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Crashes are a leading cause of personal injury in Chicago and the State of Illinois every year. These incidents are most frequently attributable to a driver’s negligent or reckless behavior, which creates the grounds for a lawsuit.
Immediately after a car accident, always call the authorities and gather information at the scene before going straight to your nearest emergency room. Once your injuries have been treated, you can begin to consider options for monetary recovery.
This starts with a call to the seasoned Chicago car accident lawyers at Wruck Paupore. When you call our offices today at (219) 322-1166, we will provide you with a fast, free and easy case evaluation.
Collisions on the roadways of the State of Illinois are typically attributable to driver error of at least one party. When drivers fail to obey traffic laws or behave irresponsibly behind the wheel, they may be deemed negligent and therefore liable for the consequences of their actions in a lawsuit. Below are some of the most common instances of driver negligence that can lead to a collision in Chicago.
These days, almost everyone has a smartphone. While some may use their phone for navigation purposes, incoming texts and calls can take the driver’s eyes off the road. If this happens even for a second, the distracted driver could lose track of their primary responsibility. Illinois law prohibits drivers from texting or making calls without a hands-free device.
Sudden lane changes are a substantial danger to other drivers, passengers, bicyclists, and pedestrians in the vehicle’s vicinity. This type of behavior is most common in urban areas like Chicago during high-traffic hours, where drivers can become impatient with the pace of traffic. Even if the lane change is not erratic, drivers are responsible for accounting for blind spots. A failure to do so may create liability for the consequences of a collision.
Illinois traffic regulations require drivers to retain a reasonable distance between their vehicle and the one in front of them. In practice, this allows the driver of the rear vehicle enough time to slow down or stop if the traffic pattern changes up ahead. For this reason, in almost every case of rear-end collision, the driver of the rear vehicle is determined to be at fault for causing the crash.
In places like Chicago, drivers are supposed to be used to driving in inclement weather. Reasonable driving during weather situations includes adjusting your speed, gap, and other common practices to account for how the weather will affect the vehicle’s ability to stop and turn. Even if the weather played a role in the accident, it is possible that the other driver was negligent in failing to account for the weather’s effects.
Drunk driving accidents claim the lives of roughly 28 people a day in the United States. Operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of drugs or alcohol is not only a crime but may also be grounds for a court enforcing punitive damages in a civil lawsuit. If you were injured in a car accident by a drunk driver, consult with your Chicago car accident attorney about whether you might be able to recover punitive damages.
It can be difficult to concentrate on securing your future financial recovery after being involved in a collision. To that end, our Chicago car accident lawyers have provided the following steps you can take both at the scene of the accident and immediately after you leave to preserve your physical and financial well-being.
The priority immediately after an accident is to make sure that it doesn’t compound itself. If you can operate your vehicle, slowly pull off to a shoulder or other side street that is out of the way. If you cannot move the car, turn on your hazards or deploy flares before getting yourself and your passengers to the side of the road.
You should always call for emergency services after any Chicago car accident, no matter how serious you believe it is at first. The dispatcher will send law enforcement officers to the scene to take down critical information, which they will include in their official accident report. You can also request an ambulance if anyone at the scene has injuries that require immediate attention.
Exchanging contact and insurance information with the other drivers involved is standard practice after an accident. The other driver is legally required to provide you with this information before leaving the scene. You should also do your best to get contact information from any potential eyewitnesses to the accident who could help sustain your claim later, as these individuals are substantially more difficult to track down after they leave the scene.
While you might ultimately not need it, visual evidence of the accident may prove vital in your later pursuit of compensation. You should attempt to document the damage to the vehicles, road and weather conditions, and tire tracks left on the road at the scene.
Once you leave the scene, the first place you should go is your nearest emergency room or urgent care facility. While you may want to wait for an appointment with your primary care doctor, you should know that this may take some time. Additionally, many primary care physician’s offices will not treat car accident injuries, as they may be unable to accept car insurance coverage for payment. Creating a medical record of your injuries immediately after the accident is critical in proving that they were caused by the collision itself.
You should not waste any time reaching out to an experienced Chicago car accident attorney. The earlier you start working on your legal claim, the more likely you are to succeed and the sooner you will receive your compensation. You should get medical care for your injuries first, as your lawyer can use your medical record to estimate potential damages.
To get your free initial case evaluation from the Chicago car accident lawyers at Wruck Paupore, call us right now at (219) 322-1166.
Don is a founding partner and one of the nation’s top-ranked personal injury litigators. He is a member of the Multi-million Dollar Advocates Forum, which includes less than 1% of the nation’s trial lawyers, and awarded the highest ranking given by Martindale Hubbel and AVVO.
More importantly, Don understands representing personal injury victims is about more than recovering the best settlement: it’s about helping clients get back on their feet and supporting them in every aspect of their recovery.
In nearly all cases, our clients seek compensation from the wrongdoer’s insurance company. Before forming Wruck Paupore, Jason worked for a prominent law firm representing some of the world’s largest insurers. This experience gives Jason a deep understanding of the insurance industry and the strategies it uses to pay injury victims as little as possible.
Jason -- and our entire team -- put this inside knowledge to work to force insurance companies to pay what is actually owed. Often, we use the insurance company’s own tactics against them as we fight for the full compensation our client deserves.
For more than four decades, Keith has been fighting for injury victims. During that time, he’s watched the insurance industry change, with insurers now more interested in protecting their stock price than treating injury victims fairly.
Since the beginning, Keith has put people first. From his childhood in Gary, Indiana during the 1960’s and working his way through law school, Keith has risen to become one of the Midwest’s most respected trial lawyers. He has never forgotten that being a lawyer is about helping people -- and seeing injury victims through struggles in a way that could change their lives forever.
Over the decades, Keith, Don and Jason have fought relentlessly for clients, even when other lawyers have said the case was impossible to win.
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Wruck Paupore P.C.
Injury Lawyers
275 Joliet St. Suite #250
Dyer, IN 46311
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