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Well I'm in a weird situation. I rotated in the ER I went to. I actually knew all the staff. They treated me more like a buddy they hadn't seen in a long time than a patient. This isn't so much of a legal question but I'm asking it here anyway. My neck is like 95% better and getting better everyday. The scrapes and bruises are just that. I even went to the gym for the last 2 days and was ok. Is it really ethical to sue for personal injury when I don't feel particularly injured? I looked up the definition and legally speaking personal injury does include destruction of property and I definitely qualify from that perspective. However, the lawyer seemed to want to go the more medical injury route since that gets bigger settlements typically and since the damage on my car would support a medical claim. This all this just sits wrong with me. I feel like if I'm suing for personal injury, particularly if we're perusing the medical angle, I shouldn't be able to go through my normal routine to the degree I can. So do I just not get the system or is my lawyer suggesting a path that may not be completely ethical?
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Nov 1, 2014 19:45
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Have you been at 100% of where you were the second before you accident from the second after your accident? Answer: Of course not, you even say so here. Because you were injured. You were not able to do things you would have been able to do because you were in an emergency room and/or recuperating. You are entitled to seek compensation for that. This is what your attorney is trying to help you do. There is no ethical problem here unless someone is lying about the extent of injuries.
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Nov 1, 2014 20:53
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No, but what damages do you hope to recover if it doesn't really seem like an injury to you?
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Nov 1, 2014 21:02
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Well for loss of property. I know this is what insurance is for but I know the insurance payout is not going to cover the entirety of a new car and I do feel entitled to the full value of one considering how she was driving. Again this is not a legal argument just my justice league sense of the world. She broke my car, she should have to pay for a new car. I guess it's ok. I'm just gonna be very truthful with everyone involved that I've been recovering quickly. I'm sure this has a lot to do with my age and that I've always been pretty active.
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Nov 1, 2014 21:35
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Southern Vulcan posted:Well for loss of property. I know this is what insurance is for but I know the insurance payout is not going to cover the entirety of a new car and I do feel entitled to the full value of one considering how she was driving. Again this is not a legal argument just my justice league sense of the world. She broke my car, she should have to pay for a new car. No dude. She broke your car. She should have to replace your car or the value thereof. Not a new car - the amount it would cost to buy an identical shitbox.
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Nov 2, 2014 01:05
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Southern Vulcan posted:Well for loss of property. I know this is what insurance is for but I know the insurance payout is not going to cover the entirety of a new car and I do feel entitled to the full value of one considering how she was driving. Again this is not a legal argument just my justice league sense of the world. She broke my car, she should have to pay for a new car. I was a young idealist once myself. Good luck with your plan.
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Nov 2, 2014 03:38
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Just a couple of months ago I was charged for an ambulance ride that I refused to take. I did end up taking the ambulance ride but was physically forced into it all the while stating that I refuse any medical treatment. After I got the bill I had called up the county ambulance service and they told me to send in a letter to dispute the charge. I got back a probably form letter saying they don't give a poo poo along with another copy of the bill. Just within the past couple days I got another letter saying they would refer it to collections if I didn't pay. The call to the ambulance was made my a cop after I called them to report an assault. This is in North carolina. specifically wake county. Just sort of looking for what sort of viable options exist.
