Once you sustain personal injuries, it would be best to file a personal injury claim and seek monetary reparations. Ordinarily, a personal accident lawyer helps you file the personal injury claim and also represents you during trial.
Additionally, a lawyer guides on the right claim to make and the amount to quote when you are seeking monetary compensation.
Despite all the benefits of hiring a personal injury lawyers, most people choose to waive their right to an attorney and self-represent in court.
Although you may keep more money when the court awards you the full compensation amount, self-representation is very risky as you might lose your case on very simple grounds.
In this article, we will discuss some of the risks associated with self-representation in a personal injury claim.
Misinterpretation of the Law
Once you waive your right to legal representation, you are getting ready to dive into the deep end of the pool.
As such, you require a sufficient understanding of personal injury laws in addition to years of working experience handling personal injury cases. But what are your chances if you barely have a law degree?
The legal process involved in filing a personal injury is significant. In addition, you need to understand the right claim to make for various accidents and injuries such as in the case of medical malpractice claims for injuries caused by a medical practitioner’s negligence.
Additionally, it would help to understand the correct channel to follow and the regulations to which you must abide to for your case to maintain legal merits.
Basically, every step in the entire process of filing a personal injury claim is full of potential pitfalls, and the defendant’s attorney will exploit them to get your case dismissed.
Therefore, it is crucial to have an experienced personal injury attorney Michigan to ensure that you do not sabotage your case with an attempt to self-represent.
Undervaluing Your Claim
The main point of filing a personal injury claim is to get monetary reparations for injuries and damages you sustain from an accident or medical malpractice (not limited to the two situations). Intrinsically, it is in your best interest to properly assign value to your injuries.
Nevertheless, you risk undervaluing your injuries and damages when you represent yourself. It is particularly difficult to value your claim if have never handled a compensation claim, or did not research on previous case settlements due to the work load involved in the litigation process.
In that case, you risk losing a potentially large sum of compensation money which you would have otherwise received if you worked with a professional personal injury lawyer.
Susceptible to Make Errors
Omission or entry errors have adverse repercussions on your case, such as delays and dismissal. In fact, personal injury lawyers avoid errors like a plague.
Additionally, some errors can shift liability to you or even attract jail terms. Sadly, you may perjure yourself in court especially when the opposing council is pressing you with questions and legal jargon you probably never interacted with before.
Therefore, to avoid all these errors, leverage on personal injury lawyers that have years of training and courtroom experience.
Limited Objectivity
Self-representation is a recipe for disaster, especially when the events transpiring to your injuries are traumatizing. As such, you may lack clear judgment because you are emotionally attached to the case.
Instead of arguing your case objectively, you will make desperate arguments, opening pitfalls the defendant’s attorney can use to ‘wipe the floor’ with you.
A personal injury attorney will offer you clarity and wise legal counsel based on mere facts of the case and the direction to which the hearing is headed.
Limited Access to Legal Resources
A personal injury claim requires sufficient and compelling evidence before a judge or a jury can award any compensation.
As such, you may lack the technical knowledge required to gather evidence, depose witnesses or subpoena expert witnesses.
An experienced personal injury attorney probably has a network of private investigators, law enforcement officers, and forensic analysts who help them to gather evidence.
Additionally, a personal injury lawyer can access expert witnesses who can help build a solid case, increasing your chances of receiving monetary reparations.
Conclusion
Although it may be enticing to save a few dollars on legal fees by self-representing, the risks of such a move outweigh the reward. Thus, hiring an experienced personal injury lawyers goes a long way in increasing your chances of receiving compensation for your injuries.
