) order your copy my free book before you speak with another lawyer or anyone from the other drivers insurance company.
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Clearly, situations where a victim would benefit from legal representation for a Missouri Car accident claim far outnumber situations in which having an attorney is unnecessary. Fortunately, we are here to provide you with the assistance you need after a crash. When you are ready to take the next steps, contact me at 417 883-5886 or Toll Free a 1800 345-0535 for a free, no-obligation consultation.