Bakersfield Truck Accident Attorney

When a truck accident injures someone, the emotional, physical, and financial toll can be devastating. If you are the injury victim, you will need the sound legal guidance and aggressive representation that a Bakersfield truck accident attorney at The Paris Firm can provide.

A collision involving a big commercial truck is not a trivial fender bender. It can be a disastrous, life-changing event that disrupts your family, your career, and your plans for the future. In the Bakersfield area, serious truck accidents happen far too frequently.

Bakersfield’s extensive roadway network includes three of the nation’s busiest highways. State Routes 58 and 99 run directly through Bakersfield, and Interstate 5 bypasses the city several miles to the west. Thousands of large trucks pass through or near Bakersfield every day.

What Happens When Cars and Trucks Collide?

Fully loaded, a large commercial truck can exceed 40 tons. The typical automobile weighs in at less than 2 tons. A large truck’s mass and momentum make stopping it much more difficult than stopping a car.

When a large truck and a car collide, the truck does substantially more damage. Survivors frequently sustain serious or catastrophic injuries, including contusions, broken bones, fractures, spinal injuries, traumatic brain injuries, and limb injuries that require amputations.

If you sustain a disabling or catastrophic injury in a truck accident that was not your fault, you may need to recover the maximum available compensation amount to pay for your medical expenses and long-term care. A Bakersfield truck accident lawyer at The Paris Firm can help.

How Are Truck and Car Accidents Different?

Along with the damage a truck can do because of its mass and momentum, accidents that involve trucks differ from and are more complicated than car-on-car accidents in several other ways:

1. A truck driver may share liability for an accident with the truck’s owner, a cargo company, a leasing company, a truck manufacturer, a parts manufacturer, a contractor, or a subcontractor. Any or all of these parties may have partial liability for a truck accident.

1. Commercial semi-trucks and tractor-trailers are subject to both state and federal regulations. Trucking companies and drivers who do not comply with regulations are subject to fines and are often responsible for the most serious truck accidents.

What Do Federal Regulations Require?

The truck companies and drivers operating 18-wheelers through Bakersfield must comply with regulations established by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). Many truck accidents involve a failure to comply with regulations that address:

1. driver qualifications and training
2. hours and rest breaks
3. cargo, weight, and maintenance

Truck drivers may not work more than 11 hours a day or 70 hours a week. They may not drive more than eight hours without a thirty-minute break. Fatigue is the number one cause of truck crashes. A violation of the hour-and-break rules is a key element in many truck accident cases.

If you are injured in a truck accident, a Bakersfield truck accident attorney at The Paris Firm can ascertain whether the truck driver or trucking company violated FMCSA regulations. Any evidence of a violation strengthens your injury claim.

When is a Trucking Company Liable for an Accident?

A trucking business may be directly liable for a truck accident if the business hires unqualified drivers or encourages its drivers to violate FMCSA regulations.

A truck company may also have “vicarious” liability for the negligence of a driver if the negligence was not intentional and occurred in the course and scope of the driver’s job duties.

In other words, if a truck driver injures someone while en route to a delivery, liability can transfer to the driver’s employer. But if the driver injures you during an unscheduled detour for a personal errand, liability will be assigned exclusively to the driver.

Is the Truck Driver an Independent Contractor?

Whether a trucking company has any liability for a truck accident depends on the answers to these questions:

1. Was the truck driver an independent contractor or a company employee?
2. Was the driver’s negligence accidental or intentional?
3. Did the driver’s negligence occur in the course and scope of the job duties?

Vicarious liability doesn’t apply to independent contractors, to a driver’s intentional wrong behavior, or to any behavior outside the course and scope of the driver’s duties.

If You Are Involved in a Truck Accident, Take These Steps

Especially in the Bakersfield area, every driver should know what steps to take after a truck accident. If you are unable to act because you’re injured, ask someone to take these measures on your behalf:

1. Call for medical and police assistance. That’s the immediate priority.

1. Obtain the truck driver’s personal contact information and as much information as you can about the truck driver’s employer and the employer’s insurance company.

1. Take photos of the accident location, the vehicles, and your injuries. Include details such as debris and skid marks.

1. If eyewitnesses saw the collision, ask for their personal contact details. Their statements or testimony could be crucial.

1. If you were not sent to a hospital or treated at the scene, have a medical examination as quickly as possible.

After a Truck Accident, Have a Medical Exam

If you do not go directly to a hospital and you are not treated at the scene, have a medical exam as soon as possible. If you don’t, an insurance company may contend that you were not injured in the accident but in some other way after the crash, but before you sought treatment.

An insurance company could also insist that your injuries are not serious because you didn’t see a physician promptly. Follow your physician’s treatment plan, or the insurance company may claim that you exacerbated your injuries by not adhering to the doctor’s orders.

Adrenaline can temporarily conceal signs of a serious injury. Without an exam, some injuries may remain undiscovered for weeks or even months. An exam promptly after a truck accident reveals such injuries. If you’re uninjured, an exam verifies it and provides peace of mind.

Are Truck Accidents Avoidable?

Some trucking accidents can’t be avoided, but you can reduce the likelihood of an accident. When you’re driving, put as much space as possible between your vehicle and any large commercial trucks, and heed these safety recommendations:

1. Never underestimate a truck’s speed or size. 18-wheelers are usually bigger and often moving faster than they appear.

1. Do not cut in front of a truck. Where two lanes merge into one, do not race a truck, but reduce your speed and fall in behind it.

