By How do you go about winning a personal injury claim? First of all, you have to prove that another person is at fault for your injury. Next, you have to prove that you are injured and what your injuries are. Following is a description of some of the evidences that you must gather in order to prove your injury and win your personal injury case.
Incident Report
Whether you are injured in a car accident or slip and fall in a store, generally there is someone that will write up an incident report on your personal injury. You must get a copy of that report.
With car accidents, you will need to contact the police agency that investigated your accident. You may have received some papers at the scene of the accident. However, those papers are probably not the accident (incident) report. The report that you need a copy of is generally written after the accident investigation and is not given to you unless you ask for it.
With a slip and fall in a store, generally the manager will write up an incident report. Get a copy of that report.
Photographs
Regardless of where you are injured, get pictures of the scene. If you are injured in a car accident, take pictures of the car from all angles. Take pictures of the accident scene and pictures of the road or area leading up to the scene of the accident. If you are injured in a slip and fall, take pictures of the place where you fell.
In addition to pictures of the scene, you need to take pictures of your personal injuries. If you have bruises, take pictures which show the bruises. If you have a broken arm, take pictures of your arm in a cast. If your injuries take time to heal, take pictures along the way. For example, if you broke your foot, take pictures of your foot in a cast. Take pictures each week. Take pictures of you walking on crutches. When your foot heals enough to have a walking boot instead of a cast, take pictures of your foot in the walking boot.
Take lots of pictures. Be sure to write on the back of each photograph the date, time, and place of the picture and who took the actual picture.
Medical Reports
Get copies of all doctor, hospital, and therapy reports. Be sure that you get copies of the complete report(s). With doctor and therapy reports, there should be a report for each visit to the doctor or therapists. With hospital reports, there should be reports from the emergency room, admissions office, nurses, lab tests, etc.
Medical Bills
You need copies of all medical bills. Basically, you should have at least one bill/statement for each report. For hospital bills, you will probably have several bills/statements.
Witness Statements
Witness statements can be tricky. But if you know of a witness, either ask the witness to write a statement as to what happened or write a statement based on what the witness says and then ask the witness to sign the statement.
