Arizona Personal Injury Laws

My name is Mack Jones. I’m an attorney at the personal injury law firm of Jones Raczkowski, here in Phoenix, Arizona. How is compensation determined for a significant personal injury? It’s determined in two ways. First, the percentage of fault that the defendant bears is determined. Secondly, one’s damages. There are two components to damages – at least, that’s how lawyers look at it. First component is what we call special damages. Those are your out-of-pocket expenses, lost wages, and your medical bills. Those can be arithmetically calculated. But if somebody came up to a person and said, “I will pay your lost wages, and I’ll pay your medical bills, and we’re square,” most people would say, “That’s not fair.” The other component of personal injury damages are general damages. It’s what laypeople call, “pain and suffering.” But it’s not just physical pain and suffering.

It is permanency. If you have permanency, how an injury affects you in terms of your work, your hobbies, your life, any scarring, any physical disfigurement. Those are the types of things that different people have different attitudes and different values on. That’s why, when somebody comes to you and says, “How much is my case worth?” it’s very difficult to determine unless you’re experienced and you’ve done those types of cases in the past. If you’ve had a serious personal injury, please contact me at Jones Raczkowski, (602) 840-8787.

By: Mack Jones

My name is Mark Raczkowski, and I’m an attorney at Jones Raczkowski PC in Phoenix, Arizona. Under most circumstances, if you slip and fall on somebody else’s property, they will not cover your medical expenses. Depends on what type of insurance coverage, if any, that they have as well as what assets they might have. But if you slip and fall and been seriously injured on someone’s property, the first thing you need to do is speak with an attorney that is familiar with the types of issues that come up in slip-and-fall and trip-and-fall cases. My office has focused on slip-and-fall and trip-and-fall cases for more than 25 years, and we know what to expect with regards to defendants that own property where people have been hurt. If you have questions about a serious injury that you’ve suffered as a result of a slip-and-fall on someone else’s property contact me through my website at www.azpremiseslaw.com.

By: Mark Raczkowski

My name is Mark Raczkowski and I’m an attorney at Jones Raczkowski PC in Phoenix, Arizona. My recommendation is that you do not speak with an insurance representative before you’ve had an opportunity to speak with an attorney about the personal injury that you suffered. Insurance adjusters have one job, and that is to pay you the smallest amount of money possible on your claim. And the way that they can do that is by getting information from you. Some of that information, they may not even be entitled to, and so it’s important that you speak with an attorney before you start divulging information that may be detrimental to your claim on down the road. Before you speak with an insurance representative contact me at my website www.azpremiseslaw.com.

By: Mark Raczkowski

Property Damages in Phoenix

I don’t understand why law firms don’t help injured victims out with their property damages. We at Wattel and York have a property damage division dedicated to serving our clients, whether that be getting your vehicle repaired properly, or getting a fair market value on the total loss. You know, if your vehicle needs to be repaired, it needs to be repaired properly and safely.

Insurance Companies

Insurance companies cut corners these days and they make money by having you go to their shops. Why, because they control the labor costs, because they can put the parts that they want on your vehicle. We recommend you get it repaired at an independent body shop, not one that’s contracted with an insurance company through a direct repair program. We recommend you have OEM parts utilized in the repair, not after market parts. Those after market parts may not fit. In addition, they may nullify your manufacturer warranty.

Wattel & York

Let us help you with the property damage portion of your claim. We do it without cost to you if we’re handling your personal injury claim.

By: David Wattel

Hi, my name is Nathan Meyer. I’m a partner at Jaburg Wilk. My practice areas include insurance coverage, insurance bad faith, insurance UM and UIM litigation, as well as commercial litigation, professional liability litigation, and general liability litigation. There’s actually been some very favorable rulings for insurance companies regarding punitive damages. It started with a United States Supreme Court case in 2003 in Campbell. There is also recently been some Court of Appeals cases that has significantly reduced punitive damages award amounts to much more reasonable amounts in Arizona.

