2009 September Archive

Defective tires may be responsible for several thousand traffic accident deaths in the United States every year, as well as for countless injuries and inconveniences. This is according to statistics issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), though the true number of accidents that occur due to tire defects may be even higher, as the role of defective tires that cause or exacerbate car and other motor vehicle accidents is often masked by other contributing factors.

There are at least 2000 major tire lines on American roads today and, although companies like Goodyear, Firestone, and Bridgestone issue recalls regularly in order to remove defective or potentially defective tires from the roads, the system to remove them does not function effectively due to its complexity. Because of this, millions of tires that may be defective continue in use on our roadways. To put this in perspective, several years ago Firestone and Bridgestone recalled more than 15 million of their tires because of severe and dangerous defects.

The age of the tire generally contributes to its failure, and tires between five to seven years old are at a higher risk for blowouts, punctures, and tears. As some tires are designed to last longer, it is important to read about them before purchasing and to talk to a respected auto mechanic about a particular tire brand’s reliability on the road.

The separation of treads can endanger a driver when the tires lose their grip fully or partially on the roadway during quick turns or while performing other emergency maneuvers.

The potential for blowouts or exploding tires can cause drivers to become unable to steer his or her vehicle and thus veer out of control, often resulting in an accident. Tires that fail catastrophically also may damage other parts of the vehicle.

Besides the actual tires, tire rims, air pump systems, and other related parts and equipment are intimately designed into the vehicle’s structure. If the structures surrounding a poorly designed tire on a modern automobile, truck, or bicycle fail, additional problems will often occur.

If there is a possibility that a defective tire or rim may have been responsible, or at least partially to blame, for your motor vehicle accident, it is important to seek out legal assistance to examine your options. Compensation for any injuries or damages stemming from defective tires may be due you.  As one of the most dedicated and esteemed Arizona personal injury law firms, Breyer Law Offices has served the Phoenix area for nearly fifteen years.  Our skilled Phoenix auto product liability attorneys provide exceptional service for our clients, custom fit to meet their legal needs, and are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week for emergency situations.  To schedule a free consultation about a possible tire defect lawsuit, please call us at 602-978-6400.

It is a regular occurrence that when a person has been in an automobile accident in Yuma, AZ or elsewhere in Arizona, that the person will likely not be able to work for a set period of time.  When someone is unable to work, having some kind of written verification from a doctor is usually enough to suit most people’s employers.  There are situations, such as when an injury is extremely severe, when one would think that there would be no question about the injury.

From our experience as Arizona personal injury lawyers, however, we understand that the representatives for a negligent party, including their insurance company or defense counsel, will many times go to extreme lengths to deny their responsibility and thus attempt to avoid paying for wages that an injured party incurred.  The opposing side may even use a lack of documentation to refuse to pay compensation for lost wages, even though they were unable to work due to the reckless actions of another party.

We give advice to all of our clients about what type of documentation they will need to obtain reimbursement for lost wages, both present and future, from the opposing party in any personal injury claim or lawsuit.  As skilled Arizona auto accident lawyers, we have ample experience working with doctors and employers to ensure that they know what is required of them.  In this way, we are able to significantly increase the chances that our clients will be reimbursed fully for their lost wages due to a car accident or other personal injury incident that was not their fault.

There have been multiple times when we have even hired experts to testify about a client’s lost wages.  So often when someone is injured significantly, an expert is required to state what a client can do and cannot do at their workplace as the result of an injury, whether it be caused by an automobile accident or as the result of any other Arizona personal injury insurance claim or lawsuit.  A person cannot simply tell the insurance company what their lost wages add up to after being involved in an auto accident or other personal injury claim.  In order to collect past and present wages that were lost due to an accident, it is often necessary to have detailed documentation concerning the wages lost.  It often takes top personal injury attorneys with the backing of skilled experts in personal injury law to understand the whole process of Arizona injury claims.

We at Breyer Law Offices, P.C., offer an initial meeting, free of any charge, to discuss your personal injury claim with us.  There is no further obligation to you after this preliminary visit.  We invite you to discover more about your legal options and to get the best legal advice about how to proceed at this free consultation.

For anyone hit by a commercial vehicle, there are obstacles beyond those faced in other vehicle accidents.  When you get into an accident with a commercial vehicle, it means you are up against a company.  Even in a case where an insurance company insures the commercial vehicle, since a company generally has greater resources it is likely that they will hire a lawyer immediately to deal with the situation and help them avoid responsibility.  Often, there are at least three insurance companies involved in such cases: yours, the driver’s, and the company’s.  In such cases, the insurance companies may squabble over who should pay.

Also, as commercial vehicles are often trucks and trucks tend to be bigger and heavier than most passenger vehicles, any collision between a smaller vehicle and a commercial vehicle raises the risk of catastrophic injuries.

