If you are reading this, it means that you have been in an accident caused by the carelessness of another driver. Resultantly, you sustained a personal injury. Now, your case might end up in the courtroom, which is why you must ensure that you do certain things right to boost your chances of winning the case and reaching a higher settlement.
Here is what to know.
Understand How Evidence Works
If you want to win your personal injury case, you should understand how evidence works. You have to know whether or not the potential evidence will be admissible at the trial. Of course, you will have to work closely with a lawyer to ensure that the evidence that you have against the at-fault party is admissible at trial.
The thing is that just because you have documents and statements from potential witnesses, it doesn’t mean that these things will be admissible in court. For instance, you might want to know how the hearsay rule works.
According to this rule, you cannot simply go to the stand and tell the judge or the jury that a certain person told you a certain statement. Now, there are exceptions, but in most cases, something as simple as that is not the type of evidence that is admissible in court.
Understand the Importance of Honesty
If you want to boost the settlement of your personal injury case or even win it – you need to make it a point to be absolutely honest about the incident. Also, your lawyer will know right away whether or not you are lying or even hiding crucial details of the case.
Besides, the jury is going to know it, too, because if you go to the court and you squirm and you aren’t honest, your case is done. Your potential personal injury lawyer might not be interested in working with you because they will be able to tell that you have serious credibility issues.
Don’t Lie to Your Lawyer
You need to know that you cannot lie to your lawyer right off the bat – otherwise, it is going to have an impact on the potential value of your case, including whether or not you are going to win the case. Understand that the most important witness at any trial for a personal injury case is the plaintiff.
So, you are the most important witness as you are injured and bringing the claim. If your credibility is called into question, you will have a serious problem to deal with. In simple words, if you lie to your lawyer or in court, it is incredibly difficult for you to succeed.
Understand the Sensitivity of Your Case
The thing is that any case, including a personal injury case, is not perfect. At the least – no case that gets to trial is perfect. If it was a perfect case, it wouldn’t have gone to trial, but you would have been paid your settlement right away.
The key is that when there are challenging facts, you have to embrace them and be honest with them and yourself. More importantly, be genuine to yourself because if you come into trial and try to pretend to be somebody you are not – the chances are high that the jury won’t like you. Also,. The chances are that somebody is going to have a hard time empathizing with your position, and they will have a hard time working in your favor.
The bottom line is to be yourself and be honest, and you will have a much higher chance of winning your case.
Connect with Potential Witnesses
To win your personal injury case, you must understand who your witnesses are and whether or not they are willing to testify in court. On that note, if you have been in a car accident and you have sustained a serious injury, you must ensure that you get the details down of all witnesses who have seen the accident happening.
This way, your lawyer can work on the evidence that you need to reach a higher settlement in court. When it comes to witnesses, they make an important part of the value of your personal injury case. On that note, if you have witnesses on your side from whom you can get statements before the lawsuit and you, with the help of your lawyer, send their statement to the insurance company, it increases the chances of you winning the case.
Why, you might ask? Well, the answer is as simple as this: by doing so, you let the at-fault party’s insurance company know that you have taken the case seriously.
Let Your Lawyer Handle Witnesses
We cannot stress enough the importance of having a professional attorney by your side if you want to win your personal injury case. On that note, allow your personal injury lawyer to deal with matters for you, including contacting witnesses and taking their statements – if needed.
Never Ignore the Proper Treatment
Of course, you cannot win your personal injury case without having sustained a personal injury first. However, this is where many people make the mistake of not staying consistent with their treatment. It is absolutely crucial that you do whatever the doctor tells you to do and stick to it until you get better.
The worst that you can do to yourself and your personal injury case is to start having gaps in the treatment or missing appointments and so on. Even if you feel like you have recovered, you should regularly visit the doctor and keep track of how you feel.
Keep in mind that if you stop going to treatment, it can be used against you in court as they can point out the huge gap or how you stopped going to treatment, which can hurt your case. Also, if you have been in an accident – seek medical help immediately instead of letting weeks or months pass you.
If you do so, the other party can argue that you weren’t that badly injured as you didn’t seek treatment, which in turn can hurt your case.
