Car Crash Lawyers

[00:00:07.07] The most important thing to do after a car accident actually falls into two areas. [00:00:11.14] There's one that's at the scene of the accident. [00:00:14.10] Number one, you need to call the police. [00:00:17.07] Even if they choose not to respond or come to the scene, [00:00:20.12] the fact that you've called the police creates a record [00:00:23.15] that the incident actually occurred. [00:00:26.08] The other thing you need to do, obviously, I think people know this, [00:00:28.19] is to get information from the other person involved [00:00:31.14] in the accident. [00:00:33.11] Insurance information, driver's license, contact information [00:00:36.22] so that you have that to use later on down the road. [00:00:40.04] The other thing is to take photos at the scene. [00:00:42.19] Take photos of the scene, of the vehicles involved in the accident. [00:00:46.14] Then finally, try to gather any witness information. [00:00:49.07] We often find that people don't really stop to provide [00:00:53.16] contact information when they witness an accident. [00:00:56.15] If someone does do that, we encourage people to try to gather that information. [00:01:00.19] You may even have to post things later on a neighborhood website or something [00:01:05.20] else to see if you can find people who might have witnessed the accident [00:01:09.07] but didn't, in fact, stop at the scene. [00:01:11.03] The other thing people can do after an accident are the things [00:01:14.01] that you do after leaving the scene of the accident. [00:01:16.10] Number one is to go get checked at the doctor. [00:01:19.09] We're never telling clients to go to the doctor when they're not injured. [00:01:24.03] But if you're injured or think you might be injured, [00:01:26.23] it's important to go to the doctor, go to the emergency room, [00:01:30.05] go to urgent care and get checked out. [00:01:32.15] Another thing is to follow up with your police department [00:01:36.03] if they did respond to the scene and do an open records request. [00:01:39.20] That can be a really complicate thing for clients, [00:01:42.02] but that's something that we routinely do here in the office, [00:01:44.16] is to gather all of the information that might exist with law enforcement [00:01:48.22] that's not contained in the actual crash report. [00:01:51.12] Another thing people need to do after an accident is to make sure [00:01:54.17] that they follow up with their doctor. [00:01:56.12] Sometimes people say, well, I didn't really have a personal doctor. [00:02:00.12] Find one, or go to an urgent care clinic and follow up. [00:02:04.08] You want to make sure that you're following up, number one, [00:02:06.21] to make sure that you're okay. [00:02:08.21] But also, number two, if later on down the road a jury [00:02:12.19] or an insurance adjuster is looking at your claim, [00:02:15.06] they want to see that you followed up with what the doctor told you to do.