Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney Sebastian Gibson provides these 2010 tips to you to assist you, and to show you why it will be to your advantage to retain a Palm Desert Wrongful Death Lawyer in the event you have lost a loved one in a Wrongful Death accident in the Palm Desert area or anywhere in Southern California.
While some of these tips may be too late for you if your family’s Wrongful Death accident in Palm Desert was some hours or days ago, as a Wrongful Death Attorney in Palm Desert, we provide these tips in the hope they may yet be useful for you in connection with your family’s Palm Desert Wrongful Death and for any future accidents you or your family may have.
First, take a look around and determine if you or anyone else is hurt. If so, taking steps to prevent further injury or loss of blood are the most important thing you can do until help arrives. The worst thing you can do is get angry or start a fight. As your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney, it is much easier to obtain the compensation you deserve if we don’t also have to deal with claims that your accident turned into a brawl or was the result of road rage.
Second, make sure any other drivers and passengers in your Palm Desert Wrongful Death accident are safe from being injured further. If you are in the middle of traffic and can safely get out of the way, walk to where it is safe. If you aren’t dizzy and can help others without risk to yourselves or risking injury to them, help them. If your vehicle is a hazard to others and you have warning devices such as triangles or flares you can safely place in the road, put them out on the road to warn other drivers and get away from any danger. Let the Palm Desert police or other emergency personnel investigate the scene with all the vehicles in place and let them move the vehicles at a later point.
Third, if no one else already has, call the local police or the California Highway Patrol or 911. Accident reports are extremely helpful if they will prepare one. Let the Palm Desert police know you are injured immediately. Answer all the questions honestly but if you are dazed or confused, let them know you need medical attention and answer only what you are certain about. Statements you make will later appear in the police report and if you make a mistake, it is unlikely a later statement will be believed over your initial statements as your best recollection is usually immediately after an accident.
Fourth, obtain the other driver’s information including their name, address, driver’s license, make and model of their vehicle, license plate number, insurance company and policy number. If there are witnesses, obtain their information as well. If the other driver makes any admissions of fault, write them down as well. The police will likely separate you once they arrive so try to obtain this information while you can. Although we can obtain a copy of the police report as your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorneys, it often takes a week to 10 days or longer for the report to be completed.
Fifth, if you have a camera or a cell phone with a camera built in, take some photos of the vehicles, the scene of the accident and the others involved. If you failed to do so immediately after the accident, take some now of the scene of the accident in Palm Desert or wherever it occurred and of your vehicle, if one was involved. As your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorneys, we can obtain additional photographs or police photographs, if any, later.
Sixth, if you are hurt, obtain medical treatment. Don’t decline the ambulance or hospital examination to save your insurance company money or to be stoic if you have coverage. Take your valuables out of your vehicle and get checked out at the hospital. If you are not hurt, don’t get treatment you don’t need. However, remember, after an accident, you may feel a rush of adrenaline that causes your symptoms to go unnoticed by you until a few hours later. If you have a health plan that requires you to obtain permission before going anywhere for medical treatment, call them first to find out where you can go for treatment that is covered by them. As a Wrongful Death Attorney in Palm Desert and other areas of California, nothing is more important to you and your case than obtaining proper medical treatment promptly.
Seventh, call a good Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney as soon as you have had your initial medical treatment so your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Lawyer can gather important evidence and prevent the other party’s insurance company from taking advantage of you by obtaining things such as a recorded statement from you. A good Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney can save you from making mistakes and can shoulder much of the hassle that results from an accident. Your Palm Desert Lawyer can also advise you in connection with how to obtain vehicle repairs, a car rental, medical treatment on a lien, etc. An experienced Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney can almost always obtain higher settlements, obtain reductions of medical bills and insurance liens that have to be repaid. Most Attorneys will also advance the costs of obtaining police reports, and medical records that are crucial to a good settlement.
