The following is a question I was asked on WAVE Listens about being hit by a cars that presented invalid insurance cards at the accident scene. I explain the ways you can go about recovering your out of pocket expense for fixing the damage to your carfrom a Kentucky car accident.

Q. In the span of about 11 months, I was hit by two different people and they presented fake insurance cards or invalid insurance cards at the scene and come to find out I had my insurance company both times take care of my car, paid my deductible through them, and now I find out that the insurance was not valid at the time of the wreck so I am out two deductibles.

A. There are several things that you can do, Mindy. It depends on whether or not these accidents have been within the last year.  There is a one-year statute of limitations on a criminal charge of no insurance where you can go down to the courthouse and take out a warrant for a no-insurance charge.  Once that warrant is issued the police will pick up or they will notify the individual of the court date.  When the individual comes to court they’ll bring you in, you bring in proof that you were in the accident, things such as the accident report, you bring in proof that your car was fixed and that you were out the deductible and any other out-of-pocket expenses.  When that individual is convicted or pleads guilty to that, one of the things the court will do is order restitution to be paid which is the money that you are out.  It will not be something that would pay, be paid immediately.  Usually it’s $100.00 a month or something like that, but that is the best way for you to get your money back.  It would be a separate charge on each one of these individuals.

Another way to do that would be to take a civil small claims action out against each one of those individuals but, in this case you’re going to have a filing fee.  Once you get the judgment against them, then you have to worry about collecting which often, is often more difficult than getting the judgment because tracking down bank accounts, where they work, and that sort of thing is extremely difficult.  I found that it’s a very big hammer to know that you’re, you could go to jail for 90 days if you don’t pay back the individuals so, I would take out these no insurance warrants.

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The following is part of an interview I did on WAVE Listens about The Schafer Law Office Glove Box Accident Guide and what to do at athe scene of a car accident.

We are talking today about specifically this little publication that Mike has created.  It’s called the Glove Box Accident Guide and this is actually a, a publication that you can keep, literally, in your glove box just in case you’re involved in a car accident, and it gives you some very important information that you need to keep in mind in case you’re involved in an accident.  One, No. 1 is to stay calm.

You don’t want to put yourself in further danger, you don’t want to move anybody that is hurt, you want to make sure that the police are called but you don’t want to put yourself in further danger. The best way to do that is to stay calm and to evaluate the situation and see what you need to do next.

At the time that you’re in the accident, you don’t know that law.

You don’t know the circumstances of how the law is going to treat the case.  So if you go up to the person that hit you and say, I’m so sorry for this accident, the insurance company or the insurance company’s lawyers are going to use that as an admission of fault down the road.  The accident may not have been your fault.  You may have made a U?turn which you think you shouldn’t have made but is perfectly legal in Kentucky if there’s not a “No U-Turn” sign.

So you can, it’s best to talk to the individual, make sure everything is okay.

Okay, all right, and then the aforementioned No. 3 is contact the police, call 911.

Always call the police and have them out there.  One, so that they can secure the area, they can document what has happened in the accident and they can get an ambulance there and take care of anybody that’s hurt, uh, if that is needed.

No. 4 is to find witnesses.

This is probably one of the most important items in there because witnesses to accidents are really a key to the success of a personal injury case if you’re injured and if you have to go forward on that case.

I’ll give you an example.  Almost every week people that come into my office as clients will say, “There are witnesses to the accident”.  I say, well, great, did you get their names.  They respond, “no, but the police talked to them”.  Well, 95 percent of the time the police may talk to the witness but they’re not going to write that name down and write that information down unless it’s a very serious accident case.  Police are very busy and sometimes they just do not document this so it’s important for you to make sure that you get the names or a card or phone number of anybody that did see the accident that you see around, if you’re able.

Never put yourself in danger of getting hit by a car or if you’re on the expressway or a busy roadway.

If you’re hurt the No. 1 thing is to take care of your health. If you are able, getting the contact information of witnesses can make the difference.  I have several cases where we would not have been able to collect for significant injuries if that good Samaritan hadn’t stopped and given their name and number to the person that was injured.

Okay.  The other things, uh, perhaps you might consider is taking photographs.  A lot easier now with everybody with smart phones and all of that sort of thing.

An old trite saying but a picture’s worth 1,000 words.

