Personal Injury

Medical costs, lost income, and the effect of the injury on your life. The exact list depends on the case and the evidence.

Most claims resolve with the insurer without a lawsuit. If the insurer will not deal fairly, filing is the next step, and you are told before that happens.

Two years from the injury is the general limit, with exceptions. It is worth a call to check yours.

Personal injury lawyers in California generally work on a contingency fee: a percentage of what is recovered, paid at the end, with nothing owed if there is no recovery. California requires the fee agreement to be in writing, so ask what the percentage is, whether it changes if a lawsuit is filed, and how case costs are handled before you sign.

Nobody can tell you honestly on the first day, and anyone who does is guessing. The value comes from the medical record of what was injured and how it was treated, the income lost, the effect on your daily life, and how clearly fault can be shown; the other side’s insurance limits set a practical ceiling. What Aryan Aliakbarzadeh, Esq. can tell you at the start is what the claim depends on and what to keep.

Your own health insurance, if you have it, pays first; medical payments coverage on an auto policy pays early bills regardless of fault; some providers treat on a lien and wait for the settlement. The responsible party’s insurer pays at the end, not as the bills arrive. Whoever paid along the way, health plan or Medi-Cal, is usually entitled to be repaid from the recovery, which is part of what gets negotiated.

Yes. Workers’ compensation covers an injury at work regardless of fault, but it does not pay for pain or the full loss of income, and California Labor Code §3852 lets an injured worker also claim against a third party whose carelessness caused the injury: a driver, a subcontractor, a property owner, a product maker. The two claims run at the same time and the workers’ compensation carrier is repaid from the third-party recovery. Tell your employer in writing within 30 days to protect the workers’ compensation side.

Most California injury claims settle, many of them before a lawsuit is filed and most of the rest before trial. A case is prepared as if it will be tried, because that is what makes an insurer settle it fairly; filing suit is a step in that process, not a failure of it. If a fair offer never comes, a jury decides, and that decision is yours to make with your lawyer.