The good news in such cases is that when a business is liable for your injury, you are more likely to collect the compensation to which you are entitled.  Just as with individuals, a business is legally at fault when it makes a reckless decision.  This could be the case if a commercial vehicle has a mechanical problem that contributes to the accident or if it hires a driver without a valid commercial driver’s license.  Holders of commercial driver’s licenses are also under special federal rules, and their employers must ensure that they comply.  Businesses are also more likely to have much more insurance than individuals, making them more able to pay on a claim.  Yet, it also means you need to act quickly, and retain the best personal injury lawyer possible.

If you have an accident with a commercial vehicle in the Phoenix area, it is important that you contact experienced Phoenix personal injury lawyers like Breyer Law Offices, P.C. as soon after the accident as possible.  Insurers of commercial vehicles and businesses know that accidents are expensive but, unlike your family, insurance companies are not dealing directly with issues that surround a serious personal injury.  They may contact you in order to settle the claim quickly, before you understand the full value of the claim, your rights, or any long-term consequences stemming from accident related injuries.  It is important not to sign any documents that you do not understand fully, as it may mean you are signing your rights away, and it is just as important not to accept money from an insurer before you even have time to consider your options.  It is best to speak first with competent Arizona injury and wrongful death lawyers who have ample experience with commercial vehicle accidents.

We urge you to contact us for an obligation-free, no cost consultation.  When we learn more about your case, we will give you our professional legal opinion and let you decide how to proceed.

Arizona car accident lawyers settle cases in serious personal injury matters all of the time. However, even the best Arizona injury lawyers do not settle a case with a single phone call. The perception that a personal injury case is settled by a simple phone call to the insurance company or insurance adjuster from an accident lawyer is inaccurate.

The reality is that these cases are settled after a thorough workup by the best possible car accident lawyers that can be found. There may be lawyers to simply try to make a phone call but that is absolutely selling the case short. Cases are settled one time, and one time only. Settling a case for less than full value does a great disservice to the person who suffered an often times life changing injury. A case can be settled at the outset by working with the insurance companies or the corporations that cause the injuries. In other cases, it may take filing a lawsuit moving forward in order to get the cases settled. Still other personal injury cases settle right before trial begins. When cases do not settle, they require a top trial lawyer in Arizona to make sure justice is done.

If you would like to speak with a trial lawyer from a firm that does nothing but help Arizona personal injury claimants to receive justice after they have been seriously injured, please do not hesitate to give us a call.

Throughout the valley of the sun there are so many lawyers that it can be overwhelming for someone who has suffered a serious injury or had a loved one killed in a wrongful death car accident. How do you choose the best car accident lawyer in Phoenix? How do you find a top personal injury lawyer when there are so many lawyers on TV, on the Internet, and everywhere else? Finding a true expert in personal injury law can be difficult. Finding not only an injury law specialist but one that understands how to communicate with clients and help them through the process can be even more challenging.

First of all, we suggest looking on the Internet and checking out the web sites of the different lawyers. Do they provide a lot of information? Do they provide valuable information or is it just a “cut and paste” job from the Yellow Pages or from other lawyers? Can you tell from the web site whether they truly have an expertise and specialize in personal injury cases? Do they have a lawyer that is a certified specialist by the State Bar of Arizona – making them less than 2 percent of all lawyers that can claim to do personal injury cases who have been certified by the very State Bar of Arizona that makes lawyers qualified to practice law – or is it just one more person trying to pick up a car accident case on the side? Do they have testimonials that speak to how highly their clients regard them or is it just the lawyers talking about themselves?

In addition to the web site, speaking with the lawyer you feel is the best possible car accident lawyer is an important step. Even the best personal injury lawyer may not be the best personal injury lawyer for you. For instance, we take great pride in the work we do but we understand that not every client with a case may be a fit for us and we may not be a fit for them. We are extremely selective in the cases we take and we only take those cases that we strongly feel we can be successful with for the client and that we feel that we have a good chance of developing an excellent attorney/client relationship during the course of the personal injury or car accident case.

If you would like to speak with us or have any questions whatsoever, please do not hesitate to give us a call.

Many people think that the top personal injury car accident attorneys in the State of Arizona refuse to answer the simple question of how much a personal injury case is worth. The reality is, it’s just not something that can be easily answered. The value of a personal injury case ultimately depends on what a jury might do with a case. Now, most cases never actually go to a jury trial. Most people who are seriously injured in a car accident will make an insurance claim and get the case settled long before they ever go in front of a trial. But the case is settled based upon what a jury would be likely to do. In other words, if a jury would likely get a million dollars, the case has a settlement value of $1 million. If a jury would likely give $100, that is the fair settlement value of the case.

However, juries consider many, many factors in deciding what a fair and reasonable verdict is for any given personal injury case. It is not just about the severity of the injury, but that matters a lot. It is not just about the medical bills, but that also matters a great deal. It is not just about the money lost from work, the pain, suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, but all those things play a factor. The reality is that an experienced Arizona car accident lawyer will need to give very serious consideration to any case before being able to give an honest and full assessment of the true settlement value of a claim.

