Ogden Personal Injury Lawyer
When the worst happens, Feller & Wendt, LLC is here for you. Every Ogden personal injury lawyer at our firm will treat you like family, talking you through your case every step of the way. We’ll fight hard to secure financial recovery for you and your loved ones through the civil court system. When you contact us, our family will protect yours. We can help with medical bills, ease your burden, and make sure that you are treated fairly by insurance companies. Schedule a free legal consultation via our contact form or call (801) 499-5060 for a consultation with our legal team.
Why Do Ogden Residents Trust Feller & Wendt, LLC?
Living in Ogden, Utah’s seventh-largest city, means encountering opportunities for personal injury accidents every day. Traffic on your way to work, dangerous premises at the local grocery store, stepping out onto a poorly designed crosswalk – you could be seconds from disaster at any time. When you’re facing a mountain of medical bills, missed shifts at work during recovery, expensive property damage, and significant mental and emotional anguish, you need a team of Ogden personal injury attorneys you can trust to represent you during personal injury claim proceedings. The lawyer you select can make a big difference in the outcome of your claim, as well as in your experience as a claimant. Choose the right team to optimize your odds of maximum compensation. In Ogden, Feller & Wendt, LLC is the go-to law firm for victims of other peoples’ negligence.
After a harmful car accident, defective product, dog attack, work accident, burn injury, medical malpractice, slip and fall, or other type of personal injury incident, call our office to speak to one of our attorneys. We’ll speak with you about your case during a free, no-obligation consultation, letting you know if we believe it has merit as a personal injury claim in Ogden. If you become our client, you’ll receive your attorney’s personal cell phone number. When you call, you’ll talk to a lead Ogden personal injury lawyer who runs the firm – not a paralegal or legal assistant.
Our attorneys are local to Davis and Weber counties, giving them in-depth, first-hand knowledge of the city-specific statistics, laws, and legal procedures. Anything you need to know about the law and your rights as an accident victim, we can tell you. If an insurance company refuses to offer a fair settlement, we have the power to aggressively try cases. We’ll file your claim and go to court in Ogden for your case and all cases – including those involving child sex abuse. We’re a top-rated, skilled law firm with client testimonials to back us up. When it comes to aggressive case litigation, look no further. We’re the team for you.
Compensation for Personal Injuries in Utah
Plaintiffs in personal injury lawsuits generally receive two types of compensation for a successful lawsuit: economic damages, which seek to repay the plaintiff for financial and economic losses, and non-economic damages for intangible losses including pain and suffering. Economic damages are typically easy to prove; the plaintiff should retain copies of all documentation, correspondence, invoices, receipts, and any other pertinent paperwork after an injury. This evidence should help prove the extent of the losses caused by the defendant’s negligence, and the plaintiff may only receive compensation for the damages directly resulting from a defendant’s negligence.
A defendant will repay a plaintiff’s economic damages to the full extent the plaintiff can prove the damages resulted from the defendant’s actions. Economic damages in personal injury lawsuits generally include:
- Medical expenses. This includes all costs associated with medical treatment necessary after the defendant’s negligent actions, such as hospital bills, ambulance fees, surgery costs, prescription medication costs, and any other costs related to medical care. However, it’s vital for the plaintiff to provide sufficient evidence that shows his or her medical expenses resulted from the defendant’s negligence and not some other cause.
- Lost wages. A negligent accident could leave a victim unable to work for an extended time. The plaintiff in a personal injury case can claim lost income from missed time at work as damages. If a negligent accident occurs in the workplace, workers’ compensation benefits may come into play and offer some relief for lost wages.
- Property damage. If a negligent accident also resulted in any damage to a plaintiff’s personal property, such as a vehicle, expensive jewelry, or electronics, the plaintiff may claim the costs of repairing or replacing those items in the lawsuit.
Non-economic damages are a bit more complicated. Because there is no way to assign a monetary value to a person’s physical pain, mental anguish, and emotional suffering after an accident, a jury must consider expert witness testimony to determine an appropriate figure. Different states use different methods for calculating pain and suffering damages, so no hard-and-fast rule exists for how much a plaintiff will receive, but pain and suffering damages are generally several times more than a plaintiff’s claimed medical expenses. For example, a plaintiff claiming $10,000 in medical expenses for a compound fracture that required multiple surgeries could expect $20,000 or more in pain and suffering damages.
Utah plaintiffs should also keep the state’s comparative negligence law in mind when pursuing personal injury claims. If a plaintiff shares any fault for the damages in question, the jury will assign the plaintiff a fault percentage. Once the case reaches a conclusion, the plaintiff will lose a portion of the settlement or case award equal to his or her fault percentage. For example, in a $50,000 case in which the plaintiff is 10% at fault, the plaintiff would lose 10% of the case award for a net total of $45,000. Under Utah’s comparative negligence law, plaintiffs may still recover damages if their fault percentage is less than 50%.
Punitive Damages
In some cases, a jury may award punitive damages to a plaintiff if the defendant’s actions were egregiously negligent or intentional. As the name suggests, punitive damages do not exist to repay victims but to punish gross negligence and discourage similar behavior in the future. Different states have different laws regarding punitive damages, and the amount of punitive damages awarded to a plaintiff typically depends on the financial status of the defendant. A wealthy defendant will likely pay much more in punitive damages than a defendant with limited financial assets. To learn more about potential damages, reach out to a personal injury lawyer in Ogden.
What Are Your Rights as an Accident Victim in Utah?
In Utah, the law permits accident victims to seek financial recovery from the at-fault parties in certain situations. Financial recovery through a civil claim could reimburse you for your past and future medical bills, mental and emotional anguish, lost wages, property damage, and many other losses. Utah places a $450,000 cap on non-economic damages (such as mental and emotional anguish) in medical malpractice claims. As an accident victim, it’s your right to investigate the accident, determine fault, and pursue damage recovery through an insurance and/or personal injury claim.
