Personal Injury in Louisiana
When you have been injured by someone else's carelessness, it is important to
take some initial steps toward making sure your injury claim can be settled fairly
and as quickly as possible:
• Write down everything you can remember about how the injury occurred, including the
names, addresses and phone numbers of potential witnesses, police officers, insurance
company representatives (or company or workers' compensation representatives if it was
a work injury)
• Talk to a Louisiana personal injury lawyer before making any statements, written or
verbal, to insurance company adjusters or representatives
• Let anyone you think may be responsible for the injury know right away that you are
intending to file a claim against them
• Take steps to protect any evidence you may need to prove your injury, such as your
totaled car, photographs of an accident or injury scene, clothing you were wearing,
damaged personal belongings, and so forth
How Do I Figure Out Who Is At Fault?
In most cases, in order to collect on an injury claim in Louisiana, you must prove
the person who caused the injury was "negligent" - which is a failure to use
reasonable care. In Louisiana, you must prove:
• The existence of a duty owed to you by the person who caused your injury
• The other person failed to carry out that duty
• You suffered damages
• The other person's failure caused you to have the injury
If you were careless, and your carelessness contributed to your injury, the amount you can
recover will be reduced in proportion to your carelessness, under Louisiana's "pure" comparative
negligence law. In "pure" comparative negligence, the award of damages to you will be reduced
in direct proportion to your percentage of fault, no matter what the ratio. This law allows a
damaged person to recover even if the person is 99% at fault, though the recovery is reduced by
the damaged person's degree of fault.
In Louisiana, if more than one person is negligent toward you, each person who has been found
negligent to you is responsible for a proportional amount of the total damages.
If you have been injured using a consumer product, the seller of the product may be responsible
under a "strict liability" legal theory. Under Louisiana law, you would need to prove that:
• The product was defective, which made it unreasonably dangerous
• You used the product the way it was supposed to be used
• The defect caused your injury
• You suffered damages
What Is My Claim Worth?
Under Louisiana law, the person who injured you is responsible for:
• Past, current and future estimated medical expenses
• Time lost from work, including time spent going to medical appointments or therapy
• Any property that was damaged, such as your vehicle
• The cost of hiring someone to do household chores when you could not do them
• Any permanent disfigurement or disability
• Your emotional distress, including anxiety, depression, and any interference with your
family relationships
• A change in your future earning ability due to the injury
• Any other costs that were a direct result of your injury
A lawyer will know what type of expert witness to hire to best prove your damages.
How Long Do I Have To File A Legal Claim?
In Louisiana, you only have one year to file a lawsuit against the person who injured you. If your
lawyer has not been able to come to an agreement with any involved insurance companies, you
will definitely want to file a lawsuit before the one-year statute of limitations runs out.