Most people do their best to stay safe on the road. Even if they sometimes bend the traffic rules a bit, they avoid obviously reckless behavior and expect others to do the same. The traffic rules that exist help to limit the likelihood of a collision, but the possibility of a crash never fully goes away.
Drivers in Arizona carry insurance to protect themselves from liability if they get into a crash and they are the ones at fault for the wreck. Those who don’t cause the crash can cover their losses by using the other motorist’s insurance in many cases. Yet, despite state laws that require motorists to carry insurance, serious car crashes often lead to personal injury lawsuits. Why is litigation such a common response to the worst Arizona collisions?
Insurance can’t always cover everything
The primary reason that people pursue lawsuits after a crash is that they have expenses that they need to cover. They may have turned to insurance and found that they still have to absorb thousands in costs on their own. There are some people who do not maintain the insurance that Arizona state law requires. If those drivers cause crashes, a lawsuit might be the only way to obtain compensation. Even when the driver at fault for the wreck does have insurance, the coverage they have may not be enough.
Whether someone suffered a permanent injury or died because of a crash, the bare-bones coverage required by law would fall far short of the total cost of someone’s medical care and lost wages. No matter how many losses someone incurs, insurance won’t pay anything beyond the applicable policy limits. While insurance coverage is subject to policy limits that apply regardless of how severe the situation is, there are fewer limits restricting the compensation that people can pursue in a personal injury lawsuit.
Verifiable economic and non-economic losses can contribute to the total value of someone’s personal injury lawsuit. What they end up pursuing in civil court could be multiple times more than the policy limits of the driver who caused the wreck. Realizing that crash-related litigation is often a reflection of poor coverage rather than frivolous demands might help people overcome their aversion to filing a lawsuit after a major collision occurs.