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Nov 3, 2014 02:55
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Option 1) Pay for the service you received. Option 2)
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Nov 3, 2014 04:34
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That would be a good reply if I wasnt handcuffed and forcibly put into an ambulance. Thanks A lot
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Nov 3, 2014 06:20
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Lets break down the response "pay for the services you received." The suggestion being that you should pay the bill because you received services. What this response doesn't address is whether you 'should' pay for them, as you were refusing them at the time you received them. There are a handful of reasons the poster may have ignored this issue, despite it being the crux of your question. First, he may have missed it; unlikely, though, as his job is to identify potential issues from a set of facts. The second possibility is that he thinks whether you demanded or refused the services, you are likely still liable for their payment. He may believe that, like an insane person who is committed to treatment against their will, you would likewise be responsible for footing the bill for medical treatment the State forced upon you when a person in a position of authority determined that your treatment was necessary. He also may not know enough about the facts of your case, your particular state laws, or the general procedure for Wake County emergency services. Another possibility is that the poster believes that the hassle and expense, ultimate damage to your credit, and other unforeseeable consequences of not paying likely outweigh the amount of the actual bill. He knows, like you do, that simply telling the ambulance company "you can't do this!" will have no effect on your net outcome, and will wind up with you sent to collections. Finally, its possible the poster feels that if they gave you enough information, you may cherry-pick the segments you feel best fit your desired outcomes, and make bad decisions based on those going forward. You might even say, he's flippant because he cares - he doesn't want you making life altering decisions based on internet advice. In fairness, he did forget to include the second viable option: 2) hire an attorney. hth
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Nov 3, 2014 07:08
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www.amazon.com posted:That would be a good reply if I wasnt handcuffed and forcibly put into an ambulance. Thanks A lot It's the only reply. edit cause you are the best blarzgh fyi
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Nov 3, 2014 07:10
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www.amazon.com posted:Just sort of looking for what sort of viable options exist. Were you hit in the head from the assault? Not a poo poo-faced question. If you lacked the legal capacity to refuse medical care (such as having received a blow to the head or being intoxicated), then the ambulance will take you against your will. In that circumstance, you owe the bill even though you refused. If you lacked capacity to refuse, then the bill is yours. If you had capacity to refuse, then I'd argue the bill is the police officer's. The police are likely immune from liability in making that mistake, but it might get the ambulance bill off your back. I'd bet a nickel that you will end up owing the bill. Among your options is to tell them to stuff it, work out a slow payment arrangement, cut deal with collections (like 50% in a lump sum to cancel it out, might be a credit hit), try to get restitution from the assailant (may not be possible), etc.
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Nov 3, 2014 07:18
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Maybe the crux of the issue is weather i had the ability to refuse. but how bad off do you have to be to be unable to refuse. having full memory of the incident I was never incapacitated. It's not like I was incoherent during any of the time. A friend was with me also saying that I was fine. The cop showed up like 30 minutes after i called them. obviously I was not in imminent harm after all of that time waiting. My thing is that the law clearly states that a competent person has every right to refuse treatment. when and how did they prove that I was not competent to refuse. I had a person, (my mom) on the way to pick me up. And my friend saying I was fine. and the dude that hit me wasn't all that severe. it more so just pissed me off because he was a junkie and I didn't feel like dealing with that poo poo hanging out with my non junkie friend. I do appreciate your insight from an outside party to put things in perspective. even if it wasn't what I was hoping to hear. After I got to he hospital, A bill which I am also disputing, I left right after I got there on refusing medical treatment. I was forcibly admitted because of the ambulance ride but never received any treatment. for anything. at this point I only make about 4-500 bucks a month since my hours have been cut for the winter time. work at a bike shop. I am still covered on my moms insurance but the co pays still work out to about 800 for both the ER and whambulance use. www.amazon.com fucked around with this message at 09:02 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 08:50
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Just out of curiosity, you say you were in cuffs, so I assume you were placed in the ambulance in that condition. When were the cuffs removed? Do you have any understanding of why you were cuffed? Were you inebriated in any way? What were the other people in your story doing during the 30 minutes before the cops showed up? baquerd fucked around with this message at 09:10 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 09:00
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The cop placed my hands behind me back to search me before placing me in the ambulance. My friend was waiting with me in front of his place in order to meet the cop with me. the cop would no talk to him and told him to go inside. they took cuffs off just prior to strapping me down on the foldable bed. but for while I was unsure on whether the cop was saying they were holding me or whether I was free to go. while waiting for the ambulance to come I remember the cop telling me I was NOT free to get up and leave
www.amazon.com fucked around with this message at 09:06 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 09:04
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Between saying "hello" to the police to this sequence of events, did anything interesting happen? What questions were you asked before you were sent ambulance-wise?