My grandmother wouldn’t allow pictures because she says pictures don’t lie so I don’t want to see them. That’s the same thing in accident cases.  Pictures don’t lie, they tell the story much better than what  you can and if you say my car is totaled, that says one thing, but if you see the entire front end smashed in to the, the steering wheel. That creates a whole different image, and the only time you can take the pictures of the car that hit you is at the scene, and once again, this is all tempered by if you’re able and if you’re, can get around without hurting yourself further and putting yourself in danger.

Gathering information is also critical when you’re involved in an accident.

If you do not get the insurance information at the time of the accident, I can go on for a long time on this one.  Insurance information, you want to get your car fixed after the accident.

And in Jefferson County it takes about ten days to get an accident report so you’re not going to get the at-fault driver’s insurance information until that ten days runs. If you don’t exchange insurance information with the other driver, it’s going to be ten days. It’s going to be ten days before you can get a car, contact the at-fault car insurance company for a rental car.

And if your car is not drivable, this can be a really, really bad situation for you.

You want to document where the cars came to rest, if there’s any skid marks, anything that can show where the cars were, how long it took the car to stop, anything like that.

That is the only time you’re ever going to have a chance to do that.

And you need to do it immediately at that time.  Once again, if you are able and don’t put yourself in further danger, you need to take those pictures, you need to document, document, document, this goes through the entire case, but you need to do this at the scene if you’re able to.

Okay.  All of this information and more in the handy little Glove Box Accident Guide provided by Mike Schafer from his law office, it’s The Schafer Law Office.

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This is a question I was asked on WAVE Listens a couple of months ago about what to do if you have been hurt in a car accident when you go to the doctor or hospital:

“My neighbor lady, she’s 85.  She’s from Germany.  Someone hit her yesterday evening and I’m taking her to the hospital here in about half an hour.  She’s refused an ambulance but she was hit so hard it knocked her hairnet off of her head.

What else I should do today for her?  I was going to take her to the hospital to be checked out.  She has a bad headache and she said it did throw her head forward really hard so we’re going to get her checked out to make sure she doesn’t have some whiplash and make sure she didn’t have any back injury out of it.”

It is important to make sure that she does understand the questions that are being posed to her since English is a second language.  It will be assumed that she understands any question she answers. She should not answer any question that she is unclear on.

It is very important that you tell her not to minimize her injuries.  We have a tendency when we go to the doctor to try to make things seem a little better than they really are.

Make sure she tells the doctor everything that’s been going on with her from the time she was in the accident up until that appointment. Whether it’s gone away or not gone away, such as the headache you spoke of, tell the doctor. If the headache goes away by the time you take her to the emergency room she should still state that she had a headache because that could indicate that she had a concussion or a closed head injury.

Another thing that is very important for her to tell the doctors is any other problems she’s ever had with her back, whether they were minimal or not. If the doctor asks her if she has been in prior accidents she should tell them about all prior accidents that she has been in whether or not she had been hurt or not hurt.

She should hold off until she’s feeling better to speak with the insurance adjuster or sign any paperwork. This will help make sure she has a clear head and has had a chance to speak with a personal injury attorney about her accident.

Would it be too much to ask for zero accidents on our Kentucky roadways as we kick off 2012?  Unfortunately, five motorists have already died in four separate crashes on Kentucky roadways during the New Years’ holiday period, which began at 6 p.m. on December 30, 2011 and ended January 2, 2012 at 11:59 p.m.

The accidents involved motor vehicles in which two of the victims were not wearing seat belts.  Single-fatality crashes happened in Jefferson and Perry counties.  There was also a single fatality crash in Harlan which involved the suspected use of alcohol.  A double-fatality crash occurred in Owen County.

The Kentucky Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) preliminary statistics indicate that 715 people had lost their lives on Kentucky roadways through December 31, 2011.  The following shows the fatality statistics for 2011.

• · 570 motor vehicle fatalities ( 289 victims were not wearing seat belts)
• · 61 motorcycle crashes fatalities (34 victims were not wearing helmets)
• · 25 ATV crashes ( 21 victims were not wearing helmets)
• · 53 pedestrian crashes
• · 2 bicycle fatalities
• · 2 scooter crashes
• · 2 horse-drawn vehicle crashes

There have been a total of 121 fatalities in these motor vehicle accidents which involved the suspected use of alcohol.  This is 45 less fatalities than reported for the same period in 2010.  As a personal injury attorney, I am hopeful that the decline in fatalities will continue throughout the year.  Let us all do our part in keeping our Kentucky roadways safe.

“Techie World” may be the best description for the modern world. There seems to be something new every day.  We all have gadgets.  I bet that we all received one this Holiday season.  Cell phones are not just for making phone calls.  There are games, apps and GPS.  This makes it harder to avoid using a cell phone behind the wheel of a car.