1. If you pass a truck, do it quickly. Always pass a truck on its left; its right side has too many blind spots.

1. Keep your distance from a truck that is making a turn. When truck drivers turn right, they swing first to the left. Do not then move to the truck’s right side; it’s about to swing back. The same rule applies in reverse to left turns.

How is Liability Determined in Truck Accident Cases?

Determining liability for a truck collision requires a careful examination of medical, toxicology, and police reports, as well as witness statements, photos, and video from the scene. The black box in commercial trucks records data about a truck’s speed, brakes, and seatbelt usage.

Black boxes (event data recorders or electronic logging devices) usually record what happened immediately before an accident. Black box data can indicate whether a truck driver made an error that caused a collision. It can support or challenge claims made by anyone involved.

By clearly showing how the accident happened, black box data can compel out-of-court settlements and affect settlement amounts. In more complex cases, a truck accident attorney may seek assistance from an accident reconstruction expert.

The legal process can be complicated, but if you are injured or disabled in a crash with a large commercial truck, and if you and your lawyer can prove it, a lawsuit that names multiple parties as defendants could recover the amount you need for your medical bills and lost wages.

How Can The Paris Firm Help You?

After the police dismiss you from the scene of a truck accident, don’t communicate with the truck driver, the driver’s employer or lawyer, or the employer’s insurance company. Let a Bakersfield truck accident lawyer at The Paris Firm speak for you and negotiate for your compensation.

Do not take a settlement offer before consulting your attorney. Particularly in truck accident cases, an insurance company may offer you a quick resolution for an amount far less than your claim’s actual value. Your lawyer can negotiate for a fair and reasonable settlement.

Most truck accident claims are settled privately and outside the courtroom. Truck accident trials are rare, but if liability is in dispute or if no fair and reasonable settlement offer is forthcoming in the private negotiations, your attorney at The Paris Firm can take the case before a jury.

At a truck accident trial, your lawyer can introduce evidence that explains how (and how seriously) you were injured, why the other driver should be held liable, and why the jurors should find in your favor and order the payment of your compensation.

What is a Duty of Care in a Truck Accident Case?

To prevail with personal injury claims based on truck accidents, injured victims (plaintiffs) and their attorneys must prove:

1. The defendant (or defendants) owed the plaintiff a “duty of care.”
2. The defendant (or defendants) breached that duty with negligent behavior.
3. The breach and negligence were the direct causes of the plaintiff’s injury or injuries.

The level or amount of care a defendant owes a plaintiff is different in different situations. Doctors owe their patients a duty to deliver adequate, professional healthcare. A truck driver owes others on the road the duty to drive soberly, safely, and responsibly.

What Will You and Your Lawyer Need to Prove?

Once it is established in a truck accident case that the defendant (or defendants) owed the plaintiff a duty of care, the next question is whether the defendant (or defendants) breached that duty by behaving negligently or by failing to act in the way a reasonable person would have acted in a comparable situation.

After determining that the defendant (or defendants) breached the duty of care, the next question is whether the negligence and breach of duty directly caused the accident and injuries.

If the negligence and breach of duty caused the truck accident, the defendant will be deemed liable. The final phase of a truck accident case is determining the amount of compensation the defendant (or defendants) should pay to the plaintiff.

What Compensation Can Truck Accident Victims Recover?

An injured victim of negligence with a truck accident claim may recover compensation for the following:

1. medical expenses, including pending and projected medical costs
2. lost wages and future lost earning capacity
3. personal pain and suffering

California truck accident victims may recover compensation for the loss of consortium if marital intimacy was impaired due to the injury. The victims of catastrophic and disabling injuries may also receive compensation for their loss of the “enjoyment of life.”

Punitive damages are not considered compensation and are awarded in California only in the most egregious cases to punish defendants for irresponsible or intentionally reckless behavior and to deter such actions in the future.

When Should You Call The Paris Firm?

In a truck accident case, time is of the essence. You must obtain medical help and then legal help immediately, and you should have quality legal advice from the beginning. The Paris Firm can provide that advice and handle every aspect of the case.

For most injury claims in this state, including trucking accident claims, the statute of limitations is two years from the date of the accident or the date your injury is (or should have been) discovered.

Do not wait two years to contact The Paris Firm. Over time, evidence deteriorates, disappears, or becomes altered or contaminated. The memories of witnesses fade. Bring your case to The Paris Firm immediately after a healthcare provider has treated you for your truck accident injuries.

What Will It Cost to Pursue Justice?

Your right to pursue justice is not dependent on your financial status. It costs nothing to launch the legal process. If you’ve been injured in a truck accident, your first legal consultation at The Paris Firm is provided without cost or obligation.

At that first consultation, a truck accident attorney can explain how the law applies to your case and recommend the best path forward, which may be a personal injury lawsuit.

Put Your Truck Accident Case in Our Hands

The Paris Firm represents injured victims of negligence on a contingency fee basis. You’ll owe no attorney’s fee unless and until we recover your compensation. If, for any reason, you are not compensated at the end of the legal process, you will owe no fees to The Paris Firm.

Attorney Eric Paris and his team at The Paris Firm are ready to work for you. If you are ready to begin the personal injury process or to learn more about your rights as a victim of negligence in a truck accident, schedule a consultation now by calling our law offices at 909-325-6185.