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Nov 3, 2014 09:10
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On this page the sa denizens of the developed world feel all warm and smug about their universal healthcare.
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Nov 3, 2014 09:22
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Nothing out of the ordinary happened as far as I can say. I explained what happened. IE retard tried to hit me from behind then I went and hid/hungout in my friends room until the dude left. Told them I had 3-4 drinks that night. The cop asked me what where probably standard questions to see if I knew what was going on. non of which I can say i didn't know the answer to. IE. what is the date and other commonly known things. The cop was a real rear end in a top hat to my friend. he tried to say what was going on and whatnot but she told him to get away and to just go back inside. she got this real stick up her rear end in the way of you just feel off to me, like I'm convinced you are slightly sluring words or basically anything she could think of. even if I was drunk off my rear end it wouldn't be a medical necessity for anything to happen. except I wasn't close to being really drunk or anything. I just can't think of why this would happen. www.amazon.com fucked around with this message at 09:29 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 09:24
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Possibly drunk with a head injury. Blarzgh's advice stands: pay, institute a payment plan, lawyer, or refuse to pay and let it hit your credit (which is going away because the bureaus aren't counting medical debts). Since you're an adult who earns less than a thousand dollars a month and are presumably judgment proof, you can refuse to pay and probably nothing will happen to you but some annoying phone calls, maybe a small debt suit.
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Nov 3, 2014 12:32
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Hot Dog Day #91 posted:Since you're an adult who earns less than a thousand dollars a month and are presumably judgment proof, you can refuse to pay and probably nothing will happen to you but some annoying phone calls, maybe a small debt suit. Garnishment sucks, though. On another note: anybody know anything about restraining order procedure in Louisiana? Curious as to whether someone (I know you assholes won't believe this, but not me) served with a TRO and a notice to show cause is risking a bench warrant if they skip the hearing, or just very likely to end up with a permanent restraining order as a result (i.e., more of a default judgment scenario).
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Nov 3, 2014 21:54
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ulmont posted:Garnishment sucks, though. Yup. So does not getting paid for your work (not that the lowly paramedics didn't get paid, but still).
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Nov 3, 2014 22:10
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Hot Dog Day #91 posted:Yup. So does not getting paid for your work (not that the lowly paramedics didn't get paid, but still). Oh, sure. I was just thinking there might be additional consequences (like only getting 75% of your paycheck) for ignoring the matter.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:13
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Hot Dog Day #91 posted:Possibly drunk with a head injury. Blarzgh's advice stands: pay, institute a payment plan, lawyer, or refuse to pay and let it hit your credit (which is going away because the bureaus aren't counting medical debts). I agree. Possibly drunk + possible head trauma = you didn't have the legal right to refuse medical treatment = they can bill you. The only option I'd add to the list is suing whoever hit you, which may not be possible.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:14
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ulmont posted:Garnishment sucks, though. Notice to Show Cause = Notice to Show the gently caress Up or go to jail.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:16
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"...That the Defendant be cited to appear and show cause as to why such relief should not be granted..."
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Nov 3, 2014 23:18
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But seriously though, your friend needs a lawyer bad.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:19
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I concur with Blarzgh, Esq. In addition to spending the night in the pokey for the show cause, just having a TRO floating around out there is bad news. It basically means they'll end up arrested at the front of a Walmart without knowing why, spending the night in the pokey.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:21
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blarzgh posted:But seriously though, your friend needs a lawyer bad. woozle wuzzle posted:In addition to spending the night in the pokey for the show cause, just having a TRO floating around out there is bad news. It basically means they'll end up arrested at the front of a Walmart without knowing why, spending the night in the pokey.
