Chesterfield Pedestrian Accident Lawyer

Who do you hold responsible for a pedestrian accident? Moreover, what point is there in taking action? If you’re injured in a walkway or on a sidewalk, you may want to go home, assess your losses, and focus on getting your life back on track.

You don’t have to let a pedestrian accident turn you into a hermit, though. When it comes time to look into your losses, you can have a Chesterfield pedestrian accident lawyer at your side. We can help you determine the value of your losses. We can then help you fight to see those losses compensated in or out of court.

Our Chesterfield personal injury lawyers have decades of experience under their belts. We want to make it as easy as possible for you to get the financial support you need to recover. With that in mind, you can book your FREE pedestrian accident case evaluation with our team today.

Pedestrians Have the Right to Safely Navigate Chesterfield Roads

There are steps, according to state law, that pedestrians have to take to make themselves visible and safe when navigating Chesterfield sidewalks. That said, pedestrians throughout Chesterfield and greater Missouri all deserve an elevated duty of care. What does that mean?

An “elevated duty of care” describes the responsibility motorists, bicyclists, construction crews, and related parties have toward Chesterfield pedestrians. All of these parties and others like them must take concrete steps to stay on top of preventable accidents. If these parties become negligent in their responsibilities, they can cause dangerous accidents.

In other words, prior to your accident, you deserved protection under a liable party’s duty of care. Now, in the wake of your losses, you can hold a party liable for violating that responsibility.

Taking Action After a Pedestrian Accident

There are a few different tools that you can use to hold a negligent party liable for pedestrian accident losses. These can include the following:

Going to Civil Court With a Personal Injury Claim

So long as you can prove that another party bears the blame for your pedestrian accident, you can demand compensation for your losses from said party. That said, you need to act quickly in the face of a dangerous pedestrian accident. If your personal injury claim’s statute of limitations expires, you may waive your right to comprehensive accident compensation.

Fortunately, Missouri has a generous personal injury statute of limitations in place. Missouri Code section 516.120 states that you have until the fifth anniversary of your accident to take legal action against a negligent party. Do note, however, that said deadline is firm. Fail to act, and you will not have the right to argue for compensation in front of a judge.

Filing a Claim With an Insurance Provider

You additionally have the right to bring your losses to the attention of a liable party’s insurance provider. The benefits of this process depend on the amount of coverage the liable party has. Should a liable party have comprehensive coverage, you may have the right to request support for your property damage and medical expenses.

That said, if the liable party doesn’t have coverage, this avenue toward compensation may not be available to you.

Be careful when interacting with an insurance provider after a pedestrian accident. In an ideal world, insurance claims adjusters would respect your right to full and total compensation. In reality, these providers want to save their companies as much money as possible, and they can undermine your losses to do so.

Fortunately, you can bring an attorney into any conversations you want to have with an insurance claims adjuster or corporate provider. 

What to Expect From the Civil Process

If you do opt to go to civil court with your pedestrian accident claim, be prepared to run through the gamut of the legal process. This process takes time. That said, it can reward you with significant pedestrian accident damages. You can then go on to use those damages to pay off your accident-related bills.

You can work with our team to estimate the value of your pedestrian accident case before you meet with a civil judge. We account for your pedestrian accident’s economic and non-economic losses before establishing your case’s value. We additionally bring forward the evidence needed to prove your right to those damages before submitting your case to a judge.

How do we find the information we need to progress your case? That process involves investigation and discovery.

Discovery and Investigation

Discovery and investigation tend to mirror one another but are not the same process. Our team investigates your losses before we bring your case to a civil judge’s attention. We engage in discovery if you decide to move forward with a pedestrian accident civil trial.

That said, both processes are essential to the process of assigning fault for your losses. We need an investigation to find evidence that a liable party violated your duty of care and caused you economic harm. That evidence can also help assign or divide fault for your losses between applicable parties.

We can further distinguish between discovery and investigation when discussing how you want to move forward with a civil case.

You Decide How to Progress Your Case

So long as your pedestrian accident case moves forward in Missouri’s civil courts, you should have the right to outline how you want your case to progress. You can, for example, go straight into a civil trial. Doing so can initiate discovery and the other stages of the civil process, including the following:

• Opening statements
• Examination
• Cross-examination
• Closing statements
• Deliberation and verdict

You can alternatively request that a Chesterfield pedestrian accident attorney schedule out-of-court settlement negotiations with a liable party. These negotiations tend only to move forward in cases where the liable party agrees to meet. That said, should your negotiations begin, you can argue for your right to compensation directly.

You can discuss which path toward pedestrian accident compensation suits your case best when you meet with our attorneys.

You Can Work With Morelli Law Firm to Hold Negligent Parties Accountable

Negligence caused your pedestrian accident. You can hold the offending party responsible for their misconduct. Don’t wait another minute. Reach out to the pedestrian accident attorneys in Chesterfield, MO, to learn more about your right to accident compensation. Morelli Law Firm and its experienced legal team want to help you financially recover.

We offer pedestrian accident survivors a free case evaluation following their accidents. You can book your case evaluation by phone or through our website. Bring questions about your right to compensation and the possibilities of action in and out of court. We’re here to demystify the legal process and help you down the road to recovery.