Easton Motorcycle Accident Lawyer

Countless Americans choose motorcycles as their primary mode of transportation due to their compactness and fuel efficiency. They are also simply fun to drive around, even if just as a recreational vehicle. Unfortunately, many motorcyclists crash and are injured every day, and the injuries motorcyclists sustain in those accidents are often very serious. To make matters worse, paying for treatment of those injuries can easily reach hundreds of thousands of dollars.

If you got hurt while riding your motorcycle because someone else was negligent, you can get financial compensation for your injuries. We can assist you with filing your claim, collecting supporting facts and evidence, and fighting hard for you to get the financial compensation you need to recover from your injuries.

Contact the motorcycle accident lawyers from Rice, Murtha & Psoras today at the number (410) 694-7291 and get a free case review.

Things that Cause Motorcycle Accidents in Easton, MD

Motorcycle accidents can happen for a lot of different reasons. Determining the specific cause of your crash is very important to your case because it determines who you sue. In court, you can only get damages from parties that actually wronged you, so it is crucial that you sit down with our motorcycle accident attorneys and determine what caused your crash so that you take the correct parties to court.

Driver Negligence

When a motorist is negligent or careless, they can easily cause a crash. Drivers are negligent in one of two ways. First, they may do something that violates a traffic law, like speeding, driving drunk, or ignoring traffic signage. Second, if a driver acts in a way no reasonable driver would in the situation they found themselves in, they can also be found negligent in court. Juries determine whether someone acted reasonably or unreasonably, so our attorneys will convince the jury that the driver who injured you was not reasonable.

Some drivers in specialized positions have special obligations in addition to being a reasonable driver. For example, truckers can only drive for certain lengths of time pursuant to FMCSA rules. So, if a trucker hits you and they were driving longer than they were supposed to, you can hold them liable in court.

Vehicle Problems

Sometimes accidents are caused by problems with your motorcycle or another vehicle. If an issue with your motorcycle or another vehicle caused your accident, you can sue vehicle designers or manufacturers for defective products.

Vehicles are “defective” when there is something wrong with them that will make them dangerous to use in their intended function. For example, motorcycles with faulty brakes that will not stop the vehicle in time will be considered defective. Defects can arise during the design and manufacturing process of a motorcycle, or they can come up when the bike is being worked on in a shop.

Road Conditions

Bad road conditions like potholes, defective guardrails, and strewn-about debris can lead to motorcycle crashes. When accidents happen because of bad road conditions, you often will be filing a case against Maryland government entities. There are some different rules for doing this, so you should bring it up with our attorneys early on in the process.

Damages from Easton, MD Motorcycle Accident Claims

The goal of any personal injury case is to get the court to make the defendant give you damages. This is how the legal system tries to “turn back the clock” on a plaintiff’s injuries and return them to where they were before they got hurt. Of course, this is often not literally possible due to the extent of a plaintiff’s injuries. Therefore, damages almost always take the form of financial payouts.

There are two large categories of damages: compensatory damages and punitive damages. Compensatory damages are meant to “make you whole” again. Things that will support claims for compensatory damages will include medical bills, lost wages, and property damage. You can use evidence like bills, receipts, and other evidence of expenses to support your claims for these damages.

You can also get compensatory damages for less tangible things like pain, mental anguish, or emotional distress. These things will not have a predetermined dollar amount, so you will need to work with our attorneys to convince the court of their value.

Punitive damages are different from compensatory damages in that they are not meant to make you whole. Instead of making you whole, they punish defendants. Courts only award punitive damages when defendants have acted particularly badly. You must prove that the defendant acted with “actual malice,” which is more than mere negligence; the defendant needs to have set out to hurt you or have done something so careless and stupid that it goes above and beyond mere negligence. Additionally, you must ask for punitive damages in the initial filing of your case. Therefore, it is best to bring up the prospect of punitive damages early on in the legal process so our attorneys can work on getting you them.

Motorcycle Accident Stereotypes in Easton, MD

Many people have the incorrect impression that motorcyclists are careless risk-takers who do not care about their own safety. We know that this is very far from the truth and that most motorcyclists are responsible and take safety very seriously. Unfortunately, this unfair risk-taking stereotype may eek its way into persuasive arguments raised by defense counsel during legal proceedings. They may try to make it sound like you took unnecessary risks to try and sway the jury. However, our lawyers know all the tricks, so we can make sure that you are presented fairly in court and will fight against any mischaracterizations.

Talk to Our Easton, MD Motorcycle Accident Attorneys Today

Rice, Murtha & Psoras’s motorcycle accident attorneys can help you out when you call us at (410) 694-7291.