Spinal cord injuries are some of the costliest and most devasting injuries that can happen to a person. They often affect vital body functions, including the ability to use arms and legs, speak, think clearly, take care of daily needs, and to work and earn a living. Victims of severe spinal injuries may wind up paralyzed and require expensive continuing care for a lifetime, and some injuries may lead to death.
If you or a loved one has suffered a spinal cord injury that was caused by someone else’s negligence or fault, a Birmingham spinal cord injury lawyer can help you get justice and compensation for your losses. While no amount of money can fully compensate for the damage a spinal injury brings to your life and family, a settlement can alleviate your financial worries and cover the expenses from your injury and the care you may need into the future.
The Birmingham, Alabama, spinal cord injury lawyers at The Wininger Law Firm, LLC, have represented individuals with spinal cord injuries and other catastrophic injuries since 1964. Our Birmingham spine injury lawyers understand that one of the biggest concerns of someone with spinal cord injuries is securing the type of resources needed to pay for appropriate medical care, and we provide aggressive representation to get you the best settlement possible. The trusted attorneys at our family firm provide responsive, personalized legal representation through every step on the road to getting your case resolved.
At this stressful time, we will take the burden off you by handling all legal matters so you can concentrate on your recovery and your family. As with all personal injuries cases, we provide a free consultation to discuss your individual situation and determine the best way to proceed with getting you the benefits you deserve.
There are no fees until we win a settlement or favorable verdict for you, so call us today for your free, no-obligation consultation at (205) 322-3663.
Let us handle the legal details so you can concentrate on your recovery.
Spinal cord injuries cases are complicated, and Alabama law makes them even more so. At The Wininger Law Firm, we take great care in assessing injury cases where paralysis, brain injuries or spinal cord injuries are involved. We have the resources to hire medical experts, certified life care specialists, and disability planners to help us calculate complex costs for specialized or long-term medical care.
When our Birmingham spinal cord injury lawyers take your case, we will take the following actions toward winning a settlement:
A settlement or judgment in a spinal cord injury case, called “damages,” can provide compensation that will offset lifetime costs for attendant care, rehabilitation, medication and supplies, specialized transportation, and home modification needs.
In Alabama, compensatory damages in Alabama cover both your economic or financial losses and non-economic damages.
Economic Damages – These are intended to compensate for your monetary losses and expenses, including:
Non-economic damages – These are compensation for losses that have a negative effect on the quality of your life, but do not have a specific dollar value, such as:
Punitive Damages – In some rare cases, when a catastrophic spinal cord injury was caused by a defendant who acted with deliberate recklessness or conscious malice, punitive damages may be also be awarded. These are intended to punish the wrongdoer and help keep similar acts from occurring in the future.
There is a wide range of the amount of compensation you may receive in a spinal injury case, depending on the individual factors of the case. If injuries are catastrophic and cause major effects on the quality of life or result in wrongful death, settlements may range into the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.
Factors a jury may consider in coming up with what is felt to be fair compensation include:
Settlement amounts vary according to the facts of the case, but when spinal damage is severe and involves large costs and devastating effects on the quality of life, settlements may range into the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.
Call our Wininger spine injury lawyers today to get an idea of what your individual circumstances may be worth at (205) 322-3663.
Due to Alabama’s unique personal injury laws, which prohibit compensation if you have done anything to contribute to the accident, it is imperative that your attorneys prove that the defendants in the case were the ones who were negligent, careless, reckless and at fault for causing your spinal injuries and the damages that resulted.
We would do this by showing that the following elements existed:
To prove the defendant’s negligence, we would:
Investigate and gather evidence about how the accident happened and locate all responsible parties. Each one would be named as a defendant, as they each may have insurance and assets we could go after. For example, if the injury resulted from a car accident, defendants may include:
Evidence may include:
Utilize experts to reconstruct the accident and how it happened and to provide medical testimony as to how your spinal injuries negative affect your life, the suffering you and your family endure, modifications you may need to make to your home and car, and the care you will need into the future.
Alabama’s laws that bar a victim from recovering damages if they are found to have done something to contribute to the accident make it even more essential to call our spinal injury attorneys as soon as possible so we can start investigating quickly, while witnesses’ memories are fresh and evidence is still available.
Also, be aware that Alabama has a deadline for filing a lawsuit. According to Alabama Code Title 6 Section 6-2-38, you generally must file within two years from when the injury occurred, or the courts are unlikely to hear your case.
A study published by the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation shows that, currently, over 5,600,000 people in the United States suffer from some type of paralysis that may result from spinal cord trauma or traumatic brain injury (TBI).
The majority of paralyzing injuries in America occur on the job, and second are spinal cord injuries from vehicle crashes as follows:
Other common causes of spinal cord injuries include:
According to the Mayo Clinic, damages from a spinal cord injury depend on where the injury is along your spine and how severe the injury is (the completeness of the injury).
Spinal injuries may cause either:
Tetraplegia (quadriplegia) – Damage is high up on the spinal cord and your arms, hands, waist, legs, and pelvic organs are all affected.
Paraplegia – Damage is lower on the spinal cord, and all or part of the trunk, legs, and pelvic organs are affected.
Some signs of a spinal cord injury include:
Spinal cord injuries often leave victims and their families fearful and unsure of where to turn for help. When you contact The Wininger Law Firm, LLC, we can relieve some of your burdens by immediately handling all of your concerns and building your case for you.
Our Birmingham spine injury attorneys have helped families for over five decades to obtain fair and just results in personal injury cases in Alabama. Through the decades, the core values and principles of The Wininger Law Firm have not wavered — integrity, a commitment to excellence, and effective legal advocacy for those whose lives have been altered forever because of the wrongdoing and negligence of another.
Call us today at 205.322.3663 for a free, confidential consultation about your spine injury so we can start working for a fair and just settlement right away.
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