San Francisco Personal Injury Lawyers

How Do I Find The Best Personal Injury Law Firm in San Francisco?

If you’ve been injured due to another’s negligence, there’s a lot you need to know. Personal injury law is a complex area of practice. There are going to be a lot of lawyers out there vying for your case. So the question then becomes: how do you find the best California personal injury firms and avoid the not so great ones?

In order to answer this question, there are a few things you need to know about personal injury law first.

Personal Injury Law is a Specialized Area of Practice

Personal injury law is not a generalized area of practice. While there are attorneys that may say that they can litigate any personal injury case that you may have, they may not be doing you any favors by taking your case. For instance, product liability cases are a specialized branch of personal injury law. They involve individuals getting injured through the use of a product. Lawyers who litigate these sorts of cases need to familiarize themselves with different kinds of liability and precedents set in other product liability cases. Individuals that have experience litigating these cases are going to have much better instincts for winning the case than someone who specializes in a different area of personal injury law or has a general practice.

The same holds true for lawyers that specialize in traffic accidents. But there’s also one more layer of complexity. Lawyers that specialize in traffic law need to familiarize themselves with the city or cities in which they practice. If you want to find the best personal injury lawyer in California you’ll need to understand the concept of negligence, liability, and how that works.

Negligence and Liability in California Personal Injury Law

The vast majority of personal injury lawsuits center around the question of negligence. In other words, the court is interested in determining who is at fault. In California, that question may not be black and white. Two drivers may be partially at fault in an accident, so even if you did something wrong, it might still be worth bringing your traffic accident case. Your partial fault doesn’t absolve the other person of what they did wrong.

Furthermore, the city where the accident took place can sometimes be partially to blame for an accident. When the city can be found to have failed a certain standard of care in the upkeep of the roads or the design of the streets, you may be entitled to collect damages from the city for your injuries. For those trying to find the best personal injury attorneys in San Francisco, it’s a good idea to ask them good questions like if they have much experience litigating in the city where your accident was. It is important that they know the in’s and out’s of that city’s court system and governmental claims process, not to mention being familiar with the streets of that area of California. Especially if you are a tourist injured while visiting California, you need a local lawyer to help.

Personal Injury Lawyers Have to Negotiate with Insurance Companies

Many personal injury lawyers have to be able to negotiate with insurance companies in order to give your case a shot at settling before dragging you through litigation and trial. Traffic accident lawyers are no different. However, understanding the tactics that auto-insurance companies employ is one of the keys to getting the best possible settlement for your claim.

It bears noting here, that you’re only going to get one chance to bring your California traffic accident case. That means that you’ll want to find the best personal injury attorney in California to handle it. Regardless of whether or not your personal injury claim was from a traffic accident, a slip and fall, or anything else, you’ll need to ensure that your lawyer understands that specific area of practice, and that includes being able to negotiate with insurance companies when necessary.

There are a number of things that an insurance company will do to devalue your case. Insurance companies are for-profit agencies. In order to turn a profit, they attempt to settle your case for as little as possible. They have every incentive to make you appear partially at fault for an accident or exploit ambiguities to make their own client’s liability appear to be a gray area. This is despite the fact that they will attempt to contact you and present themselves as though they’re on your side and helping you out. Make sure you protect yourself by finding the best possible San Francisco injury lawyer you can get.

If You've Suffered Serious Injuries, Don't Hire a High Volume Injury Law Firm

There are a number of personal injury firms in California (commonly referred to in the industry as “mills”) that attempt to operate on extremely high volume and quick turnover. That means that they take a large number of cases, settle them as quickly as possible, and then are on to the next one. This works for them because they still turn a profit by handling a high volume of minor injury claims.

If you hire one of these firms, they can waste your one opportunity to be compensated fully for your injury. That’s not to say that these firms can’t handle the average “fender-bender” traffic injury case. That's actually what they are perfect for. But, if you’ve suffered serious injuries involving broken bones, hospitalization and/or surgery, you want a personal injury lawyer who will give you and your case more personalized attention.

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How Do I Find the Best Personal Injury Lawyer Near Me?

How Do I Find the Best Personal Injury Law Firm in San Francisco

The number one thing to remember about searching for top personal injury lawyers in cities like San Francisco, is that there is a huge amount of competition for your case. There are many lawyers that run a generalized practice (whether it be handling all types of personal injury cases or any type of case at all) that will take traffic accident cases to pay the bills while using that money to fund potentially more lucrative cases in other areas of the law. A firm that specializes ONLY in traffic accident cases is a firm that you can trust to give your car crash, bike accident, motorcycle claim, pedestrian accident or Uber lawsuit the full attention that it deserves.

How Do I Find the Best Personal Injury Law Firm in Los Angeles

Los Angeles is another city which has a great deal of competition for personal injury cases. Sometimes it feels like there are more lawyers than people in LA! So many billboards... Again, lawyers in Los Angeles with more general law practices that take traffic accident cases often prioritize them well beneath medical malpractice and product liability claims, which potentially have massive payouts. The best Los Angeles personal injury lawyers focus exclusively on traffic cases to give your car wreck or other traffic injury case the attention necessary to secure you a great settlement.

How Do I Find the Best Personal Injury Law Firm in Oakland

There are a number of great personal injury law firms practicing in Oakland, and several that specialize in traffic injury law. This has a lot to do with the fact that that Oakland has some of the most dangerous streets in the country. Nonetheless, there are a number of traffic injury attorneys in Oakland who run what are call “mills.” They will take your case, along with hundreds of others, and then push it through the settlement process as quickly as possible. They operate on volume, taking as many cases as they can. While they can secure a living doing this, they aren’t securing the best possible settlements for their clients, and will usually drop any case that requires litigation to get a solid result.

How Do I Find the Best Personal Injury Law Firm in San Jose

San Jose has a number of personal injury attorneys, but very few that specialize in traffic accident law. Finding an attorney who does specialize in only traffic accident law means that they will not only be experts at trying that case, but they’ll also prioritize your case regardless of the potential payout of other types of cases like more generalized San Jose personal injury law firms.

San Jose injury law firms that take traffic accident cases, but also handle larger cases like mass tort, product liability and medical malpractice matters, will often put support staff on your traffic accident case, or devote less time to researching and negotiating your case. They’ll settle your case quickly without maximizing value and then move on to another type of case that promises a big payday. You want a San Jose injury lawyer that’s going to go the extra mile and secure you damages that you deserve in your car wreck, motorcycle crash or other traffic injury case.