I am in China right now on a adoption trip. We’ve spent 10 days in Beijing. Yesterday we went to a “silk market.” This is a place where there are literally hundreds of vendors selling everything from trinkets to fake Armani. If you express any interest in something they quote you a price. The first price they quote you is totally unreasonable and ridiculous.

The key is to be prepared to walk away. It was actually fun to see how many “dollars per foot” you could get as a discount as you walked away–sometimes ending up at 10% of the original asking price.

This reminds me of our recent experience in several cases with USAA car insurance company. (Your case may be different and our past results are not indicative of your future…but there is a teaching point here!)

In several cases USAA made absolutely ridiculous offers in clear cut liability cases. The cause of each accident was clear. The medical care was unchallenged yet USAA made initial offers that would have, in one case, not even paid the medical bills!

We walked away and filed suit. In one case there was a significant increase in the offer–just by filing suit– and in another the offer doubled–just by filing suit.

This tells me that it may be time, once again, to just ignore the pre-suit settlement process. USAA and other car insurance companies acting this way are just wasting my time in the pre-suit process.

Of course, this all works if they know that we will go to trial. If your lawyer is one they know won’t go to trial your results, as they say, “may differ.”

A new trial has been ordered in Arlington in a case in which a man was injured by a police vehicle. The police officer driving the vehicle and her employer were excused from the case due to sovereign immunity and the plaintiff’s only recourse was to seek a judgment against his UIM carrier, State Farm.

In this case State Farm plays two separate roles. First, as UIM carrier State Farm defended the case in court as if it were the police officer’s insurer. And second, State Farm serves as a provider of benefits to the plaintiff through its MedPay division. Many auto insurance policies include some amount of medical payments (MedPay) that can be paid out to cover medical bills following an accident. Sometimes the insurance company will have its MedPay unit do investigations to find out what injuries and care are related to the accident and which are not.

In the case at-hand the MedPay division of State Farm was conducting an investigation into the plaintiff’s injuries and hired a psychologist to assess the extent and causation of the claimed brain injury. The psychologist completed a review of the plaintiff’s file, confirming the existence of an injury and that it was caused by the accident, for State Farm but only on the final day of the trial. By the time the plaintiff had been provided with the report, which the plaintiff’s counsel labeled as a “game changer,” it was too late.

A judge ruled that this was enough for a new trial because the evidence should have been provided to plaintiff’s counsel as soon as State Farm received it. State Farm argued that there liability department did not know that the MedPay division had such a report until after the trial and therefore was not in violation of procedure. Plaintiff’s counsel then argued that State Farm is one legal entity and that one department possessing a document is the same as all departments.

The new trial was granted pending further motions.

Plaintiff’s counsel is attorney Joseph Cammarata.

The Town of Warrenton had recently completed its new visitor center in 2007 when Harold Spencer fell into a 19th-century cistern featured as part of the entrance plaza. Mr. Spencer was at the center for a meeting of a charitable foundation and upon leaving that night tripped over a 16-inch high brick edging surrounding the cistern. Mr. Spencer fell several feet and suffered a cervical fracture resulting in unconsciousness. He never awoke and three days later he passed away.

A wrongful death suit was filed by Mrs. Spencer and her attorney, Roman Lifson. In discovery it was revealed that the new building did not have a certificate of occupancy at the time of Mr. Spencer’s death. As it turns out, the building had failed four pre-opening inspections due to the fact that there was no guardrail surrounding the cistern. Despite these failures, the town decided to open the center without the certificate.

The defense argued that Spencer was contributorily negligent because the cistern presented an “open and obvious” condition and because he knew it was there. The risk at trial was great enough for the defense that they agreed to a $1.26 million settlement via mediation. Perhaps most concerning to them were the notes of the inspector singling out the lack of a guardrail and the extensive e-mail communications between town officials regarding the necessity of ones installation.

Mr. Spencer was 73 at the time of his death in 2007 and was survived by his wife and five adult children.

Met with a very nice lady and her husband yesterday. Rear ended almost two years ago. Herniated discs in her neck and over $100,000 in medical expenses for surgery. The defendant was insured by one of the major insurance carriers.

Here’s the drill they used:

Provide no information TO the claimant, only ask for information FROM the claimant;

Change adjusters at least four times during the claim…each time an adjuster comes on board ask for all of the information all over again;

Keep asking for more information but PROVIDE no information;

Then, with two weeks to go before the statute of limitations expires, tell the claimant “if we don’t have everything we (keep) asking for in two weeks we are closing your file because your statute of limitations will expire.”

That’s right. These nice folks who got hit didn’t know that there is a two year limit for filing a lawsuit in Virginia. If you don’t file your claim in court in two years it is “forever barred” as they say.

Did the insurance adjuster do anything wrong? NO! The insurance adjuster working on your claim owes you NO duty. They work for the insurance company and are bound to act in the best interests of their company and their insured.

So, no, the adjuster is under no duty to tell you about things like the statute of limitations. They don’t give you legal advice.

That’s why I write the Virginia  Accident book that I do, record the CD’s and DVD’s and created the most extensive legal information website in Virginia.

Just so you’d know (and won’t have to rely on the insurance adjuster.)

Why do car accident victims seek out lawyers? In some cases its because they figure out that they have been outright lied to by the insurance adjuster.

We had a gentleman hire us yesterday. English is his second language. He was involved in an accident where the other driver ran a red light before crashing into our client’s car. Our client was taken to the hospital and is still under treatment several weeks later.

Here’s the game the adjuster plays. (This is one of the big car insurance companies.) She gets on the phone with the guy and tells him she is “sending a check for his medical bills.” She tells him to go ahead and cash the check and if there is money left over after paying the bills he gets “to keep it for himself.” She knows he was in the ER for hours and got x-rays and CT scans. She has to know that his bill will be more than $2,500.

