Austin Personal Injury Lawyer Blog | Gonzales & Gonzales

Car accidents can affect all parts of your body, but some areas of your body are more vulnerable than others. Among the most common, back injuries caused by serious car accidents, can destroy people's lives in many ways. Few people are prepared to handle such sudden and drastic changes that require immediate and long-term attention.

What would you do if you were hospitalized because of an auto accident? What steps would you take to adapt your life if you sustained a serious back injury in a car accident? And if that back injury resulted in paralysis, full or partial, would you know what to do?

You may be facing months of hospitalization or rehabilitation, exorbitant medical bills, and loss of income. Initial expenses are likely to drain whatever financial resources you have on hand.

The Texas auto accident attorneys at Gonzales & Gonzales go the extra mile and provide assistance with many common needs auto accident victims face. We can help by making sure you receive the compensation to which you are entitled following your accident.

When you need a personal injury attorney who truly knows how to take care of you from accident to settlement, please contact Gonzales & Gonzales and discover how well-prepared we are to serve clients in the Austin and Round Rock, Texas area.

Austin, Texas has earned the title of being one of the fittest cities. That means there are more pedestrians and cyclists on the streets of Austin. If you are driving a car in Austin, you must be more aware of the many people walking, jogging and cycling in and around town. Unfortunately, the number of pedestrians and cyclists being injured and even killed in Austin continues to grow.

If you or a loved one has been injured as a pedestrian or a cyclist there are several things you should be aware of:

(1) if you are hit by a car or truck and you are a pedestrian or cyclist you may be able to recover under your own auto insurance as well as under the insurance of the driver who caused the accident;
(2) you may be entitled to personal injury protection or medical payment coverage;
(3) you need to make sure you are receiving the proper medical treatment.

Unfortunately, when a pedestrian or cyclist is hit by a car, the injuries to the pedestrian or cyclist are often severe and sometimes catastophic. At Gonzales & Gonzales, we work with a number of medical professionals to ensure that you have the proper specialist or medical doctor examining and treating you. Brain injuries can often result in these types of accidents. Making sure that the injured person receives proper evaluation, including evaluation by a neurologist, is imperative. Experienced accident lawyers can send letters of protection or even letters of guarantee to make sure that you receive the proper treatment without having to pay out of your own pocket. Insurance companies will often not pay until all treatment has been completed. Therefore, the injured person often fails to seek proper treatment as medical treatment can become too expensive. Don't let the cost of medical treatment keep you from getting the type of medical treatment you require and deserve. Contact accident attorneys who truly understand what you are going through.

Contact us for a free consultation. At Gonzales & Gonzales, no case is too big or too small.

Did you know that land owners have a duty to warn you of dangerous conditions that they know exist on their premises or property?

When a land owner or building owner allows a dangerous condition to exist; and, when the dangerous condition causes injury to a person, the injured person should be aware that they have a right to be compesated for their injuries. In Austin, many personal injury attorney's have stopped taking on cases involving slip and falls or premise liability injuries. At Gonzales and Gonzales, we believe that the land owner or building owner who failed to clean, dispose of, or improve a dangerous condition should be required to pay for damages which arise because of their negligence. If you have been injured on someone else's property due to:

(1) poor lighting;
(2) hole on the walking surface;
(3) crack in the sidewalk;
(4) wet surface;
(5) poor security;
(6) slippery stoop or stairs; etc.

contact Gonzales & Gonzales at (512) 474-2001. We are experienced attorney and are not afraid of helping injured people understand and pursue their rights in a premise liability matter. We have personally helped a woman who was injured after her landlord came on to her the property she was renting to install a sprinkler system. After installing the system, the landlord, failed to fill in a large hole on the side of the house and the tenant fell into the hole, fracturing her heal bone. The landlord initially refused to provide his insurance information and the carrier initially denied the claim. Ater, the tenant got Gonzales & Gonzales involved the carrier ended up paying policy limits. We hope that we can use our experience to serve your needs. Call us today.

What happens if the person who caused the accident doesn't have insurance or doesn't have enough insurance?

