If your car is not on fire, or if you are no longer in immediate danger, while in your car, do not move.  Your body is in shock as a result of the crash.  Your pulse is up, your blood pressure is up, your thoughts are not carefully ordered.  Your body’s response to the impact may by, and probably is, masked by the shock condition.  This means you may not feel the pain that indicates injury.  To be on the safe side, stay where you are until emergency personnel arrive.  If you have a cell phone, and are able to make a call, call 911 immediately.  It is likely that good Samaritans will arrive at your vehicle before the emergency people do.  If so, tell them where you are injured, and allow them to make calls for you.  Do not allow them to move you unless there is an immediate danger if you stay where you are. 

If you are able, completely cooperate with the police.  This includes giving a statement to them about what happened.  It is also a good idea to ask the police officer if he/she has the names of all the witnesses.  Sometimes the witnesses approach the officer, but their names and addresses are not recorded by the officer.  Make sure you keep your insurance information in your glove compartment for easy reference .  If there is any question of injury, seek medical treatment immediately.  

If you require legal assistance, Young and Young is ready to assist you.  We represent seriously injured Hoosiers all over the State of Indiana out of our Indianapolis offices.

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We all know that motorcycles are on the road.  We all know that a quick glance, without stopping is not enough to always see what is plainly there.  A motorcycle has a bright headlight, it is plainly visible.  Slow down, take a better look.  Care for the life and welfare of the other guy.  He/She probably has a family that loves and needs them.  Even if they do not, they are entitled to live their life.  Be careful.

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Your best defense is buying three different kinds of insurance in addition to your liability coverage.  The first two are very similar and are called Uninsured Motorist coverage (UM) and then Underinsured motorist coverage (UIM). If the drunk driver, or any driver, has no insurance your claim will be against your own UM coverage.  If the other driver has state minimum coverage then your claim will be against your own UIM coverage because the State minimum coverage was not enough to cover all your losses.  I recommend you purchase as high a limit of UM/UIM coverage as you can afford.  After all, it may be the only insurance available if you have a serious personal injury or even a wrongful death.

The other type of insurance is medical payments insurance.  This insurance will pay your medical bills, up to the limit of coverage you purchase, for injuries sustained while a passenger in your car. It is a kind of health insurance. It comes in very handy when you have a high deductible on your regular health policy.  Med Pay Insurance is very affordable.  I recommend that you buy as much as you can, but at a minimum you should buy an amount equal to your deductable on your health insurance.  That way you will have little or nothing out of pocket if you are hurt in a crash or accident.

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 A collision in Noblesville, over the holiday weekend, is more evidence of the dangers associated with distracting a driver. Nicholas Killinger was northbound on Ind. 37, just south of 206^th street, when he was distracted by a passenger.  Killinger’s pickup truck crossed the center line on collided head-on with a Kia Spectra driven by Daniel Stone.  Daniel Stone, and his passenger, Lisa Stone both suffered wrongful death as a result of Mr. Killinger being distracted. Mr. Killinger’s passengers were seriously injured in the accident. 

Anything that distracts a driver away from their duty of operating a car safely must be avoided. Other examples of common distractions include texting while driving, driving while talking on the cell phone, reading anything such as a map or a paper, the list goes on and on.  If you must do anything that will take your attention away from the road, please pull of the road to a safe location and take care of your business.  After you have safely concluded your work, drive again.  Parents, please have this discussion with your children.  Children, please have this conversation with your parents and your friends. We all want to get where we are going safely.  Avoiding distracted driving will help us all.

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 To my surprise, he just kept moving left.  The car to my left hit the brakes and the merging car barely missed him, then his luck ran out.  The merging car kept on going, but in the next lane was a semi tractor-trailer.  The semi cannot slow as efficiently as a car and the merging car hit the semi on the passenger front corner.  The merging car was suddenly fully in front of the semi being pushed down the road.  The driver of the merging car could only see the grill of the semi as he looked left.  Unfortunately both the semi and the merging car were not only moving down the road, they were also merging into the left lane.  An SUV clipped either the merging cars front or the semi’s front lost control and started to roll.  The SUV landed on the wheels.  I do not know what happened to the merging car.  I pulled over, called 911 reported the collision, gave the State Police my name and telephone number.  I thought about going back to the scene, but many, many people had already stopped to help and I was on the opposite side of the highway from where they all came to a stop, so to reach the scene I would have had to cross three lanes of traffic, which oddly enough barely seemed to slow down.

