Dixon Car Accident and Personal Injury Lawyers
Car Accidents, Personal Injury, Farming Accidents, Slip & Falls
We have you covered!
Have you recently been in a car accident in Dixon, Illinois? If so, you are probably facing a range of physical, emotional, and financial pain points.
Pain from injuries sustained in the accident, stress from dealing with insurance companies, and financial strain from mounting medical bills can all take a toll on you and your loved ones.
The consequences of not seeking legal help after a car accident can be even more devastating. Insurance companies may try to lowball your settlement or even deny your claim altogether, leaving you to bear the burden of your injuries alone.
But there is a solution that can bring you relief. Dixon Car Accident Lawyers can help you navigate the legal process and fight for the compensation you deserve. Don’t let the pain of a car accident linger any longer – let us help you get the relief you need.
Do This After A Car Accident (Or Any Accident)
Doesn’t matter if you were in a car accident or slip and fall. Here are some steps to take to protect yourself.
- Get to a safe space
- Take photos of the scene of your injury if you’re able to safely do so. If it’s a car accident, take photos, if you have slipped or fallen, take photos of what caused your fall, etc.
- Obtain transport to be checked out by an ER or Doctor (Oftentimes with the way our bodies deal with shock, it’s not uncommon to not “feel” badly in the immediate aftermath of a car crash, just remember to seek treatment if you start feeling pain in the hours after being involved with a crash).
- If you’re injured at a business, restaurant, bar, or workplace, report it right away. This puts them on notice and they have to keep any evidence of what happened. You might need to file a lawsuit to get video evidence, but you can always take pictures yourself. If something caused your injury, like broken glass in your drink or the wrong medication, keep it for your lawyer to test. Don’t give it to the business, as they might destroy or alter it.
- Before speaking with any insurance companies, it’s important to contact a lawyer. If the person who caused your accident had minimal or no insurance, you may need to seek uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage from your own insurance company. Even in this situation, your own insurance company could use your recorded statement against you to minimize your recovery. If you have a premises liability case, insurance companies will want to know a lot about what happened and what you were doing at the time of the accident, which could devalue your claim. Always speak with a lawyer before speaking with an insurance company.
- Ensure that you follow up with all treatment professionals’ instructions, and do everything they say to ensure a quick physical recovery, and to preserve your rights to a meaningful financial recovery. Gaps in treatment are the insurance companies favorite way to minimize a claim by stating that, “if someone were really hurt they wouldn’t miss any of their treatment”.
Automotive Accident Attorneys for Dixon, Illinois
Accidents Happen, We Help Protect Your Rights
If your injury occurred due to a car crash, one of the first things that happens after a crash is that someone generally will call 9-1-1 and a law enforcement officer from a responding agency will arrive at the scene of your crash for a variety of reasons. First, they’ll assess if anyone needs medical attention and order an ambulance if necessary, second they’ll interview witnesses including the drivers and passengers at the scene, arrange for transport of any immobilized vehicles, prepare a crash report based on Illinois Statutes, and then issue any citations to at-fault drivers.
If you’ve been in such a crash you’ll want to get your accident report from the authorities. If you’re in Lee County your report will be processed by either Dixon Police or Lee County Sheriff’s Department. Find their contact info below:
- Dixon Police Department: Visit website
- Lee County Sheriff’s Department: Visit website
Once you obtain a crash report from the above listed agency this gives us a number of important pieces of information. First it tells us what the officer’s initial observations were after arrival and after investigating the scene of your crash. It lists of all relevant witnesses, brief statements, a diagram of what looks to have happened, and the insurance information of every vehicle involved in your crash. Once we have this information we can initiate a claim for property damage to try and have your vehicle fixed or replaced, as well as initiate a bodily injury claim so that you can focus on your physical recovery and getting back to normal while we fight the insurance company(s) for your financial recovery.
From there we can assist you and your family in the following ways:
- Assisting you with obtaining proper medical care
- Assisting with your medical billing and general record keeping
- Assist you with obtaining temporary financial relief with a third party financing company (if necessary) if your injury has impacted your ability to work and provide for your required expenses.
- Attend traffic court hearings with you, or on your behalf
- Resolve insurance issues
- And most importantly, fight for the compensation you’re entitled to
How We Proceed if You’re Injured
Common injuries we handle in personal injury cases are broken bones, fractures, ligament strains, and concussions. If you have any injuries stemming from an auto accident the most important thing you can do is to seek treatment for all injuries. While we can never tell a client when they come in how much a case is worth, one way that we’re able to appraise the value of a case is how much medical treatment someone had to endure, and then discuss with the client how the injury impacted their day-to-day life. Were they able to play with their children, attend work, take a shower, pick up items to perform household chores, drive to medical appointments, etc. Once we discuss with you what a reasonable number might be, we submit that demand to the responsible insurance company that was covering the Defendant/Tortfeasor (person who caused your injury).
If they agree to pay the specified amount this is called a “Settlement”. If they refuse to pay what’s fair, or offer an amount lower than you wish to take this is when we would prepare a lawsuit, file it with our county circuit clerk’s office, have the defendant/tortfeasor served, and set the case ultimately for a trial so that a Lee County jury can determine what a fair recovery is for your personal injury case. There are key areas after a lawsuit is filed that may allow a settlement to occur even after a lawsuit is filed but the biggest threat an injured person has, is that their lawyer will drag the insurance company through the mud in front of a jury. Also, there are no hard and fast rules on what a fair amount might be for any case generally. Fair is ultimately what the client thinks is fair, and then adjusted to what previous cases may have been assigned at trial in their respective area. You may have heard that the value of a case is 3 times the total of medical bills. While that sometimes can be a standard metric on some cases, often times it falls critically short. For example if the injured party had a large income that was curtailed or reduced based on the permanence of the injury sustained, or if it’s a lifetime debilitating injury, a simple calculation of medical bills being multiplied doesn’t compare to the amount of financial loss a victim would suffer if that was the bench mark that was applied to appraising their claim.
As an example if your case involved a fractured sternum with a typical recovery, and a normal amount of medical appointments, we can typically find a similar case within the surrounding area and see how much a jury awarded in that real case. We can then provide that case information to the insurance company and say this is what we’re likely to get at trial, and we’re going to ask for even more because our case is distinguishable in these other ways, etc. Simply being prepared, and being willing to take cases to trial is one sure fire way to get a better recovery for all clients than what will happen if someone brings on a lawyer that does not file lawsuits or tries to handle their case on their own.
Illinois Time Limits on Filing Suit
Illinois sets a time limit of two years to file a personal injury lawsuit in the state’s civil court system. In most cases, this two-year time limit, known as a “statute of limitations,” begins to run on the date of the accident. Sometimes, however, a statute of limitations might run from the date that you discovered you were injured, rather than the date of the event that injured you. This later date is known as a “discovery date.”
For injury claims against a city or county, you have one year to file a lawsuit. The time limit to sue the state is generally two years, but you must file a formal claim within one year in order to sue.
Get in Touch
For an honest, free, and compassionate consultation about your Dixon or Lee County, Illinois personal injury case, feel free to call or text message us confidentially at (815) 964-8303. Remember, our service comes at absolutely no cost to you unless we earn a recovery on your behalf. Let our law firm help you or your loved one navigate the legal side of your case and fight for your financial recovery, while you focus on your physical recovery.