Contact a Lawyer Immediately
In personal injury cases, it is extremely important that a lawyer be contacted as soon as possible. In many cases, valuable evidence will be lost if there is a delay in documenting what happened. If it is a car accident, your car or the other car involved may have damage repaired that could destroy evidence of how the collision occurred. Even debris from the accident on the street and skid marks on the street may be lost shortly after the accident. If you do not contact a lawyer so he can be sure the proper pictures and/or video is taken to document the accident, it may be impossible, or at least much more difficult, to prove your case in court.
Moreover, by contacting my firm immediately, I may be able to speak with witnesses of the automobile collision and/or other event causing your injury before the insurance company takes statements from them with their own spin on the issues.
Further, I always advise my clients not to speak with insurance adjusters, but instead, have correspondence and information go through my office. Everything you say to an insurance adjuster is admissible in court. My concern is not that you would be dishonest, but I have found that regardless of someone's integrity, the more recorded statements they give, the more insurance companies can claim to find inconsistencies in those statements. Under Illinois Law when a lawsuit is filed, the insurance company or the other lawyer involved is entitled to take your deposition.
A deposition is a discovery tool in which opposing parties can ask questions of the other side under oath. These questions and answers are usually taken down verbatim by a transcriptionist so that the other party at trial can use the statements.
Before giving this deposition, all the materials and potential issues in your case should be thoroughly discussed with your lawyer. This enables you to be prepared ahead of time and anticipate what questions you will be asked and what the other lawyer will intend to accomplish by taking your deposition. Your lawyer can also take the deposition of the other side or other witnesses in the case. This is extremely helpful in preparing for trial because it will then be known what each party will testify to at trial. If that party testifies differently than in their deposition, their prior inconsistent statement in the deposition can be used to impeach them.
These inconsistencies, even if they are only apparent inconsistencies, can sometimes hurt your case. Accordingly, the policy of my office is that I am always willing to exchange information with the insurance company; however, the questions asked of my client prior to a lawsuit have to be sent to me in writing, at which time I can respond to these questions in writing back to the insurance company. As a general rule, I will not allow an insurance adjuster to, in essence, take an additional deposition of my clients by means of a recorded statement prior to filing a lawsuit.
In sum, you should keep in mind that immediately after you are injured, the other party and his/her insurance company will have access to lawyers, and they may be taking actions immediately after the accident in an attempt to minimize the amounts that you will later be able to prove in damages. You should not give them this advantage.
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