Your Basic Guide to Suing Someone:

Generally, when considering whether or not to sue someone, you have to ask three questions:

1. Is someone dead?
2. Is someone injured?
3. Is someone else at fault?

If someone is dead or you are injured, then you may be entitled to compensation. It really depends on if you or someone else was at fault. If someone else was at fault for your injury, then the law makes it possible for you to “become whole again” through bringing a lawsuit.

If you were in a car accident and someone else was at fault, then a lawsuit is taking the next step. If this happens the first thing you need to do before you talk to insurance companies is to speak to a personal injury lawyer. Once lawyers get involved the amount the insurance company offers usually increases significantly. The reason for this is insurance companies want to avoid expensive litigation where there is a clear case of fault. If they know they will end up paying a larger verdict after trial by being willing to take the case to court, they will generally pay more upfront.

One very important fact: If you have pre-existing injuries which were made worse by the accident, then the at-fault party’s insurance company is responsible for treating those additional injuries as well. South Carolina law is clear you take people as you find them.

For example, this means if someone injures a veteran with a bad knee and his knee gets worse because of the accident, the Defendant is liable for any treatment for his knee injury reasonably related to the accident.

Ultimately, with car accidents you must decide if you want money now or want to wait to get more. An attorney can advise you of what your best course of action should be. If you want money now, call one of our lawyers who can assist you in getting paid fairly, now. If you are willing to wait to take it trial, you will likely get much more. We can help with this too. The decision is yours and your personal injury attorney can advise you about which choice is right for you given your injury and financial situation.

“If someone intended to hurt you and you were injured either psychologically, emotionally, or physically, you need to talk to a lawyer.”

Medical Malpractice:

1. Did you or someone you love have an unexpected medical outcome?
2. Did someone die or suffer serious injury?

The goal of a hospital or doctor is to cure the sick. Basically, if someone dies unexpectedly in the hospital and you have questions about why it happened, you should speak to a lawyer as your lawyer is a non-interested party who will be honest with you opposed to a hospital who is trying to protect themselves from a lawsuit.

You owe it to yourself and your family to investigate the matter. If you call us, we will have an expert doctor look at the medical records and either clear the medical provider so you can know there was nothing more that could have been done or tell you the truth about what happened. If our expert finds wrongdoing, we will then file an appropriate action against the doctor and hospital.

South Carolina laws holds medical providers to the standard of what a reasonably prudent physician or hospital would do under the same or similar circumstances. If they can’t meet this standard, then they need to be held liable for their actions.

To file a medical malpractice suit, you must first ask your lawyer to order the medical records from your healthcare provider. We will then have an expert look at those records to tell us if any doctor did something wrong. If they did wrong and did anything less than what a reasonably prudent physician would do, then they deserve to pay for damages they caused.

You should never believe the hospital if you are even somewhat uncertain about the cause of injury or death. If someone has died or you are seriously injured, the best course of action is to let one of our experts with no financial interest at stake tell you what really happened.

If someone died or was seriously injured in a hospital or after being seen in the hospital, please speak to one of our lawyers, so we can let our doctors look at the records and know if there was anything that could have been done to save their life.

Slip and Fall

1. Did you fall on someone else’s property and injure yourself?
2. Were the premises unsafe?
3. Were you warned about the safety issue?

The law commonly refers to slip and fall cases as “premises liability.” This is a fancy lawyer word for injuries that occurred on property or “premises” someone else owns. The law for slip and falls is quite clear. If you were on someone else’s property and there is a dangerous condition that you weren’t warned about and sustain any injury they are liable.

Your lawyer will ask you the following:

1. Were you there with permission?
2. Were you invited?
3. Did you trespass and injure yourself?

There are different requirements to bring a lawsuit for each type of invitee or non invitees. Your lawyer will talk to you about this.

What you need to know is the basics: If you were injured on someone’s property and you weren’t warned about the possibility of an injury, then you need to speak to a lawyer.

If you were badly injured even if warned please still talk to a lawyer.

Intentional Actions:

1. Did someone injure you either psychologically, emotionally, or physically?
2. Did the person intended to hurt you?

A long time ago a bunch of very clever lawyers got together and figured out all the ways it was possibly to intentionally harm someone. They labeled these types of injuries: “intentional torts.” Intentional Torts are the words lawyers use for intentional injury done to you.

There are different types of torts and many can apply depending on what happened. Call one of our lawyers to speak with them so they can tell you more about intentional torts.

Basically, all you really know is if someone intended to hurt you and you were injured either psychologically, emotionally, or physically, you need to talk to a lawyer.

Negligence:

1. Did someone act carelessly and injure you?

There are four elements to a negligence action: duty, breach, causation, and damages. People generally have a duty to act reasonably under the circumstances. People also generally owe a duty to obey the law. If they broke a law and injured you then they either did it intentionally discussed above or unintentionally called “negligence.” Breach means that they broke a law or acted in an unreasonable manner or were careless.

The most important aspect is causation. Did their unreasonable conduct cause you injury? If they acted unreasonably but you were injured because of something else that wasn’t in any way related to their unreasonable action, then they have no liability.

Just because someone acted unreasonably doesn’t matter in the eyes of the law, unless you or someone else was injured because of it. You must have damages to bring a case. If you were injured because someone was careless then please let one of our lawyers help.

Defamation:

1. Did someone say or write something untrue?
2. Did you suffer an injury as a result?
3. Did someone post something untrue on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter that got you upset?
4. Do you want them to pay?

False statements or publications which cause you injury may entitle you to monetary damages. There are two types of defamation: libel and slander. Libel is written false statements which cause injury, slander is oral statements which cause personal injury. In order to bring a case for defamation you must prove that someone said or wrote something untrue about you or your business. Defamation can be difficult to prove because proving what was actually said when you weren’t present is very difficult without the cooperation of multiple witnesses. 

In the digital era, where there is a post or “written evidence” to corroborate the defamation. These cases are much easier to prove. The most important thing you can do is take a screenshot of the post, save it, then bring it to your lawyer.