Florida Injury Attorney Blog

A single car accident on Edgewood Avenue in Jacksonville, Florida resulted in three people being ejected from the vehicle, including a baby, according to an article on News4Jax.com. One of the people died and the other two were seriously injured. The police indicated that none of the vehicle occupants were wearing seat belts or child restraints.

In a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit resulting from a serious traffic accident like this, a lot of time and resources will go into attributing blame for the crash and the resulting injuries and death. When a person injured or killed in a traffic crash is not wearing a seat belt, the insurance company lawyers will always argue that the damages recoverable in the lawsuit should be significantly reduced due to the injured party's negligence in failing to wear a seat belt. They will hire an expert to say that if the person had been wearing the seat belt, they either would not have been injured at all or would have been injured much less severely. Personal injury/wrongful death lawyers for the plaintiff can also hire an expert to show that wearing a seat belt would not have made a major difference in the crash, but the issue can become an obstacle to a full recovery.

Keep in mind that the law requires all front seat occupants to wear a seat belt. Additionally, all occupants under 18 must wear a seat belt, or be secured in a child restraint, no matter where they are in the vehicle. However, even if the law does not require adults in the back seat to wear a seat belt, if an adult in the back seat does not wear a seat belt and gets injured or killed in an accident, the insurance company for the other driver will argue that his/her damages should be reduced due to the negligent failure to wear a seat belt. The safer course of action is for everyone to wear a seat belt at all times in any vehicle.

I read a post on the Department of Transportation's website that said three out of four children are not properly secured in their seats. A child may not be safe in a vehicle for several reasons including: they are not in a child seat or not in a child seat appropriate for the child's age, weight or height, the child is not tightly secured in the seat, the seat is not properly secured to the vehicle, the child is facing forward when he/she should be facing backwards and other reasons.

If you are unsure of how to properly secure a child or a child seat in a vehicle, there are child seat safety inspection locations in Florida and throughout the country to assist people with child seats. Inspection locations can be found at this website.

I recently wrote a post about an auto accident involving two people who died in Green Cove Springs, Clay County, Florida, neither of whom was wearing a seat belt. Obviously, it is well known that seat belts are important in protecting vehicle occupants from serious injuries, ejections and deaths in a car crash. In the context of a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit, whether the plaintiff, or victim, of the crash was wearing his/her seat belt can be a major issue.

In a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit resulting from an auto accident, the plaintiff is entitled to compensation, or damages, caused by the negligence of another party. Those damages relate to past and future medical expenses, pain and suffering and lost wages as well as other elements of damages. However, a plaintiff's damages may be reduced by the percentage that plaintiff contributed to his/her own damages. For instance, if in a personal injury lawsuit the defendant was 60% at fault for causing the accident and the plaintiff was 40% at fault for causing the accident and the plaintiff's damages were determined to be $100,000, that plaintiff's damages would be reduced by 40%, or $40,000, due to his/her own percentage of fault.

Because seat belts are widely known to protect occupants from injuries or reduce the severity of injuries, when a person does not wear a seat belt and is involved in a crash, the lawyer for the insurance company will always argue that the plaintiff partially or completely contributed to his/her injuries due to the failure to wear the seat belt. In other words, the lawyer for the insurance company will argue that the plaintiff would have been injured much less seriously, or not at all, if he/she had been wearing a seat belt in the crash. The insurance company will pay thousands of dollars for a so-called biomechanical expert to support the insurance company's position, even when it appears obvious that a seat belt would have made no difference in the crash. The plaintiff's lawyer will hire his/her own expert. This seat belt issue can complicate a personal injury or wrongful death case and take a jury's, and insurance adjuster's, focus away from the important issues- that the insurance company's driver caused the accident and the victim is seriously injury or deceased.

The easy solution is for everyone to wear a seat belt. However, if you have been involved in an accident and there is a seat belt issue, contact a law firm whose attorneys are experienced and knowledgeable about the complex issues that will likely materialize in the personal injury or wrongful death case.