Lavis Law Firm-Personal Injury & Accident Attorney

If you are injured in a car accident and your car is damaged because of another driver’s negligence, you should be compensated for related bodily injury and property damage. Bodily injury damages may include money for physical injury suffered; pain and suffering, both physical and mental; permanent disability, if any; loss of earnings, if any, both past and future; medical expenses, both past and future. If the negligent driver was intoxicated, you may be entitled to punitive damages. Property damage includes money to repair the vehicle or the fair market value of the vehicle if the car is a total loss. Sometime contents of the car might be damaged as well including, car seats, cell phones etc and you should be compensated for that as well.

If you don’t’ return to work, your weekly workers compensation check might be suspended and you may lose the position offered. Generally speaking, weekly workers compensation wage loss payments are owed if your wage loss is due to your work injury. It is hard to explain how your wage loss is due to your job injury if you are offered a job with the same employer, paying the same amount of money if the offered position is within the work restrictions assigned by your doctor. The best course of action would be to show up and do the job offered. If you cannot perform the job, call your doctor immediately to get another off work slip.

The Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act (”LHWCA”) is a federal workers compensation system designed to compensate injured maritime employees like shipfitters and stevedores who are not considered to be Jones Act Seamen. The Defense Base Act (“DBA”) is an extension of the LHWCA and provides workers' compensation protection to civilian employees working outside the United States on US military bases or under a contract with the U.S. government for public works or for national defense.

If your treating physician has taken you off work due to a work injury falling under the Louisiana Workers Compensation Act, your weekly workers compensation payment is calculated by multiplying 66.66% times your Average Weekly Wage (“AWW”). If you are capable of returning to work, but not capable of earning 90% of your pre-injury AWW, the payment is calculated by first subtracting your weekly wage earning capacity or actual wages from your AWW and then multiplying the difference by 66.66%. AWW is defined by Louisiana statute and is generally based upon how your wages are paid, hour, monthly, annually etc.

Premises liability law deals with a landowner, lessee or custodial liability for conditions or activity on the premises. Two examples of premises liability are slip and fall and trip and fall accidents.

An insurance company owes its insured a duty of good faith and fair dealing. An insurer acts in bad faith is when it violates its duty of good faith and fair dealing by not making a timely payment on a claim, misrepresenting pertinent facts or insurance policy provisions relating to coverage or not adjusting a claim in a timely manner. Acts of bad faith are delineated in Louisiana insurance statutes. See, LA. R.S. 22:1892 and 22:1973(b)(5)

A life insurance policy that provides for an additional payment (sometimes double the face value of the policy) if the insured dies due to an accident as defined in the policy.

The term “accidental death” is defined in the accidental death insurance policy. Generally speaking, if the insured's death is not a natural death or a suicide, the court must then infer that the death is accidental. Once an accidental death is proven, the burden shifts to the insurance company to show by a preponderance of the evidence that the insurance company is nevertheless not liable by reason of a special defense or an exclusionary clause of the accidental death insurance policy.

One Way Auto Insurance is called One Way Insurance because your “On Way” policy does not cover damages to your car. One way insurance is better known as automobile liability insurance. Under Louisiana law, you must carry liability coverage on any automobile you own. Liability insurance covers bodily injury or property damage caused by you, your family members, and others driving your vehicle with your permission. You and your family members are also covered when driving another person’s automobile including rental private passenger vehicles. Company cars and other non-owned cars regularly available to you are not covered.