Missouri Auto Accident & Motorcycle Laws

Any time a grownup falls in Missouri, there is an opportunity for the jury to blame you for not paying attention. Because of that, slip-and-fall or trip-and-fall type cases are the type that I’ve tried more than any other in my history as a Missouri slip-and-fall lawyer. Whether it’s on snow and ice, or a spilled yogurt at the grocery store, or any number of other things, you’re responsible to look out. And because of that, the insurance company is going to want to blame you for your incident and say you’re at fault for falling. Call a professional, call a Missouri slip-and-fall lawyer, and get the help you need when you’ve injured yourself, to take care of your medical bills and to pay for the bills that are going to continue to come in while you can’t work.  When you’ve been hurt and the bills are racking up, you don’t have to pay a lawyer out-of-pocket to represent you in your injury case. Call my office, and if we can help you we won’t charge you anything until the end of your case, if we’re successful for you. Call 314-A-LAWYER today for a free consultation.

By: Spencer Farris

Summary judgement is when the other side tries to win your case without going to trial based on the papers that have been filed.

By: Spencer Farris

I got a call from a lady the other day who wanted to know how her medical bills were going to be paid after her injury.

Injury Law News brought to you by the S.E. Farris Law Firm.

I’m Spencer Farris and I represent injury victims in the state of Missouri. I get that kind of call a lot from folks who are worried about their rising medical bills and the daily mail that they get with another bill collector looking for payment. And this is what I typically tell them.

Medicare

Senior citizens and folks on social security disability are covered by Medicare and Medicare will pay the medical bills as they are incurred. However, Medicare gets part of their money back from your injury case at the end. Your lawyer will have to negotiate that for you because Medicare will want dollar for dollar on what they spend.

Medicaid

Children in Missouri who don’t have private health insurance, and some adults, are covered by Missouri Medicaid. And Medicaid also will pay Medical bills and, at the end of your lawsuit, they will expect to be repaid. However, a judge can reduce or totally eliminate your payback to Medicaid. You’ll need your lawyer to help you with that.

Private Insurance

The other group that frequently pays medical bills in Missouri is private insurance and private insurance will ask for repayment almost always. Unless they are a special plan, a self-funded union plan or something along those lines that is governed by federal law, they’re not entitled to reimbursement. The word that they will say is subrogation, which means they stand in your shoes and get to collect their money back from the person who hurt you. Make sure that your lawyer is well aware and willing to fight for you so that you don’t have to pay back the health insurance. And this isn’t cheating. You paid benefits to get the health insurance. You wrote a check every month. They shouldn’t get their money back just because they did what they promised to do.

No Insurance

Finally, there are a lot of folks that don’t have any health insurance. And in those situations, hospitals and doctors will treat you on what’s called a lien basis. Hospitals don’t have to see you unless you’re in an emergency. But, experienced trial lawyers can help you find a doctor who will treat you on a lien basis and will make sure that your doctor understands that they will get paid.

When you’ve been hurt, the most important thing is to feel better and not be worried about how you’re going to pay for your medical bills. Remember that a trial lawyer who cares about his clients will fight for you and fight to put money in your pocket, rather than spend it all on the health care that you wouldn’t have needed but for your injury. If you have questions about medical care or how to pay for it after an injury, call my office or reach us at the website at the bottom of the screen. I’m happy to visit with you without any cost or obligation and hopefully help put your mind at rest.

The S.E. Farris Law Firm is dedicated to the needs of injury victims and their families.

By: Spencer Farris

Auto Accident Litigation

Accidents involving over the road trucks are almost always devastating. While you’re off work, your bills are going to pile up. You’re going to want to hire a St. Louis truck accident attorney to protect your rights, because the trucking company and their insurance companies want to delay things as long as possible. The longer they delay, the more hard up you’re going to be for money to pay your bills and whatnot, and the better chance they have of getting off cheap. When you’ve been hurt and the bills are racking up, you don’t have to pay a lawyer out of pocket to represent you in your injury case. Call my office and if we can help you, we won’t charge you anything until the end of the case, if we’re successful for you. Call 314- A-LAWYER today, for a free consultation.

By: Spencer Farris

Taxes are on everybody’s mind at this time of year and you maybe wondering, “Do I have to pay taxes on my personal injury case?” Injury law news brought to you by the S.E. Farris Law Firm. I’m Spencer Farris, a partner at the S.E. Farris Law Firm. I’ve represented hundreds of injury victims throughout Missouri. And at the end of the case the question my clients always want to know is how much money do I get from my settlement and will I have to pay taxes. Current Internal Revenue Service and Missouri state regulations do not tax personal injury cases. They treat a personal injury case settlement as a return on investment, which means that you’re really just getting back money that you’ve invested or in the case of an injury, your body and your future work life, which has been taken away from you. So, you don’t currently pay taxes on a personal injury case. However, whenever you file your taxes you always want to meet with a professional tax adviser because there are a couple of exceptions to that rule. If you’re verdict of settlement included punitive damages it is taxable.

Punitive or exemplary damages are damages to punish a defendant which you don’t typically see in a civil trial setting. The State of Missouri will take up to half of punitive damages that are awarded and puts them in a special fund to benefit injury victims. If you’re verdict or settlement includes a confidentiality clause – meaning that you can’t talk about your settlement – there are taxes are on confidential portion or the portion that was paid for confidentiality. Finally, lost wages are taxed just like your wages would be. It’s rare in Missouri for a verdict to specifically set out wages so this doesn’t come up very often, but it can and you and your lawyer and your tax attorney should talk about those things. If you have questions about the tax consequences of a personal injury settlement, call my office at the number on the screen or visit us on the internet. We’ll be happy to try to help you without any cost or obligation. The S.E. Farris Law Firm is dedicated to the needs of injury victims and their families.

