Common Mistakes After a Bicycle Accident in Georgia

Answer:

What are common mistakes made by people who have been victims in bicycle accidents? We were recently contacted by a man who’d been the victim in a bicycle accident on Peach Orchard Road, here in Richmond County. Looking at his case, you noticed that he made several key mistakes early on in the case that affected not only possibly the money that he received in the end, but also the length of time that it took to prosecute his case.

One of the first mistakes that he made is that he delayed his medical treatment. He did get hurt at the scene, and an ambulance did come and tended to his injuries, but he didn’t think that he was hurt badly enough to go to the hospital. He went home instead, even though he was advised by paramedics that he might need to actually go to the emergency room. Several days later, he was still in pain. At that point, he went to the hospital and it turned out that he had sustained a significant lower back injury.

Later on in the case, if you’re the insurance company, all you know is that this man was hurt in a bicycle accident, but wasn’t hurt badly enough to go directly to the emergency room.  Insurance companies really do make those evaluations, and something as simple as a three- or four-day delay in seeking medical treatment can cause you a lot of time and effort in litigating any kind of case against an insurance company.

Another mistake that I think people make is that they delay in hiring an attorney; what’s more, they often choose an attorney who might not be best suited to represent them in a bicycle case. If you’ve been the victim of a bicycle accident, you want to make sure that you hire an attorney as quickly as possible. Early on, there are things that need to be done in order to preserve evidence later— things as simple as taking photographs of the accident scene.

There may be issues with the intersection where you had your accident that might need to be looked at, for example. You want to make sure that you take photographs, and you want to make sure that you take photographs of your own injuries. Those photographs will be worth a lot of money later on in the case. Getting an attorney early on in the case will really help you gather that evidence.

Another mistake that people make is that they choose the wrong lawyer by choosing an attorney who’s not best suited to handle a bicycle accident case. Bicycle accidents are similar to other personal injury cases, but they are unique. When looking for a lawyer to represent you in a bicycle accident case, you should look for an attorney who is an experienced trial attorney – in other words, a lawyer with experience in the area of personal injury law who has been to court, who goes to court, who files lawsuits, and who’s had successful trials.

You also want a lawyer who has experience in handling, specifically, bicycle accident cases. Bicycle accident cases are similar in some ways to other personal injury cases, but they are a little different and come with their own issues, particularly ones surrounding public perception, that need to be overcome. A lot of people don’t like bicyclists or they think that bicyclists are automatically at fault in any wreck. An attorney who has handled many different kinds of bicycle accident cases in the past will be able to overcome that prejudice better than someone who’s never handled a bicycle accident case before.

If you’ve been the victim of a bicycle accident and have questions, we would be more than happy to sit down and go over your case to answer any questions that you might have.