Instead of going through tons of boring law, I will just try and explain two things that may surprise you to learn:
Surprise #1- Contributory negligence
The basics of car wreck and general negligence is fairly straight-forward, you have to act as a reasonable person would act. Failure to act reasonably is negligence. So, if you fail to watch where you are going and run into another vehicle, you are mostly likely negligent. That part is easy, and you certainly do not need to be a lawyer to figure that out.
The problem in North Carolina is something called contributory negligence. Contributory negligence means that you also "contributed" to the wreck by your own negligence. That does make sense, because anything you did you should not recover for. Unfortunately, our North Carolina laws take this idea too far. In North Carolina, if you are 1% at fault, or contributorily negligent, then you cannot recover anything. It sounds crazy because it is crazy.
Let me give you an example, let's say you are driving down the road and you slow down to make a right hand turn. Someone behind you was not paying attention, was on their cell phone or something, and runs into the back of you. Again, they are clearly negligent, and they should be held responsible. It is just that sometimes the aren't.
Some insurance companies love to try and argue that you were contributorily negligent. They will hire a defense lawyer who will argue that you actually did not have your turn signal on, or you braked too quickly and that it is partially your fault. If one jury happens to believe that, you lose. The jury must be unanimous. If one juror happens to just hate lawyers or feels so strongly about tort reform or something, you could lose. Contributory negligence is simply an "all or nothing" rule that is unjust.
Most states have what is called comparative negligence, which simply compares the negligence of the drivers. For example, if you did slow down maybe just a little too fast, then the jury could hold you 10% at fault and the defendant 90% at fault. So, the defendant would only have to pay 90% of the damages. However, not in North Carolina where the insurance companies rule. If you would like more information, click on this link to wikipedia.
Surprise #2- "Insurance" is a bad word
In North Carolina, if the insurance company refuses to settle, you have to file suit. However, you do not file suit against the insurance company. Instead, you must sue the other driver, and you can not mention "insurance" or the "insurance company" at all. You can not tell the jury that there is insurance, how much insurance is on the car, and how poorly you have been treated by the adjuster. Insurance is not admissible at all.
What happens is that the insurance company will hire an insurance lawyer to defend the case. The insurance lawyer is paid by the insurance company, and the defendant has no say so as to settlement. Many times, I have tried cases where the poor defendant wanted to settle because he or she knew it was her fault. However, they have no choice in the matter, the insurance company decides. Insurance companies will sometimes not even pay for the medical bills from the car wreck. The insurance lawyers will then go into court without the jury ever knowing that they are hired by the insurance company and not the defendant.
This becomes incredibly important in big damage cases. In one case that I tried in Lexington, the plaintiff was a school teacher who was killed in a car accident. I represented her three boys in the case. During the trial of the case, the jury really struggled. They knew that the boys had lost their mother, but they did not want to punish the defendant. He was a good, religious person who simply fell asleep at the wheel coming back from a long trip. He was unemployed and his family had hit hard times. Since I could not tell the jury that he had $1 million in insurance, they did not come back with a large verdict. The verdict was $229,000, but not as high as it should have been. When I talked the jury after the trial, some of the jurors were literally crying. They were so upset, because they thought that they had let the boys down. They specifically admitted that they would have raised the verdict much higher, had they known it was not coming out of this nice defendant's pocket. If you would like to read a NC Court of Appeals case on this issue, click here: "insurance" case.
The above are two examples of how things have gone wrong with our negligence jury system. Personal injury cases such as these are surprisingly difficult to try in front of a jury, but there are plenty of good lawyers in North Carolina and the Piedmont Area. Just ask your potential injury lawyer, "how many large car accident cases have you tried in front of a jury or settled in the last few years?" Remember: advertising and skill are frequently opposites for lawyers, because some lawyers spend more time on TV than in the courtroom. If you are in a car accident, make sure that you get a good lawyer. You are going to need it.