Many times insurance carriers will send a letter explaining that the vehicle which caused the accident was not insured (i.e. there is no coverage). This can occur because the owner failed to pay their premiums or because the driver is an excluded driver. Whatever the reason, you need the assistance of experienced attorneys who know how to help you. You should ask the carrier to send you a notice of cancellation. At Gonzales and Gonzales we can help you seek compensation from your own insurance if we find that we are dealing with a party who has no insurance. That is, we can file an uninsured motorist claim.

Additionally, we want to make sure you receive full compensation. If the driver who caused the auto accident has only minimal limits (i.e. $20,000.00 per person), we can help you recover the other driver's full policy limits and then file an underinsured motorist claim on your behalf. If you settle with the other party prior to providing the proper notice to your own insurance company, you may end up letting your own insurance off the hook. Believe it or not, if you want to settle for policy limits against the party which caused the accident, you may need to first get a permission to settle letter from your own insurance company.

Underinsured motorist claims and uninsured motorist claims are often just referred to as "UIM" or "UM" claims in the insurance industry. We understand these types of claims and are here to help. For a free consultation, please call Gonzales & Gonzales at 512-474-2001. We want to help you maximize your case.

Commercial truck drivers are among the safest, most careful drivers on the road, usually. But, even the most conscientious drivers can succumb to pressures that create truck driver fatigue.

Competition in the shipping business is stiff, and, too often, trucking companies offer more than lower prices to gain clients. Sometimes they offer faster delivery times to get the edge over the competition. This puts drivers at risk of causing an accident due to truck driver fatigue.

Despite the fact that laws require drivers to log their time spent driving and resting, and that much of this is electronically recorded, drivers often run into delays that pressure them to drive longer than the law allows, to take shorter resting periods or to use their rest periods for other activities, leaving them tired when they, again, get behind the wheel. Truck driver fatigue is a major cause of accidents, injuries and loss of life.

If you have been involved in an accident and suspect truck driver fatigue was a contributing factor, please contact the experienced accident and personal injury attorneys at Gonzales & Gonzales, serving clients in the Austin and Round Rock, Texas area.

In today's world of electronic gadgets, it's easy to become a distracted driver and cause a motor vehicle accident due to your lack of attention to the road and your surroundings. A little pre-planning can help you can avoid many of these distractions, and, hopefully, an accident.

Plan Ahead

• If you are going on a long trip, plan to stop every one to two hours in a safe place to rest, stretch, and refresh yourself. Make sure you drink plenty of water. Dehydration is a common cause of drowsiness.
• You can eliminate many accident causing distractions by making any phone calls you know you will have to make before you start out on a trip.
• Plan your route and program your GPS and other devices before you leave. Don’t try to read maps or any literature while driving.
• Plan safe places to stop to make calls that must be made later.
• Turn your phone off while driving so that you’re not tempted to answer any incoming calls.
• Organize your vehicle up to minimize distractions. Keep maps and other items that you'll need on your trip organized and easily accessible.

If you are playing CDs, invest in an auto-changer that holds several so that you are not distracted by changing CDs. Alternatively, if someone else is in the car with you, ask them to change CDs, read maps, program your GPS, take or make calls or attend to any distractions for you.

If you live in Austin, Texas and are in need of an auto accident or personal injury attorney, please contact Gonzales & Gonzales for a no-cost, confidential consultation to discuss the details of your case.

Fender-benders come in all types–side swipes, head-ons, rear-enders. But one of the more common, and potentially more serious auto accidents occurs when a driver makes a left hand turn. Left turn accidents occur when a driver crossing the oncoming traffic in the other lane collides with one or more of those vehicles.

Unfortunately, the left turn driver will be presumed to be at fault in the absence of evidence showing another cause. Some of the evidence at the scene of an accident includes whether the left turn driver gave a proper turning signal alerting other drivers of his intent, whether he had sufficient distance to make a safe left turn, whether he had control of his vehicle, or was there a turn light to protect him.

In Texas if the left turn driver can show that another involved vehicle was at least 50% responsible for the accident, he may be able to recover all or part of his losses and damages.

The skilled investigative and legal team at Gonzales & Gonzales works diligently to uncover the facts of your accident and to protect and win your claim for damages.

If you were involved in a left turn accident and need experienced accident representation in the Austin area, please contact the experienced Texas auto accident attorneys at Gonzales & Gonzales for a no cost evaluation of your case.