Portland Personal Injury Lawyers

The law of negligence applies to personal injury claims. When someone owes you a duty of care and they breach that duty by doing something they shouldn’t or failing to do something they should, they can be held liable to you for any injuries they caused as a result of their negligence. A duty of care can be the duty to drive safely or maintain safe premises or workplace. Injuries can include the physical costs of medical care, payment for work you had to miss or if you suffered a disability, or the pain and suffering you are forced to endure. Our job as personal injury lawyers is to prove that the other party owed you a duty, breached that duty, and caused you harm. We are skilled and experienced in doing this, having successfully represented countless accident and injury victims over many years. If you’ve been hurt by the negligence of another in Portland, Rosenbaum Law Group is one of the best law firms you can turn to for help. Call our experienced Portland personal injury lawyers for a free consultation on your claim. There’s no fee unless and until we recover compensation for you.

Damages Available in a Portland Personal Injury Case

If you’ve been harmed by the negligence of another in Oregon, you are entitled to a full measure of compensation that reflects your economic and noneconomic damages, the legal terms for money losses. Economic and noneconomic damages are together known as compensatory damages, as they are meant to compensate you for the harm inflicted on you by another’s negligence. Examples of these damages include the following:

Economic damages

Present and future medical expenses, including doctor and hospital visits, surgeries, physical therapy, medications, prostheses, or medical equipment you require
Lost wages or income if you had to miss work due to your injury, including sick leave or vacation benefits that you had to use up
Diminished earning capacity, if your injury prevents you from going back to your old job and earning the same amount, or if you are disabled from working at all because of the injury

Noneconomic damages

Noneconomic damages are meant to compensate you for your present and future pain and suffering, emotional distress, mental anguish, scarring and disfigurement, etc. In Oregon, you can recover noneconomic damages that reflect how severely you were injured, whether you suffered a permanent disability or other long-term adverse consequences or a temporary injury that resolved, the effect of the injury on your quality of life, and similar factors.

Punitive damages

In addition to compensatory damages, in certain circumstances you might be entitled to punitive damages as well. As opposed to compensating you for your harm, punitive damages are intended to punish a wrongdoer for especially bad behavior and deter future similar conduct from that party or others. To get punitive damages, you must prove by “clear and convincing evidence” that the party acted with malice or showed a reckless and outrageous indifference to a highly unreasonable risk of harm and acted with a conscious indifference to the health, safety and welfare of others. Punitive damages aren’t available in every case, and they are more difficult to obtain, but our skilled and experienced team will take the extra step to obtain a punitive damage award in appropriate cases.

Oregon’s Law on Comparative Negligence

In some situations, it isn’t always clear who is at fault in causing an accident, or if both parties might each share some portion of the blame. For example, you might have been injured in a car accident by a speeding or drunk driver who ran a red light, but you might have been looking down at your phone instead of watching the road when the crash occurred. Or you might have tripped and fallen over a cracked sidewalk in front of a store that you should have noticed and avoided. What happens when both parties are considered partially at fault?

Every state handles this question differently. Some don’t allow an injured victim to recover if they were in any way to blame for an accident, while others let a victim recover against a negligent party for that party’s portion of the blame, no matter how big or how small. Oregon’s law is “modified comparative fault.” Accident victims’ claims against a negligent party are reduced in proportion to their own share of negligence in causing the accident, so long as they are not more than 50% to blame. If they are in the majority at fault, then they cannot recover anything against the minority negligent party.

This rule in Oregon might seem fair, but it is also a powerful tool in the hands of insurance companies who will go to great lengths to convince you or a jury that your own negligence was the main reason for the accident. Our job as your personal injury attorney includes proving the other party’s negligence to the fullest extent while also defending you against claims that your own negligence was to blame. We seek justice and compensation for you to the fullest extent, and we don’t fall for insurance company tricks and tactics.

Contact Rosenbaum Law Group Today

If you have been hurt in a motor vehicle accident, workplace or construction accident, or because of a property owner’s unsafe premises, the Rosenbaum Law Group is the law firm to turn to for help obtaining a full measure of justice and compensation for the harm done to you. Call our experienced Portland personal injury lawyers today for a free consultation to discuss your claims.

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