To successfully recover damages after an accident, you must file your claim within the state’s deadline or statute of limitations. The deadline is strict and missing it generally means losing your right to file. In Utah, you have four years from the date of your injury to file a claim with the courts. If you’re filing in regard to a car accident, you can only file a personal injury claim (as opposed to a car insurance claim) outside of the state’s no-fault insurance system if your injuries are “serious.” This term is open to interpretation, so it’s important to hire an experienced Ogden personal injury lawyer to help argue your case.
An accident victim (the plaintiff) in Ogden must prove the other party’s (the defendant’s) fault during a personal injury claim. In general, this involves evidence that the defendant: 1) owed the plaintiff a duty of care, 2) breached this duty of care, 3) caused the accident, and 4) caused the plaintiff’s damages. Our Ogden injury attorneys can help you with every element of your claim, gathering evidence and taking professional legal measures to prove fault. No matter what type of accident caused your recent injuries, trust us with your claim for outstanding litigation.
Types of Personal Injury Cases We Handle
As Ogden accident attorneys, we know that many situations can lead to personal injury cases. Whenever one person or party causes injury or economic harm to another party, the injured party can seek compensation for damages in a personal injury claim. Some of the most common types of personal injury lawsuits that our firm handles include:
Car Accident Claims
Car accidents are one of the most common injury-causing incidents in the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that about 2 million injuries and 32,000 deaths occur due to traffic collisions every year in the U.S. About one in three car accidents occurs due to speeding, and one in three results from driving under the influence of alcohol. If a driver causes an accident due to negligence, illegal actions such as speeding or driving under the influence or intentionally driving aggressively, he or she is liable for any resulting damages.
Medical Malpractice Claims
Doctors and other healthcare professionals have a duty to prevent harm to their patients. Doctors must use acceptable diagnostic methods to reach accurate diagnoses in a timely manner, and they must treat their patients using methods and treatments approved by the medical community. When a health care professional commits negligence that results in patient injury, the injured patient can seek compensation for the resulting damages through a medical malpractice claim. Filing a medical malpractice claim is a complex process that generally requires a review from the relevant medical board as well as testimony from expert witnesses. An expert witness with a medical background will review a plaintiff’s medical malpractice claim and provide a signed affidavit of merit if the expert believes the plaintiff has a solid case.
The crux of any medical malpractice claim is whether the defendant met an acceptable standard of care for the given situation. “Standard of care” refers to the quality of services and the extent of treatment in relation to the patient’s condition. During a medical malpractice case, the plaintiff’s Ogden personal injury attorney will likely call on expert witnesses who can provide the court with an assessment of the defendant’s behaviors and whether another similarly skilled professional in the same situation would have acted differently.
Dog Bite Claims
Every state has different laws when it comes to dog bites, and Utah adheres to a “strict liability” law for these claims. A dog’s owner is responsible for any injuries his or her dog causes to others, regardless of whether the owner knew the dog had violent tendencies or attacked someone else in the past. Generally, if a dog bites a person while the person is lawfully present at the location of the attack, the victim can file a personal injury lawsuit against the dog’s owner. However, this protection does not apply to trespassers or an individual who provoked a dog into attacking.
Premises Liability Claims
Property owners have a legal obligation to prevent injuries to lawful visitors on their property. If a property owner allows a safety issue to persist on a property and does nothing to correct it or warn guests of the issue, anyone who suffers an injury from the hazard can file a personal injury lawsuit against the property owner.
Wrongful Death Claims
When a negligent action results in the victim’s death, the at-fault party will be liable for a wrongful death claim in lieu of a personal injury claim. The deceased’s family or a representative of the deceased’s estate will file the wrongful death claim on behalf of the victim.
How Soon Should You Talk to an Ogden Personal Injury Attorney?
Talking to a lawyer right away after suffering personal injuries in Ogden can maximize your odds of success. The sooner you call Feller & Wendt, LLC the sooner an attorney can start working on your case. Expediting the claims process with help from our lawyers can mean avoiding issues with your insurance company and filing a personal injury claim within the state’s strict deadlines. We recommend speaking to an attorney if any of the following are true:
- You suffered serious injuries. A “serious” injury is generally one that significantly impacts your life. It might have caused long-term or permanent disability, scarring, disfigurement, or psychological harm.
- You lost a loved one. If someone else’s negligence resulted in the death of a spouse, parent, child, or another blood relative, call an attorney. For a loss this serious, your case deserves attention from skilled wrongful death lawyers in Ogden.
- The defendant is a government body. If you need to bring a claim against a government body, you only have one year from the date of the accident to file your lawsuit. These claims abide by a different set of rules and can require help from an attorney.
- Your claim is complex. Many personal injury cases involve legalities such as shared fault, strict liability, high-value losses, corporate negligence, and state- or city-specific statutes. Only an Ogden injury lawyer can successfully navigate the nuances of your unique claim.
When in doubt, call a lawyer. Our initial consultations are always free, we charge no up-front fees, and we offer our legal services on a contingency-fee basis. This means you don’t pay unless we win. You have nothing to lose and potentially a great deal to gain in working with one of our Ogden lawyers. Call us right away after any type of accident to learn your rights and legal options. Contact Feller & Wendt, LLC online or call our main office at (801) 499-5060 to schedule your free legal consultation today.
“Want personal attention? You should go to Feller & Wendt. You can call your attorney and actually speak to him. Using mock juries to help figure out possible trial outcomes and juror reactions is one of many ways these guys will do what is needed to make sure you receive what is fair for you and your family.”
-Brian