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Nov 3, 2014 23:28
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Well, yeah. But they won't know exactly why in that moment. They're just in line at Walmart and the duty cop cuffs them. "Woah, Officer, you had no warrant to search my trunk, I know my rights!" "It was just a TRO violation, but thanks for the tip"
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Nov 3, 2014 23:45
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I'm worried my dad's attorney in his divorce may be taking advantage of him. The local legal aid service found the attorney for him since he's an ~older individual~ and/or disabled (not sure which), and apparently told him not to piss the lawyer off as he was the only lawyer he'd get. The lawyer was supposed to be pro bono, which was good for my dad because he can't work and has basically no income. Without saying anything too specific, the lawyer didn't do anything about an important issue he was facing in the case for two months, and took a week to respond to attempts to contact him about said issue. Now he's telling me that this lawyer has said he's going to start charging him money, and that he doesn't understand what the lawyer is doing any more. Is there anything I can do to help him that won't mess things up? Can I talk to the legal aid people? Have I screwed up making this post? I don't know. atomicthumbs fucked around with this message at 05:37 on Nov 5, 2014 |
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Nov 5, 2014 05:33
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atomicthumbs posted:he's an ~older individual~ and/or disabled (not sure which) You're not sure if he's just old or actually disabled? Do you know if he has, say, dementia? Things can get very fun if he doesn't have capacity to make decisions for himself.
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Nov 5, 2014 06:06
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atomicthumbs posted:I'm worried my dad's attorney in his divorce may be taking advantage of him. With total empathy for old crazy dudes, and no empathy for a weirdo divorce attorney that takes pro bono from legal aid then blinks... I think you got the situation backwards. While this may be the land of the free, it ain't the land of free legal assistance. His attorney basically agreed to donate thousands of dollars to charity, and your dad bothered the poo poo out of him and now the party's over. You said your dad was facing an "important issue" for two months. Important to who? From a neutral point of view, do you think your dad or the attorney has a better grasp of how to handle said important issue? I'd betcha fifty bucks that the attorney was busy, comes up for air and sees 50 escalating messages from pops, and says "gently caress this, he can pay me or I'm done". I don't think the attorney is taking advantage of anything. I think they want to get paid for their labor, and in their rare charity cases they don't want to put up with any second-guessing. Your dad is not going to understand what the attorney is doing. I see three options: 1. Pay this attorney 2. Pay another attorney 3. BEG for forgiveness, say he will never ask another question again and not speak unless spoken to, and PLEASE PLEASE DEAR GOD I WILL MOW YER LAWN if you take the case back pro bono. In order for option 3 to be on the table, your dad needs to buy food for the secretary he's been pissing off.
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Nov 5, 2014 06:27
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atomicthumbs posted:I'm worried my dad's attorney in his divorce may be taking advantage of him. The local legal aid service found the attorney for him since he's an ~older individual~ and/or disabled (not sure which), and apparently told him not to piss the lawyer off as he was the only lawyer he'd get. The lawyer was supposed to be pro bono, which was good for my dad because he can't work and has basically no income. Spend money to get a real attorney for him. Christ. What's there to fight about if there's no money at issue? Here's a real issue: mom won't surrender the kid when it's dad's time with him and you have a jury trial in the loving case in four weeks to decide who gets custody. Here's a non-issue: mom uses the toll tag registered to dad. Dad gets a bill. Oh no. I mean it. You want a divorce attorney's attention, get 500 bucks in cash. Bring it to him. He'll perk up. If you can't tell, woozle and I are divorce lawyers. G-Mawwwwwww fucked around with this message at 06:41 on Nov 5, 2014 |
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Nov 5, 2014 06:28
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baquerd posted:You're not sure if he's just old or actually disabled? Do you know if he has, say, dementia? Things can get very fun if he doesn't have capacity to make decisions for himself. I'm not sure the legal aid place has services for disabled people, but they do have services for the elderly. He is of sound mind, but he's disabled physically. woozle wuzzle posted:While this may be the land of the free, it ain't the land of free legal assistance. His attorney basically agreed to donate thousands of dollars to charity, and your dad bothered the poo poo out of him and now the party's over. You said your dad was facing an "important issue" for two months. Important to who? From a neutral point of view, do you think your dad or the attorney has a better grasp of how to handle said important issue? I'd betcha fifty bucks that the attorney was busy, comes up for air and sees 50 escalating messages from pops, and says "gently caress this, he can pay me or I'm done". I don't think the attorney is taking advantage of anything. I think they want to get paid for their labor, and in their rare charity cases they don't want to put up with any second-guessing. The issue there was that my mother started withholding spousal support pending my dad signing some sort of document for her, so he had no money to pay for groceries, bills, or anything, and the lawyer didn't get back to him until after two months had gone by on whether or not he should sign it. As far as I know, my dad wasn't second-guessing him, the guy just wasn't giving him any advice at all (or telling him he was working on it) as to whether he should do it or not. Note, though, that I only have his side of the story, not my mother's. CaptainScraps posted:Spend money to get a real attorney for him. I don't have the money to do that and neither does he 
atomicthumbs fucked around with this message at 06:45 on Nov 5, 2014 |
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Nov 5, 2014 06:42
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Probably shouldn't have pissed off his free lawyer then.
