Oceanside Car Accidents

Oceanside is a coastal city in San Diego County. If you travel north on I-5 from San Diego, Oceanside is the last city before you reach Orange County. There were 12 fatal car accidents in Oceanside in 2014, which was not an uncommon rate compared to other years. After a serious car accident, you may face enormous medical bills and serious disabilities. It can be difficult to know how you will pay for the expenses caused by your accident. Most people do not have enough money saved to cover the costs of catastrophic injuries. If another party is at fault for the car accident, they should be held accountable for their actions. Experienced Oceanside car accident lawyer Zev Rubinstein can help you recover the compensation that you need to get a fresh start.

Car accidents can result in many different types of injuries, including broken bones, lacerations, traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord damage, paralysis, and internal organ damage. These injuries can be expensive to treat. The more serious among them may require rehabilitation or may result in your not being able to work again. Some of these injuries are fatal, perhaps not immediately but after efforts to save the victim have failed.

In a personal injury lawsuit, your goal is to recover damages from the party responsible for the accident and your injuries. A car accident attorney in the Oceanside area most likely would need to establish negligence by proving that it is more likely than not that the defendant owed you a duty of care, the defendant breached their duty toward you, and the accident caused your injuries and losses. A breach of duty can take many different forms. Most likely, if a defendant was speeding, tailgating, driving drunk, driving while fatigued, texting while driving, disobeying traffic signals, or breaking safety laws, the jury will find negligence.

However, many defendants' insurers look for ways in which the victim might have been at fault. In other words, they hope to show comparative negligence. Under the rule of pure comparative negligence that California follows, your damages can be reduced by an amount equal to your degree of fault. This means that the jury will look at all of the evidence and arguments and assign both the defendant and you a percentage of fault, if appropriate. In addition, the jury will determine your damages, and your percentage of fault for the car accident is used to reduce your damages. For example, if the jury decides that the damages are $200,000, but you are 30% at fault and the other driver is 70% at fault, you can recover up to $140,000 from the other driver.

It is important for your Oceanside car accident attorney to sue all of the potential parties that may have been at fault. For instance, if the person who hit you was on the job, you might have a vicarious liability claim against their employer. This legal theory holds businesses accountable when their employees act carelessly on the job. In other instances, a defective auto part or a poorly maintained road may have played a role in an accident, which means that a manufacturer or a government entity might share the fault.

Damages to which you may be entitled if you establish liability can be economic and noneconomic and may include medical bills, lost wages, lost earning capacity, rehabilitation, pain and suffering, emotional distress, and loss of consortium. While economic damages are tangible and can be determined with some degree of precision, noneconomic damages can vary widely and depend on what the jury believes would naturally flow from the kinds of injuries sustained. Often, the jury relies on testimony about how much physical suffering you experienced. This testimony may be provided not only by you but also by loved ones, friends, coworkers, doctors, and others.

If you were injured or a loved one was killed in a car crash in the Oceanside area, you may have legal options. You should consult Attorney Zev Rubinstein to craft a strategy for pursuing compensation. For a free consultation, call 760.804.2790 or contact us through our online form.