Do I have a case?

The four pieces, in plain language

Lawyers call these the elements of a negligence claim. Stripped of the vocabulary, they are four ordinary questions.

1. Did someone owe you care?

Every driver owes other people on the road reasonable care. A property owner owes people who come onto the property a degree of care that depends on the circumstances. A dog owner is responsible for the dog. This element is usually the easy one.

2. Did they fall short of it?

This is the fight in most cases. Running a red light is a clear shortfall. Whether a floor was left wet too long, or a driver was following too closely for the conditions, is an argument built out of evidence.

3. Did that cause your injury?

The failure has to be what actually hurt you. This is where insurers spend their energy, particularly if you had a prior injury to the same body part, waited before seeking treatment, or had a gap in your care. None of those end a case. All of them get used.

4. Did it cost you something?

Medical bills, lost income, the future care you are going to need, and the effect on how you live. Being frightened by a near miss, without an injury behind it, is generally not a claim.

Cases that people are surprised to learn they have

• The other driver had no insurance — your own policy may cover it
• The driver fled and was never identified
• You were partly at fault — California compares fault rather than barring the claim
• You did not go to the hospital that day but were hurt
• Someone already told you no case, without reading your policy

Cases that people are surprised to learn they do not have

Boyd would rather tell you this on a free call than after you have waited a year.

• A crash with real property damage but no injury
• An injury with no connection to anyone else's conduct
• A claim where the responsible party has no insurance and no assets, and no other coverage applies
• A situation that is genuinely nobody's fault, which does happen

The honest answer is that it depends on facts

No page can tell you whether you have a case, and any page that says it can is selling something. What a page can do is tell you what the questions are, so the call goes faster.

Boyd takes that call himself. It is free, and if the answer is that you do not have a case, he will say so.