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Nov 5, 2014 06:45
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Javid posted:Probably shouldn't have pissed off his free lawyer then. I don't think that was the issue with the lawyer starting to charge, as he only sent one email regarding the issue - he said something to me about the lawyer saying he was gonna have to start charging now that things are getting litigious. Again, I haven't read any of his emails, so this is what I can remember of what he told me. I'm not trying to say "help my dad's lawyer is charging him money oh my god how do i make him stop" I'm trying to make sure this sequence of events seems edit: woozle wuzzle posted:I'd betcha fifty bucks that the attorney was busy, comes up for air and sees 50 escalating messages from pops, and says "gently caress this, he can pay me or I'm done". something I forgot: apparently while this was going on the lawyer went on two separate vacations. which I can certainly understand with that kind of workload, but nobody told my dad in advance (or at all). atomicthumbs fucked around with this message at 06:52 on Nov 5, 2014 |
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Nov 5, 2014 06:46
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It's quite possible that your dad wasn't a pain. So giving him the benefit of the doubt, the attorney is a regular dude who agreed to take on a pro bono case provided that it was totally easy. The moment it became not easy he wants out. The reason he'd take on a free case is so that he specifically doesn't have to notify the client about vacations. Your dad's not getting taken advantage of. His needs simply are not free.
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Nov 5, 2014 06:55
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woozle wuzzle posted:It's quite possible that your dad wasn't a pain. So giving him the benefit of the doubt, the attorney is a regular dude who agreed to take on a pro bono case provided that it was totally easy. The moment it became not easy he wants out. The reason he'd take on a free case is so that he specifically doesn't have to notify the client about vacations. that makes sense. thank you! edit: so in a case like this, if my dad had no money instead of very little, would he basically be getting the most minimal possible level of defense if my mom decided to play hardball?
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Nov 5, 2014 06:55
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If he has no money for a lawyer, then he just represents himself. There's no minimal standard of protection. He has to decide whether to sign stuff for himself, he speaks for himself, etc. Opposing counsel will take advantage of him. My blunt advice without knowing anything about anything: let's assume the paper is trying to totally screw him... what does he have to lose by signing it? Like if he can't pay for an attorney and he's going hungry due to no spousal support, then what in the world could it take from him that he hasn't already lost? Like even if the paper was to screw him over on spousal support, that still might beat the zero he's currently getting.
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Nov 5, 2014 07:07
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woozle wuzzle posted:If he has no money for a lawyer, then he just represents himself. There's no minimal standard of protection. He has to decide whether to sign stuff for himself, he speaks for himself, etc. Opposing counsel will take advantage of him. Yeah, that's what I thought. Apparently my mom was expecting him to represent himself and her and her attorney were somewhat surprised. (if you can't tell, I'm not entirely happy with her course of actions, but it's not my place to confront her about it, at least at this point) I'll let him know about your advice in case a situation crops up like that in the future. Thank you very much. addendum: this solidifies my opinion that we should do things scandinavian style and give everyone a well-paid public defender for everything
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Nov 5, 2014 07:29
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