Los Angeles Injury Attorney, Personal Injury Lawyer in Southern California

Passenger Van Accidents Result in Injuries and Fatalities.

Many schools, churches, and shuttle services use various models of 15 passenger vans made by different automakers. Many accidents involving fatalities and serious injuries to children being transported in these types of vans have been documented in the past. Many of these accidents involved rollovers, which raised public concerns and eventually resulted in a safety study of 15 passenger vans by the National Transportation Safety Board. This study named, Evaluation of the Rollover Propensity of 15-passenger Vans. Safety Report was published in 2002 with recommendations to the automakers.

The study found that 15-passenger van accidents are involved in a higher percentage of rollover accidents than are passenger cars and smaller vans. Higher occupancy of these types of vehicles, combined with higher percentage of rollover accidents, result in serious injuries and fatalities to a disproportionately high number of people every year.

Especially in more rural areas in the San Bernardino County, like Colton, Fontana, Victorville, Bloomington, Beaumont, Rialto or even in parts of Los Angeles County, like Ontario, Covina, Monrovia, Pomona, and Sierra Madre, or even parts of Orange County like Santa Ana, Anaheim, Buena Park, Irvine, Garden Grove or many parts of Southern California, these types of vans are used more often.

Although, some of the recommendations have been adopted by the automakers, there are still many of these vehicles on the roads in California and through out the United States of America.

If you or a family member, have been injured in a rollover accident or any other serious injury accident, you should contact an experienced auto accident lawyer for a case evaluation and consultation. We have represented hundreds of injured clients in our many years of practice who have been injured in car accidents and can help you with your injury claim.

You may contact us anytime for a free consultation and injury case evaluation.

A Car Crashes Through The Window of a Restaurant in Los Angeles.

A car lost control and went through the window of a popular Asian restaurant in downtown Los Angeles injuring several people. Serious accidents such as this, happen too often, resulting in death and injuries to bystanders and motorists alike. Most of us remember the deadly accident in Santa Monica some years ago, where a driver lost control and plowed through Farmers Market, killing and seriously injuring several people.

An experienced personal injury attorney, can assist an injured individual in determining who are the responsible parties in such complex circumstances. For example, in the case of the accident in Santa Monica, the attorneys for the injured shoppers, successfully argued that the City of Santa Monica was in part liable for the injuries to their clients for its failure to install proper barriers that would protect them.

Similar arguments maybe appropriate in the case involving a car crashing through a restaurant in Los Angeles, injuring its patrons. If such an accident was foreseeable and the restaurant failed to take reasonable steps to prevent it, then the restaurant and the at-fault driver can be held liable at the same time.

If you or a loved one is hurt, injured or killed in such an accident, please call the LAW OFFICES OF JUBIN J. SHARIFI, APLC for a FREE CONSULTATION and CASE EVALUATION immediately.

We have handled similar cases for injured pedestrians, motorcyclists and drivers of automobiles in Los Angeles, Santa Monica, San Bernardino, Fontana, Rialto, Colton, Covina, Glendale, Long Beach, Culver City, Westwood, Beverly Hills, Downey, Ontario, Pomona, Chino, Orange County, Riverside, Santa Ana, Newport Beach and throughout Southern California.

MEMBERS OF A CALIFORNIA FAMILY DIE IN A HORRIFIC CAR ACCIDENT

In an accident that could be the result of a faulty gas pedal, four members a California family are all killed. A 911  call made by the driver seconds before the car accident, suggests that a faulty gas pedal may have made it impossible to stop the car, causing it to go through an intersection, crashing and killing all occupants.

In a statement issued by Toyota, the company announced that it is ordering all its dealers to inspect all cars for mismatched floor mats. This, after a mat was suspected of snagging a gas pedal on a runaway car, ending with a fiery crash in San Diego.

If you or a loved one are involved in an automobile accident, involving any vehicle manufactured by Toyota, Lexus, or any other vehicle and suspect that a manufacturing defect caused it, please contact us immediately for a free consultation and case evaluation.

Can I Sue an Automaker For Injuries Resulting From a Defect in My Car?

Sometimes, a defect in your vehicle can cause an accident and result in injuries to you, your passengers or others. Examples of such defects are a tire blowout, brake failure, design defects resulting in roll-over accidents or other mechanical failure.

In some instances, the defects do not cause an accident, but worsen your injuries. Common examples of such instances are, defective seatbelts, airbags that do not deploy, headrests that do not support your head and neck or vehicles that ignite in auto collisions that are otherwise non-injury causing.

An experienced auto accident lawyer, can assist you in detecting such defects and pursuing the automobile maker for injuries caused by defective vehicles.

Lawsuits against carmakers are costly and difficult. If you have been involved in such an accident as a driver, passenger, or even a pedestrian, you should contact an experienced car accident attorney for a FREE CONSULTATION.

At the LAW OFFICES OF JUBIN J. SHARIFI, APLC, we are available to advise any injury accident victim, anytime, anywhere!

Assumption of Risk – How Does It Affect My Injury Claim?

A recent conversation with a client, gave me the idea to write a blog about what assumption of risk means in the context of an auto accident case, slip and fall case or any serious injury claim.

Defense attorneys and insurance companies sometimes raise the defense of assumption of risk in some injury cases. If raised successfully, it can deprive the injured person of any recovery in the case. What assumption of risk means is that although defendant injured an individual, the injured person was aware of the risk that caused him or her the injury and either expressly or impliedly assumed the risk.

The following example will help us better explain what this concept means to individual claims. Some years ago, when we were representing a severely injured passenger in an auto accident case, the insurance adjuster attempted to raise this defense by arguing that since the passenger knew the driver was drunk and allowed himself to be driven home by a drunk driver, the passenger can not ask for compensation for his injuries. In that case, we successfully defeated the insurance companies defense, by establishing that the passenger was unaware of the driver’s intoxication and therefore, he could not in fact assumed any risks relating to the driver’s drunkenness.

Other types of injury cases where assumption of risk is raised as a defense, are slip and fall cases where some signage warns customers of a grocery store for example, of “Wet Floors”. Yet, an individual still decides to walk through the area and slips and falls. The insurance company can be expected to argue that when an individual is warned of a dangerous condition, such as wet floors, and decides to take the risk of walking through it and ends up with serious injuries, he or she has assumed the risk and is not entitled to any recovery.

Although, on its face this argument may make sense, an experience injury lawyer, can examine the facts further and determine if the defendant was negligent in improperly placing the warning signs, being in violation of building and safety codes, which may have been the real cause of the injuries and other relevant arguments to defeat this defense.

Upon suffering any serious injuries such as head trauma, fractures, whiplash, back injuries, nerve damage, burn injuries, sprains or strains call an experienced injury lawyer for a FREE CONSULTATION and CASE EVALUATION.

At the Law Offices of Jubin J. Sharifi, APLC, we have dealt with and have stood up to many of common insurance company tactics through out the years and continue to represent injury victims in Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Kern and San Diego Counties.