Trucks and passenger vehicles that are involved in car accidents will sometimes roll over. This can result in severe injuries or even fatalities. Rollover accidents in Arizona are subject to personal injury claims for common injuries that result from them.
If you have been involved in a rollover accident that is the fault of someone else, Stone Rose Law can represent you in settling your claim with an insurance company or in court.
Call us at (480) 631-3025 to speak with one of our rollover accident lawyers, or contact us online to set up a free initial consultation.
In this post, we discuss how rollover accidents occur, the kinds of harm you can suffer, and how you can recover compensation in settlement or at trial for such a motor vehicle accident.
The potentially liable parties in a rollover accident are the same as in other motor vehicle accidents. These include:
Possible legal grounds for liability include negligence (possibly including wrongful death if you lose a loved one in the accident), product liability, and agency law.
If you were injured while driving a company vehicle for employment purposes, an insurance claim may also be possible under Arizona workers’ compensation.
Most personal injury claims arising out of motor vehicle accidents, including rollovers, settle out of court. This means that you will probably be negotiating with one or more of:
In most situations, you will be dealing with one or more insurance claim adjusters.
Arizona insurance laws make the at-fault party financially responsible for paying for an accident. The injured crash victim must still prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the other party caused the crash and the crash caused your injury(ies). This means that settlement negotiations often proceed in parallel with trial preparation.
Your personal injury lawyer will file a lawsuit on your behalf to make sure your legal rights are not time-barred by the Arizona statute of limitations for personal injury claims. This will also put the at-fault party or parties and their insurers on notice that you have a legal claim, which will be important in getting them to take you seriously in settlement negotiations.
The amount you may receive in a rollover accident claim settlement payout depends on several factors. These include establishing the fault of the defendant or defendants, the negotiating skill and experience of your personal injury attorney, and whether the defendants have any valid claim that you were partly at fault for the accident.
You can generally seek economic damages and non-economic damages for a rollover accident claim.
In rare cases, such as if the defendant acted intentionally in causing the accident, punitive damages may also be available.
Arizona law includes an affirmative defense of comparative negligence, meaning that if you were partly to blame for the rollover accident, your settlement payout or trial judgment award may be reduced by the same percentage as your established percentage of fault.
For example, if the defendant can establish that you were 10% at fault for the accident, and your settlement payout or judgment award was $100,000, then it would be reduced to $90,000.
Multiple contributing factors can lead to a rollover accident.
Driver error is the most common cause of a vehicle rollover. These errors include:
Depending on the circumstances of an accident, any passenger car or other vehicle can roll over. Some are more prone than others to rollover accidents. Generally, the higher the vehicle’s center of gravity, the greater the chance that it will roll over. Examples of these kinds of motor vehicles include sport utility vehicles, pickup trucks, other light trucks, and vans.
In addition to the type of vehicle, other factors can play a significant role in the occurrence of rollover accidents. These factors include imbalanced cargo loading, poor road design, poor road condition, road hazards, bad weather conditions, and tire blowouts.
Compared to other motor vehicle accidents, seat belts and airbags rollover accidents can be more dangerous to the vehicle occupants because of the more extreme forces their bodies are subject to, including being thrown about inside the vehicle or occupant ejection.
Bodily catastrophic injuries that can result from a rollover accident include:
In addition to physical injuries, drivers and passengers in rollover accidents can also experience emotional and psychological trauma, including anxiety, depression, pain and suffering, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
A rollover accident can lead to serious injuries or even a fatal outcome for a member of your family. The financial value of the harm you can suffer can add up quickly into a formidable sum, making it important to receive all the fair compensation you deserve from the person or people responsible for causing the crash.
Negotiating with an insurance company on your own can be risky. Insurance claims adjusters are tough negotiators whose loyalty is to the insurers they work for. They can use a variety of subtle tactics and strategies to pay you less than you deserve, especially in an initial settlement offer.
This is why it is important to have an experienced, tough negotiator on your side when dealing with insurance companies – the kind of negotiator you will have if you hire Stone Rose Law to represent you in a rollover accident claim.
We have represented hundreds of people in Arizona with motor vehicle accident claims, including rollover crashes. We will put together the strongest possible legal case on your behalf so the at-fault parties and their insurers must take your claims seriously and pay you what you need to make yourself whole again.
We will gather all relevant evidence, work with expert witnesses and accident reconstruction experts, help you calculate your damages, and aggressively negotiate with claim adjusters and defense lawyers.
If negotiations fail we will take your case to trial.
Don’t leave your compensation to chance after a rollover accident. Call Stone Rose Law at (480) 631-3025 to speak with an experienced Arizona car accident lawyer and to schedule a free consultation with us. You can also reach us online by using our contact form.