We all know the dangers associated with texting while driving as well as other distracted driving behaviors. Different awareness programs and media campaigns have been organized to inform the nation’s drivers of the hazards associated with using the phone behind the wheel.  I am not sure anyone is paying attention to these! It has been estimated by the National Safety Council that talking on the phone causes 1.2 million crashes a year and texting another 100,000.  If we all know the danger, why do we still have this high number of crashes every year?  Many states have already enacted anti-texting while driving law hoping to make the roads safer for drivers.  The issue maybe how to regulate the laws because they are difficult to enforce.

Nearly 6 in 10 motorists admit to driving and talking on a cell phone, and 37 percent acknowledged to texting while behind the wheel of a car, according in a recent Harris Interactive Healthy Day poll.   This is alarming!  Drivers know the dangers of texting while driving but, still think they’re capable of doing it.  It can never happen to me!  This is the wrong attitude.  The use of phones behind the wheel of a motor vehicle is a major threat to traffic safety!  Not only for those committing the act, but also for drivers sharing the road.  Let’s wake up and save lives.  Dnt txt n drv!

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has been prompted to review the safety of steroid injections into the epidural space near the spinal cord. These injections are used by Pain Management Doctors to relieve back and neck pain. There have been reports of severe and unexpected complications, including paralysis and death.  The chief of pain medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, James Rathmell, states the procedure is safe and only in a very rare event is there harsh complications caused by the shots.

Rollie Parrish is one of the rare cases to have suffered a stroke during the procedure. He was treated by a steroid shot to his neck to ease chronic pain in a hospital in Nederland, Texas.  Now, he’s nearly blind and in a wheelchair.  Another case involved Luciano Rolando who has received a shot of Kenalog in the lower back. Within hours of the injection, he experienced pain in his legs and loss of sensation when urinating.  And it’s not only them.  In a survey of physicians reported in the Journal Spine, there were 78 cases where patients who got shots in the neck, known as the cervical area of the upper spine, suffered serious injuries. There were 13 deaths.  Physicians were alarmed of these reported cases.

Interestingly, epidural injections were estimated to be as much as $300 billion a year industry!  As a Kentucky Personal Injury Attorney I know that epidural injections relieve pain and makes life better for the victims of car accidents.  Unfortunately, not all recipients are aware of the risks.  Ask your doctor what the risks are if you receive an epidural injection.  This way you can make an informed decision as to whether this treatment is best for you.

According to a recent report the United States could save 2,000 lives a year if all 50 states established comprehensive programs of phased-in privileges for young drivers. A report from the Allstate Foundation and the National Safety Council stated that an estimated 20 lives can be saved in Kentucky from the implementation of a more comprehension graduated driver licensing law.

Auto accidents are the leading cause of death among teens. Every State has a form of GDL, which rewards novice drivers with additional driving privileges as they gain experience and maturity. John Ulczycki of the National Safety Council and other experts say that the most effective GDL programs contain seven components.

The seven components are:

1. Minimum age 16 for a learner’s permit;
2. Six months before unsupervised driving;
3. Minimum 30 hours supervised driving during learner’s stage;
4. Intermediate licensing at 16 ½ minimum;
5. Intermediate nighttime driving restriction beginning no later than 10 p.m.;
6. No more than one non-family passenger for intermediate license holders;
7. Minimum age 17 for a full license

New York and Delaware are the only states that have programs with all seven components. In Kentucky, the GDL program includes:

a) A six month learning permit at age 16 that requires adult supervision;

b) A restriction on driving after midnight during the permit level;

c) A six point limit on traffic violations to age 18, with a penalty of license suspension; and

d) A four hour driving education class. Under the current National Highway Traffic Safety

Kentucky’s program no longer meets the minimum requirements for a full GDL program with seven components recommended by the National Safety Council.

This is an issue that Kentucky Lawmakers should consider. As a Kentucky Personal Injury Attorney and a father of a teenage daughter, I am concerned about the number of car crashes involving teen drivers. I agree that more lives and more money will be saved if GDL programs in Kentucky will be strengthened.  This is enhancements to the current law should defiantly be considered by Kentucky Law makers.

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Kentucky accident victims should never hide the fact that they have prior injuries! They should not fail to disclose any fact for that matter. Their personal injury attorney should know everything there is to know about them, even more than their own mother. Dishonesty can destroy a case in a number of ways.  When your attorney and doctor know what’s going on, what your history is, they can react to it.  A plan that’s best for your car accident case can be developed.  If you hide an old injury from your doctor or attorney, it creates a lot of problems in the handling of your accident case and the outcome of the case.