If you have questions about what your case should be settled for or what its expected value may be after a serious car accident, please do not hesitate to give us a call. We will provide you with an honest assessment as best we can after doing a thorough review to make sure that the guidance you are given is something that you can rely upon.

We are very proud of the paralegals that we hire and train at Breyer Law Offices. We feel that they are experts in the area of being paralegals and helping out clients. However, we take even greater pride in knowing that our clients always have access to an attorney. No matter how good a paralegal is, as a matter of law, a paralegal is not allowed to appear in court. A paralegal is not allowed to try a case. A paralegal has almost never gone through law school. Therefore, even the greatest paralegals within the personal injury field are limited in the type of questions they can answer and what they can do.

At Breyer Law Offices our paralegals are excellent. They can answer many questions that can help our clients throughout the process. But we do not just assign a paralegal to our clients and then the attorneys walk away. We know it is the husband and wife law team, Alexis and Mark Breyer, that had been retained by the client. We know it is our expertise and the expertise of our attorneys that must lead the way for our clients.

If you or anybody you know is in need of a top level personal injury firm in Phoenix, Arizona or anywhere throughout the State of Arizona please feel free to contact us. Even if you are not sure whether you want to pursue a claim and you just have some questions, we are always happy to provide guidance and our honest insight and analysis into any potential claim so that you can decide the best decision to make for you or your loved ones after a serious personal injury situation.

The best Arizona personal injury lawyers understand that the question of what the time deadline is for any individual case has to be addressed on a “case by case” basis. Far too many people believe that there is a two-year statute of limitations in Arizona. The statute of limitations tells people how long they have to file a lawsuit following an accident. There are many problems with simply relying upon the belief that there is a two-year statute of limitations.

First of all, somebody can lose all of their rights to receive any compensation whatsoever even if the other person admits that they caused a serious injury or wrongful death in Arizona, in some cases if they do not bring a detailed claim filed with the right person at the right location in less than six months following the accident. In other cases, a child who is injured may have 20 years in which to bring the claim.

Also, far too many people believe that they need only file a claim with an insurance company within the time deadline. The reality is this is not the case and many people have lost their right to recover any money for their medical bills or lost money from work because they were so badly injured simply because they do not realize that they had not filed a proper lawsuit with the county in enough time.

For anyone who has questions about their particular case and the deadlines that apply, contact the best possible personal injury lawyer that you can find. If you have any questions whatsoever, feel free to give us a call. We have expertise in dealing with these deadlines and providing the guidance that you may need to make sure that you do not lose all of your legal rights.

There is an archaic law known as the firefighter’s rule. The rule has been done away with in multiple states throughout the country. Unfortunately, Arizona punishes its own firefighters and police officers with unjust laws such as the firefighter’s rule. The firefighter’s rule says that somebody who was badly injured or killed while working as a police officer has no right to bring a lawsuit against the negligent person who caused their injury. This even includes a situation where somebody negligently did something that directly led to the death of one of our brave police officers or firefighters.

Somebody who puts their life on the line has a right to hold negligent people responsible for what they’ve done. There is far too much misinformation and far too many people believe they have no right to bring any kind of insurance claim or lawsuit outside of workers’ compensation. While this is true sometimes, there are other situations where a top Arizona injury lawyer can help overcome the hurdle created by this unfair and unjust law.

If you have questions about any case involving a serious injury or the death of a loved one who was on the job as a firefighter or police officer please do not hesitate to give us a call. At Breyer Law Offices, we have fought the fight for police officers. We have overcome motions to dismiss their cases to make sure that people who are seriously injured in the line of duty are not denied the compensation they need and deserve for the serious injuries they have suffered.

Far too many people walking along our sidewalks and our streets are badly injured because cars simply do not pay attention to the pedestrians on the side of the road or in the crosswalk. Arizona Revised Statutes ARS 28 791 and ARS 28 792 both govern crosswalk accidents. Arizona Revised Statute ARS 28 793 also discusses those who may have been crossing somewhere other than a crosswalk. However, people fail to pay attention to Arizona Revised Statute ARS 28 794 which also requires drivers to exercise due care.

Far too often, the person seriously injured in a pedestrian accident with a motor vehicle has to overcome the initial reaction that blames the pedestrian even though the car may have been at fault.

Because someone who has been seriously injured has the burden of proof, finding the most experienced Phoenix pedestrian accident lawyer can be a vital first step for anybody who needs a top lawyer anywhere throughout the State of Arizona.

If you or someone you know has been seriously injured or if you have had a family member killed who was walking along the street and you believed that there may be a right to pursue a legal claim, do not just guess. Contact a top accident lawyer and get your questions answered. We are happy to answer your questions at no cost and we will provide you honest feedback—we will tell you if there is a case and whether we believe it is worth pursuing—so that you can make the best decision possible under these terrible circumstances.

Source report:http://www.azleg.state.az.us/FormatDocument.asp?inDoc=/ars/28/00792.htm&Title=28&DocType=ARS