Mediation is a very important tool for resolving California car accident injury and wrongful death claims. Recently, we settled a Riverside rear end car accident injury claim at mediation for $550,000. Robert Walch was the attorney handling this matter in our firm. We used an experienced former judge as our mediator in this case. If you need help with a mediation, let us know.
Usually mediations are a tool used during the litigation process for resolving disputes. However, sometimes, as was the case in this particular matter, no lawsuit was filed and this was considered a pre-litigation mediation. By doing the mediation pre-litigation, both parties were able to save a lot of money in litigation costs, which was beneficial to our client.
Also, nobody knows what will happen in litigation or in a trial. By settling without litigation, the client also saves the time that would have to be used for responding to discovery, preparing and having his or her deposition taken, appearing at a Defense Medical Examination, etc. Our approach to resolving claims is that if we can get full value from our client without the time and expenses of litigation, we will happily do that for our client, but it must be full value. If the insurance company thinks that they will get a discount for resolving a claim before litigation, then they are mistaken.
Another benefit to our client in this case was that the case settled for approximately four times his medical bills. Some people think that there are some personal injury rules, such as that cases settle for three times the medical bills. There are no rules like that. Every case is fact specific and the factors that go into a car accident settlement include who was at fault, how bad the impact was, what injuries were caused by the accident, any loss of earnings, loss of enjoyment of life activities, pain, suffering, etc. There are no hard rules about multiplying the medical bills to get a settlement amount. Every case is different and depends on its own factors. In this case, our client required a knee surgery from this accident. When an injury victim requires surgery, that typically increases the value of the claim. However, it is very important that the treating doctors document how the accident caused the particular need for surgery.
You can see some of our other verdicts and settlements here on our website and if you need assistance with a personal injury or wrongful death in California, contact us right away for a free consultation.