One of the most common things accident victims do is fail to tell their attorney and their doctor about a prior accident that they were in. Along the same line is not telling them about being treated for a similar injury even if it was not from an accident.  At the very least this hurts your case.  First, because the doctor doesn’t know about the prior treatment, he’s not going be able to treat you properly.  The tests needed to properly evaluate your injury will not be ordered. Prior medical records will not be reviewed.

Also, should your accident case go to court and the insurance defense attorney asks your doctor the question, “Did you know about the accident that happened in 2002?”, and he says “No, my patient never told me about that”, it makes the doctor look like he wasn’t thorough. And even worse it makes it makes it look like you were being dishonest.  That you are a liar. The theory would be if you were dishonest about that, are you dishonest about something else that’s going in the case.

The insurance company will eventually have access to all of your medical records. They are going to discover if you have previously complained about neck pain or were in an auto accident 10 years ago. If a Kentucky accident victim tells their doctor and attorney this information at the beginning of the case it will have very little affect on the outcome of your case. On the other hand, if the insurance company finds it on their own it can significantly lower the amount you will receive in compensation. Honesty is the best policy!

The Insurance industry has been trusted for many years. It protects us all from tragedies, at least so we think.  Do we always get what we think we are paying for? Insurance companies are required by law to work in good faith with their customers. Unfortunately, its weak regulation and delays in handing claims have ordered this trust.

Russ Roberts, a New Mexico-based management consultant and former business professor at Northwestern University who studied the insurance industry’s evolution from a service business to a profit-driven machine said that, “Claims has been converted into money-making process.” The change started when consulting giant Mckinsey & Company sold Allstate and other leading insurance a new system where a computer-driven method produced purposefully low offers to claimants in auto accidents.

There have been cases of complaints where consumers suffered financial hardships because of delayed payment of insurance claims. Studies have shown that insurance companies delay claims to help save millions of dollars. Some claimants who file cases against insurance companies will never see the end of their case because of death, other injury or lack of interest. Some insurance company purposely delay claims as tactic to manipulate or evade legal insurance claim settlements and to increase their own profit.

As of November 28, 2011, the NAIC had received 11,503 delay-related complaints this year. How can you keep yourself from being taken advantage of by insurance companies if you have been injured in a Kentucky car accident? You are the one injured you have experienced a loss.  You deserve to be compensated under the insurance policy.  Knowing your rights and the law is the first step to making sure you are not taken advantage of.  My book “7 Potholes That Can Wreck Your Kentucky Accident Case” was written to give Kentucky car accident victims thorough understanding of the claims process in a car accident case.  Order your complementary copy today so you can level the playing field and not be taken advantage of by the insurance industry.

Over 500,000 Large Truck and Commercial Vehicles were involved in accidents in the United States in 2010. Over 100,000 people sustained serious injuries in those accidents. Tragically over 5000 people died in these accidents according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Semi trucks referred to as “80,000-pound unguided missiles” by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, present a significant danger to all drivers and passengers on highways and roads in America. These risks are greater when truck drivers involve themselves in distracted driving or drowsy driving.

There have been many reported accidents caused by a distracted truck driver. One tragic incident happened in 2010 in Hart County, Kentucky.  The use of a cell phone brought about tragedy for a family and friends in a van. The National Transportation Safety Board (NSTB) during the investigation of the fatal accident found out that the truck driver had used his cell phone 69 times in the 24-hour period before the accident. This includes one phone call at the time of the accident. NTSB concluded that a distraction caused by using a cell phone led to the fatal accident.

The NTSB recommended that cell phone use, including talking on both hand-held and hands-free technologies, be banned for commercial drivers excluding emergency situations. Since the NTSB do not have the power to implement the ban, its recommendation could be a spring board for federal rule-making agencies and state legislators to act.

Authorities are also trying to make sure that truck drivers get enough rest so they won’t be fatigued while at work. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is in the final stage of changing the rules about hours-of-service regulations. At present, drivers have an allowable 11 driving hours in a day, changing this rule would limit drive time to 10 hours per day. The proposed rules mandate that drivers take at least 1 hour of break time during the day. Proposed modifications would also require drivers to include two overnight periods before their workweek would restart.

As a personal injury attorney, accidents involving semi trucks are often tragic and result in death, expensive medical bills or long-term rehabilitation. Both of these changes will defiantly save lives.