Any car accident is a scary ordeal, and in some cases, it may be difficult to determine who is at fault. This is especially true when multiple vehicles are involved. Chain reaction crashes are often the result of a negligent driver who started it all, though certain actions or inactions taken by others involved may result in their shared blame.
In Wisconsin, insurance follows an at-fault model, meaning that the driver who caused the accident will be responsible for the damages to the victims. However, in a multi-vehicle crash, there is a significant possibility that you as one of the victims may incur some of this fault.
It helps to understand the laws in Wisconsin regarding multi-vehicle car accidents. Read on to learn more about what these could mean for you in your recent crash.
In multi-vehicle accidents, experts investigate them as primary and secondary impacts. Primary impacts in these crashes are the initial crash that causes the other crashes to occur. Usually, a primary impact is the result of negligent or reckless driving actions.
Secondary impacts happen when cars that were involved in the first crash are further forced into other vehicles or when other motorists are trying to avoid hitting these vehicles. Naturally, secondary impacts would not occur if not for the primary impact.
It can be confusing to determine what happened in a car accident involving just two vehicles. When three or more vehicles are involved, investigations will be more complicated.
Liability must be determined to hold those responsible for the accident accountable. You may be asked by the police who arrived on the scene if you know which vehicle hit your vehicle first, if you were part of the primary or secondary impact or even both, and which one caused your injuries.
Another issue with multi-vehicle car accidents is that there will be multiple car insurance companies trying to determine who to blame for this incident. Some may claim their policyholder was not at fault while others may blame another driver involved. Since this is a possibility, you should also prepare for the likelihood that they may try to blame you for causing the primary impact in this accident.
Multi-vehicle crashes are among the most complicated, which makes it a smart idea to protect your legal rights. Instead of being blamed for something you didn’t do, consult a Wisconsin multi-vehicle crash attorney.
Wisconsin uses a modified comparative negligence law that allows for assigning a percentage of fault in these types of car accidents. This may mean that each driver is provided with some blame, and the percentage assigned would reduce their compensation by that amount.
Additionally, you should know that you must be 50% or less at fault for your role in the multi-vehicle crash. If you are assigned a percentage higher than this amount, you may be barred from collecting compensation.
Now here’s the tricky part - insurance companies know this and often look for ways to assign more fault than necessary. By doing so, they can effectively deny your claim. However, a car accident attorney will be wise to these tactics and can build a strong case based on evidence that supports your case.
When you are involved in a multi-vehicle collision in Wisconsin, it is important to analyze every metric to fairly and appropriately determine who is at fault. Since there are so many factors that contribute to these types of crashes, every part of it must be analyzed.
In the aftermath of a multi-vehicle pileup, victims are encouraged to take photos and videos as well as talk to witnesses. However, they should only take this action if they are capable. When serious injuries are the result of such crashes, the most important thing to do is get urgent medical care.
If you were severely injured in your car accident, your attorney will have investigators look more deeply into what happened. They will analyze the police report, photos and videos taken by authorities, traffic camera footage, skid marks on the road, and testimony from witnesses. They will also hire accident reconstructionists to help determine how the crash started.
Did you break any traffic laws when you were involved in the accident? This factor will also be reviewed. If another driver in the multi-vehicle crash was issued a citation or arrested for drunk driving, this will be noted by the police in their crash report and may help pinpoint the fault.
The investigations will go even deeper to examine whether or not one of the other drivers was distracted and texting, eating, or performing other tasks that took their attention away from driving. Any careless or reckless behavior that is found will likely result in their fault in this accident.
As mentioned, experts will likely be called in to help unravel the mystery in complicated cases of multi-vehicle crashes. They will prove through the latest technology how the accident happened and be able to assign fault either to just one driver or to multiple drivers involved in the crash.
There may be other factors at play that will require investigations to either determine as a part of the cause or rule out. The condition of the road at the time, weather, and the potential for mechanical failures cannot be overlooked. Examining all the factors involved will provide a factual account of what happened and allow blame to be assigned to those responsible.
After you have been involved in a multi-vehicle collision, it’s important that you get legal representation. You may have serious injuries and you will have extensive expenses that could put you deeper into debt. Protecting your rights with legal counsel ensures that you will not be unfairly blamed for an accident you didn’t cause, and can help you recover the maximum compensation deserved.