Eighth, report the Palm Desert accident to your insurance company. However, before you do so, it is good advice to retain a Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney first as even your own insurance company will want to take a recorded statement. If the other driver did not have insurance, remember, your own insurance company will be your adversary. You will also need to report the accident to the Department of Motor Vehicles and your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Lawyer can provide you with the form.
Ninth, do not agree to settle your claim privately with the person at fault for the accident in Palm Desert or with their insurance company when they want to offer you a paltry amount before your injuries have been checked out or treated. Neither of these scenarios work to your advantage. Private individuals rarely want to pay you for anything more than your car repairs. And if you agree to not involve the police, the other driver may change his or her story and blame you later when the police are no longer willing to investigate the accident. Insurance companies offering a quick settlement are usually taking advantage of you at a time when you can least afford it.
Tenth, don’t pay a traffic ticket without attempting to fight it if you weren’t at fault and don’t accept a small payment from the other driver for your vehicle repairs without knowing that the amount will in fact cover the entire cost of repairs. As your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney, we can usually persuade the insurance company to pay for additional repairs beyond the initial estimate if the body shop finds additional damage from your accident once the repairs have begun.
If you’ve lost a loved one a Palm Desert Wrongful Death accident, auto, bicycle, car, big rig truck, motorcycle, or pedestrian accident or a dog bite in Palm Desert, or anywhere in Southern California, we have the resources and knowledge to be your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Attorney and your Palm Desert Wrongful Death Lawyer and will see that you are properly represented to obtain the compensation you deserve for your accident and the loss of your loved one.
Palm Desert California 2009 Restaurant Lawyer News - The Risks of Serving Alcohol to Minors and the California Alcohol Beverage Control Board.
Every hotel, restaurant, bar and nightclub in California is warned repeatedly how dangerous it is to their reputation, income, liability and their Alcohol Beverage and Control License if they serve alcohol to a minor. The knowledge of this danger has recently been enforced in the minds of hotel and restaurant owners in the Coachella Valley.
In August 2008 two restaurants in the Coachella Valley, one in Rancho Mirage and another in La Quinta had their liquor licenses suspended for 30 days after serving alcohol to minors. Both restaurants chose to shut down and use the time for remodeling. When a restaurant or drinking establishment can’t sell alcohol, there is a big hit to the establishment’s ability to make a profit.
But the lesson learned in the Coachella Valley holds true also for owners of restaurants, hotels, nightclubs and bars throughout California.
It’s bad enough if the Alcohol and Beverage Control Board catches a restaurant serving alcohol to a minor, but what is unusual in these two cases is how the restaurants were caught and sad what happened to the minors.
In the case of the Rancho Mirage restaurant, the minor died in a car accident. In the La Quinta incident, the minor jumped to his death from a pickup truck.
It gets even worse. In the Rancho Mirage restaurant case, the minor was riding in a car with a friend who had also been drinking but who was not a minor. Both died when their vehicle hit a curb and rolled over. Both had been drinking at the restaurant.
In the La Quinta restaurant incident, the 19 year-old minor had dinner with his girlfriend, with the twenty-two year-old male driver of the vehicle, the driver’s wife and their two year-old child.
At some point, it was reported, the driver of the pickup truck had an altercation with his wife. The minor then threatened to jump from the vehicle if the driver continued to argue. The minor kept his promise while the truck was driving between 30 to 40 miles per hour.
The La Quinta restaurant was also hit with a two year probation, which if violated, could lead to the revocation of their liquor license.
This litany of events does not even consider what number of civil lawsuits may be filed as a result of these two incidents, the grief of the families of those who died, or the losses the two restaurants can expect to incur as a result of the inattention of their employees.
When a restaurant or hotel serves an adult, in California there is generally no responsibility if that adult is later involved in a drunk driving accident. There are no actions taken by the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control. Not so when the restaurant or hotel serves alcohol to an intoxicated minor. Then all bets are off.
California Personal Injury 