 The point of this story is that we want to you to be careful when merging into another lane.  Every car has a blind spot.  To properly merge you must signal your intent and then look to make sure no one is in your blind spot.  If the merging car, in my story, had followed this simple rule, there would have been no collision and several families would have made it home safe.

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This may seem contrary to your own best interest , however if you have been injured in a auto crash, construction accident or other event that leaves you with lost wages ,disabled , impaired or with other injuries it is best to make your insurance aware as soon as possible so they can start a file(this will often preclude a later denial for failure to timely report a claim). The insurance company you should contact is not only your auto policy ,but your health insurance , disability , homeowners , workmen’s compensation and even life insurance where appropriate. The reason you should let them know is to find out if they provide any benefits(which you have already paid a premium for) that might help you as you work your way through the process of trying to get your life back to normal.I have had clients who did not want to report a case to their insurance company because they thought it would raise their rates. My response is always the same. You have already paid for this coverage. They can’t raise your rate for using coverage you have already paid for. It would be like going to the grocery and getting some steaks on sale for $3.99 per pound and at the check out counter they tell you if you take home the steaks and eat them then the next time they will charge you more. No one would go back to that store and no insurance company should ever try to pull that line on one of there insured. So if the occasion arises where you are injured in a crash or accident then be sure to list the insurance’s companies that you have (and pay premiums to ) that might apply and at least report the claim. There are times when they might not have any coverage’s that apply and others where they do at that time or at a latter time(e.g. if you later find out that the drunk driver who crashed into did not pay his premiums and is uninsured).

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 This argument ignores, however, rules of physics regarding the transfer of energy.   Simply put, the steel car, weighing several tons, may not show the effects of the collision enough to show up in pictures, because the energy from the crash travels through the rigid structure of the car without much change in the car until it gets to the soft tissues of the human being driving the car.  There the force of the energy still remaining, is often times, more than enough to injure the driver or passenger.  An example of this flow of energy, is the novelty item we have all seen where six or seven steel balls are suspended from a rod, lined up so they are in contact with each other.  When the end ball is pulled back and released, it strikes the next ball in line.  The energy does not move all of the balls though.  Rather, it travels through four or five of the balls and the last one in line is catapulted outward.  That ball then snaps back and the energy is passed back through to the first one again and so on.  This is the same transfer of energy from a striking car, traveling  through the car it has hit, and then into the soft tissues of the bodies of the occupants.

We also have seen or heard of crashes where the cars are totally smashed and obliterated but the driver walks away unharmed.  So the next time someone says there is no way a person could have been hurt in a car just because the pictures of the car don’t show any damage, remind them that because of energy management principles, the pictures may not tell the whole story.  Drive safe!

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The Indiana State Department of Toxicology is under investigation for returning questionable test results.  What’s worse is that these results may have been, in some instances intentionally altered to reach the desired result rather than the true result.  This means that some workers at the lab have been intentionally altering test results to show a positive result.  These findings are a problem for Hoosiers in many ways.  First it diminishes the confidence of citizens in or criminal justice system.  If we cannot trust the system to be fair, then the system is not working and must be altered. Second, the victims of drunk driving accidents may be victimized twice.  The first victimization is the injuries from the crash.  The second is from having to know that a person who really was drunk driving is going to have the charges dismissed because of shoddy work performance by the lab.               

 The only bright side to this mess is that Scott Newman, former Marion County Prosecutor, a man respected by his peers for his honesty is taking the lead in the investigation and is honestly assessing the damage caused by problems at the lab.  In addition, many tests were performed at subcontracted labs.  These test results do not appear to be in doubt. 

 If you, or a loved one, has been seriously injured in a drunk driving accident, and you have questions about the lab and these issues, and you are not currently represented by an attorney, please feel free to call and discuss your concerns.

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If you cannot find out the name of the truckers insurance company, you may need to contact your own insurance company.  We recommend that if you have uninsured motorist coverage, you turn in the claim on that insurance.  In this instance you will not have to pay a deductible.  If you do not have uninsured motorist insurance (If you don’t we highly recommend that you talk with your agent and purchase it.  UM coverage is not expensive and protects you against those not responsible enough to purchase coverage) then you will have to file your claim under your comprehensive coverage. If you do have comprehensive coverage you will have to pay the deductible.  If you have any questions, please contact Young and Young.

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