Reducing Punitive Damage Awards

In the United States Supreme court case “Campbell”, the court actually reduced a $145 million punitive damages award all the way down to a million dollars, or at least they said – they told the Utah Supreme Court, “We’re sending this back to you, and you need to reduce this award to something around a million dollars.”

In a recent Arizona Court of Appeals case, there was a $54 million punitive damages award. And the Court of Appeals initially reduced that from $54 million down to $620,000. Then the Arizona Supreme Court actually reduced it from $620,000 all the way down to $155,000. So it’s a substantial reduction.

Also you have another recent case called “Orellana the Prime Life Insurance Company”, and they reduced a punitive damage award from about $1.3 million all the way down to $320,000. So courts are really reducing some of these egregious punitive damages awards amounts down to something much more reasonable.

3 Factors Courts Consider When Reducing Punitive Damage Awards

In “Campbell V. State Farm”, that 2003 United States Supreme Court case, the court established three guide post a court should look at when they’re reviewing these large punitive damages awards.

One is reprehensibility, the degree of reprehensibility of the defendant’s conduct. Two is the disparity, and that’s where you get the ratio of the punitive damages to the compensatory damages. And the third is comparability to civil authorized fines, and those are usually fines authorized by statutes.

For example, in Arizona there is a maximum $50,000 fine per six month period when you violate the unfair claim settlement practices act. So those are the three things that courts look at when considering whether to reduce punitive damages.

By: Nathan D. Meyer

Attorney Thomas M. Richardson

I’ve been practicing law here in the Phoenix area and in Greater Arizona area for the last 15 years. I do mainly trial work and a lot of the cases that I have – are able to settle before they go to trial.

A personal injury attorney is a moniker, really, attached to trial lawyers. What I always wanted to do is trial law. I do a lot of jury psychology studies, a lot of jury strategy studies, in an effort to be a good trial lawyer. So when I am a personal injury attorney, it’s actually being a trial lawyer.

By: Thomas Richardson

Do Not Falsify Claims

One of the things that we want to make sure happens is that there are only legitimate claims being brought and pursued through the court system. The court system is overburdened as it is. Only the legitimate cases are the ones that we take. If a case is not legitimate, there’s no room for it at our justice system.

By: Thomas Richardson

Medical Malpractice Claims in Phoenix

We handle medical malpractice claims. A lot of lawyers don’t. They’re very time consuming, they’re very expensive often times. We have an obligation to establish that your physician has breached the standard of care, fell below the standard of care, and that that breach has caused you injury. You may have been harmed by your physician, and you may have a viable malpractice claim, but it may not be economically worth pursuing.

Pursuing Malpractice Claims

Often times these days, medical malpractice claims take tens of thousands and we’ve had some, as much as hundreds of thousands of dollars in client costs to pursue them to conclusion. It’s gotta be a good injury, it’s gotta be significant, because otherwise, it may not be cost-effective to pursue it.

Wattel & York

If you’ve been injured, give us a call. We’ll tell you if we think we can help you out. Call is free, consultation is free. We represent you. We work on a contingency basis. That means no money up front. We get paid at the end of the case. And if we don’t collect money for you, there’s no fee.

By: David Wattel

Unsafe Premises

Well one of the main things we’re worried about at Friedl Richardson, are unsafe premises. And premises are generally unsafe, because the owner of those premises, be it a supermarket, a retail establishment, or any other commercial building, chooses to violate building codes, and make their premises dangerous for the people they’re inviting on-board to buy their product.

The most common ways that people are injured on premises are ways in which it would be so easy for the premises owner to have avoided. Quite often it’s just something that the premises owner puts up to look good. Something the premises owner puts up temporarily. Something the premises owner puts up that attracts people into their business, yet is unsafe. And those are the most common ways people can be injured when they’re in and out of commercial establishments.

By: Thomas Richardson