Our guy says “great, that sounds reasonable.” So the check comes. But it comes with a “full and final release” and the language on the back of the check warns that signing the check settles the case and closes the claim. Completely opposite of the lie she told him.

He’s smart enough to show the documents to a co-worker (our guy works on the custodial staff of a local high school). The co-worker has seen our advertising (“you may not need an attorney but get our free book before you talk to the adjuster”) and sends him our way for advice. He hires us.

He may have been able to settle this case himself had the adjuster not gotten greedy. Had she not been trying to achieve her goal of settlling XX cases in a month she may have kept the lawyers out of the case.

Look…not all adjuster are like this and not all insurance companies act this way but enough do to make anyone who settles might be thinking about settling a case on their own very wary.

You DON’T always need an attorney but you probably should get educated about your claim before settling, and even before talking to the highly trained, fast talking adjusters.

Actual phone call one of our lawyers had today with Allstate. Clear liability, $4,500 in medical bills.

Allstate’s offer? $4894,

The moved to $6,100 by the end of the call and then uttered these words:

“I work for Allstate, My Hands are Tied”

It’s getting to the point where the only way to deal with some insurance companies is to file suit. We are wasting our time with demand letters, cooperation pre-suit, etc.

Who’s running up the cost of car insurance now. We recently made a demand on USAA to settle a pretty simple case. The defendant, a guy who probably shouldn’t have been driving at all, turned in front of our client, causing an accident.

Clear liability…no defense.

Our client has not medical insurance and incurred about $7,500 of bills to be evaluated and treated for the injuries he sustained. He has got doctors and hospitals sending him dunning notices. He made about $10.00 an hour and supports his family on that.

USAA offered $8.000 on a take it or leave it basis.

OK, we don’t take it. We will immediately file suit and the defendant will be served and he’ll spend time in deposition and trial and in the end of the day USAA will spend more money defending and then paying the case than they could have paid today. And then they’ll blame the lawyers when they increase the rate they charge to customers.

See you in court USAA

Update: the adjuster called back: “we aren’t going to give you our best offer.”

Response:   “OK, thanks for calling. Merry Christmas”

According to published reports, in 2008, an Abingdon woman was outside in an apartment complex common area one evening while walking her dog and talking on her cell phone when she fell in a hole. The hole was formed by a corrugated pipe and was partially covered by grass. The hole was discovered to be part of a drainage system installed back in 1993 and was unbeknownst to the defendant and the maintenance man responsible for the complex.

The most serious injury sustained was a compound fracture below the plaintiff’s right knee which lead to $52,250.46 in medical bills. On top of this the plaintiff was unable to care for herself while recovering and spent 13 weeks in her sister’s basement while recovering from the surgery repairing the breaks. For the first month of this stay the plaintiff was unable to use the bathroom without assistance and was unable to shower at all. The plaintiff’s recovery was a success and she was able to return to work with only a slight limp and no vocational impairment.

On top of her hardships the plaintiff missed four months of work resulting in lost wages of $8,492.12. After mediation by Magistrate Judge Michael Urbanski, the apartment complex agreed to settle the matter for the amount of $240,000.

When asked about the outcome, Virginia personal injury attorney Ben Glass said “Slip and fall cases in Virginia are very difficult. The key point is whether or not the hazard was open and obvious and whether or not it was man-made. In this case it turned out that the hole was man-made and that it was hidden enough to not be obvious.  While the press release makes the case seem simple I assure you it was very complex and it’s important to have someone with experience on your side, such as a veteran personal injury attorney, to guide you through the issues of premises liability.”

Each case is different and you have to draw your own conclusions about whether or not you need to hire an attorney for your claim.  However, we will keep recounting for you the stories of dealing with various insurance adjusters.

This accident occurred on December 21, 2006 in Virginia near Dulles Airport. The defendant had just left a Washington Redskins game and was very drunk. The vehicle our clients were riding in was hit from behind and rolled and destroyed.

The defendant hired a good drunk driving attorney and avoid going to jail on a technicality. The judge in traffic court actually said “not guilty does not mean innocent-the next time you do this I hope you go off a bridge by yourself.” (We have the transcript.)

The clients hired an attorney and made a claim against Allstate. At the time the case was referred to Ben Glass the male driver had been offered $20,500 to settle his claim and his wife had been offered $12,000. We thought these offers were ridiculously low and at a northern Virginia jury would see otherwise.

We filed suit and shortly before trial the case is settled as Allstate finally offered fair value for the cases. The case in which Allstate offered $20,500 settled for $85,000. The case in which all state had offered $12,000 settled for $55,000.

Again, each case is different and must be judged on its own merits. Here, the defendant lied in deposition about his prior drunk driving experience and conviction. You can draw your own conclusions as to whether hiring an attorney to prosecute your claim against Ball State is necessary.

This case was handled by attorneys David Marks, Brian Glass and Manuel Leiva, who are of counsel to BenGlassLaw.

According to published reports, a 55-year old Virginia woman has settled her case against a trucking company for $2.5 million. The names of the parties have been withheld as part of the settlement agreement.

The plaintiff was a passenger in a vehicle that was struck by a tractor-trailer owned by the defendant trucking company. The crash caused massive damage to the plaintiff’s vehicle and caused multiple injuries to the driver and other passengers. She claimed physical and psychological trauma, including a closed head injury, and multiple orthopedic injuries which disabled her from working.

The brain injury resulted in dizziness, loss of balance, post-traumatic seizures, and cognitive deficiencies including exacerbation of her ADD. Her severe orthopedic injuries included spinal and knee injuries.