By: Spencer Farris

You wouldn’t dare hire a surgeon based on a television ad, but many people hire their attorney based on a television ad. It’s a horrible idea. Here’s why.

Injury Law News, brought to you by the S.E. Farris Law Firm.

A lot of lawyers want to talk to you about credentials. Board certified? Schmoard certified. Superlawyer? Pooperlawyer. At 800-CASH-COW, we’re the home of the Super-d-Duper Lawyers.

You’re in a wreck and you hurt your neck. We’ll be there to get you your check.

I’m Spencer Farris. I represent injury victims in Missouri, and I’ve been doing it for about 20 years. I hope you enjoyed that video and realized that’s just a joke, and that’s the last way you should pick an attorney.

Here are some of the things you should look for though. You should look for experience. A lawyer who’s trying his first personal injury case is not the lawyer you want trying your only personal injury case. You want someone with trial experience.

You want someone with credentials, and we’ve talked about this before, credentials are a thing that requires some research to see if they’re real credentials or not. Be aware that a lot of the badges and things you see on folks’ websites are nothing more than paid marketing things. Real credentials are things like board certification. That’s a test that lawyers have to take, and it’s not required, so lawyers that are board certified you know have gone the extra mile.

Finally, you want to find a lawyer who’s dedicated to your needs, not someone who’s just trying to see how many cases they can handle and how fast they can move through each one. You’re entitled to personal assistance on your personal injury case, and you want a lawyer that takes that commitment and that relationship seriously.

Television ads are a great place to buy a refrigerator, but they’re a horrible place to hire an attorney.

If you have a personal injury case and would like to talk to an attorney without any cost or obligation, call me at the number on your screen, or visit us at our Internet website. I’m happy to try to help without any cost or obligation, and if we can do nothing more than help you choose the right lawyer, we’re happy to do that as well.

The S.E. Farris Law Firm is dedicated to the needs of injury victims and their families

By: Spencer Farris

We count on medications to make us feel better, but it doesn’t always work that way. Some drugs get to market before adequate safety studies are done, and the drug itself winds up causing more harm than good. Other times, a doctor will prescribe a drug without knowing a full history and the other medications that you are taking, and the drugs and your history work together to cause harm. Finally, my office has represented folks where the pharmacy has placed the wrong drug, either the wrong dosage or the wrong pill altogether in the bottle. If you or a loved one has been harmed due to a medication error, call my office at the number on the screen or visit us on the Internet. Not all injuries are caused by drugs, and I’m happy to help you figure out if your family has been harmed due to a dangerous drug.  Call 314-A-LAWYER today for your free consultation.

By: Spencer Farris

Whether you’re shopping at a business or walking down the street, the last thing you expect is to be flat on your back, and feeling pain. When you fall, or what lawyers typically call a “slip and fall injury,” the first thing to do is to figure out what caused you to fall. Was it a change in grade? Was it a slick substance on the floor? This isn’t always easy to do, because as you lay there in pain, the most important thing in your mind is to get medical attention. That is crucially important but if someone with you can take pictures of the scene, it will be invaluable to you later. When you slip and fall on someone else’s property, it’s important to get an experienced attorney who’s capable of investigating those claims. And if the claim involves a government entity, it is even more important to have an experienced attorney to investigate on your behalf. Call my office at the number on the screen, or visit us on the web at any time. I’m happy to visit with you and answer your questions about your slip and fall injury, without any cost or obligation. Call 314-A-LAWYER today, for your free consultation.

By: Spencer Farris

Products liability is the part of the law that deals with defective or dangerous products. As a Missouri products liability attorney, I’ve been involved in cases where a product was misused and the manufacturer knew that it would be misused in that manner. The one that comes to mind was a baby seat case where a grandpa had strapped a baby into the car, didn’t get the seatbelt routed right, and there was a crash and the baby had a horrible, horrible brain injury because of that. We were able to hold the car seat manufacturer accountable because they knew that folks misused the product in this way and they didn’t design around it.

 It’s coming to light now that General Motors did exactly what Ford did back in the 70s and choose dollars over human lives with their Chevy Cobalt. As a Missouri product liability attorney, we understand that it takes a lot of work from the legal aspect from getting engineers involved and kind of doing reverse forensic sciences to figure out what was wrong with the product. Although, in the GM case, frankly they knew what was wrong and they made a decision to choose dollars over human lives. It’ll take a lot of attorneys to hold them accountable for what they did and for all the lives that they destroyed. There was a problem with the ignition switch that caused the airbag to fail. The airbag that’s designed to protect folks was failing and the cost of the part to fix it was under $1. GM’s first choice was to tell folks don’t hang heavy keys on your keychain. That will keep this from malfunctioning. They’d known for years before they finally did a recall, but they decided that the lives that they would have to pay for cost less than the cars they would have to fix. When you’ve been hurt and the bills are racking up, you don’t have to pay a lawyer out of pocket to represent you in your injury case. Call my office and if we can help you, we won’t charge you anything until the end of your case if we’re successful for you.  Call 314-A-LAWYER today for a free consultation.

By: Spencer Farris