subject: The Personal Injury Attorney And How A Case Is Won [print this page] For most people, the decision to hire a personal injury attorney will come around only once in a lifetime. If you're lucky, it may never happen at all. But if it does, odds are good that you will be entering uncharted territory. You probably have dozens of questions, including whether or not you should even hire a lawyer in the first place. It can be scary to contemplate the magnitude of taking a company or individual to court. Knowing what might be waiting for you can help remove some of the fear. Here are some of the things that go into a winning case.
Negotiations
Most people believe that a personal injury attorney wins the majority of his cases in a courtroom, having convinced a jury to vote against the defendants. In truth, a very small percentage of cases end up this way. The rest are settled out of court through negotiations and professional mediation. This helps keep the court dockets unclogged, removes the unpredictability of a jury, and drastically cuts down on the time and cost of a full trial. Don't be disappointed if your lawyer advises you to settle. This isn't a loss. This is how these cases are handled, nine times out of ten.
It Takes Time
If you want your settlement yesterday, you are in for a rude awakening. It's become a clich to say that the wheels of justice move slowly, but nowhere is this more true than in the realm of civil law. Even with a personal injury attorney who prides himself on moving things along quickly, there's not much you can do in the face of an insurance company determined to throw every wrench in the gears they can to avoid judgment day. There are plenty of ways to abuse the system, and you can bet their lawyers know all of them. Actually getting paid after a judgment has been rendered is another matter altogether, and can also take years.
Victory is Not Guaranteed
You may think that just because a personal injury attorney agreed to take your case that it's in the bag. Not so. While lawyers working in this field generally try to find cases they think they can win (since otherwise, they usually don't get paid), they don't have a crystal ball. Once a case goes to the jury, anything can happen. Though a jury is instructed to make their decision based on the facts of the case, they are human. They can and will make mistakes. Don't make plans based on what you believe is a foregone conclusion. You never know what might happen.
