Car Accident Victim Gets Justice at Trial!

Car Accident Injury Victim Finally Gets Justice!
4 Year Wait Ends With a Happy Ending For Injured Bookeeper!

I am happy to report that about 2 weeks ago, I took a 4-year-old case in my office to trial, and we got a good verdict for the client.

This case involved a rear end automobile accident with a fair amount of property damage to both vehicles. My client sustained myofascial neck injuries and post-traumatic headache that lasted about a year. In one particularly bad episode of pain, my client drove himself to the Emergency Room with 10/10 pain that was so bad that he was vomiting.

What most people do not realize is that in virtually every personal injury car accident and injury case in Illinois, insurance is involved. In this case, the Defendant wanted to settle. The Defense attorney, a tough opponent and great lawyer, wanted to settle the case. But State Farm Insurance Company would only offer $3,500.00. THAT OFFER WAS ONE QUARTER OF THE MEDICAL BILLS.

As in so many of these cases, and as disingenuous insurance companies do not want us to know, the only reason this personal injury case went to trial is because State Farm ignored my requests for a reasonable offer, ignored their own attorney and the wishes of their own insured. They wanted to force 12 jurors and a Judge to spend 3 days of their life trying a case that could have been resolved.  We, the taxpayers pay for State Farm’s greedy decisions because we pay to maintain and staff the Courthouse, pay the Judge and Baliff’s salaries, and pay the Jurors to decide the case, through our taxes.

They forced the Plaintiff, the Defendant, and their attorneys to try the case, spend over a thousand dollars on a doctor’s deposition for testimony at trial. The reason they do this is that they know people are skeptical. If a jury sees anything that is not “perfect” in a case, they just do not give an injured person the benefit of the doubt, instead believing that the car accident and injury is a scam.

In our case, the Defense attorney did a very good job with what he had. But in the end, the jury awarded just about the full amount of my client’s medical bills, plus about $8,000.00 for my personal injury car accident client having to endure the pain and frustration of severe neck and headache pain for about a year.

As I explained to the jury in Closing Argument–I was not there to make my client rich, or to make myself rich. I was just there to get his bills paid and get him compensation for the injuries caused by the other driver. That’s all, and that’s exactly what the Jury did.

State Farm made a greedy, bad faith and immoral decision, and got burned. But let’s face it, a $20,000.00 verdict is not going to convince State Farm to change its ways.

Still, a win is a win, and I was very happy that after a 4 year wait after his car accident here in Chicago, I was able to win my client reasonable compensation for his injuries.

by Scott D. DeSalvo – 6-18-08

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Source: http://www.desalvolaw.com