A personal injury claim aims at providing financial relief to the victims of negligence.
In complex cases, a proper investigation is done to determine the cause of action and thereby assign the blame for the accident. The at-fault party’s insurance company must pay for the victim’s damages. But the compensation may take a hit when comparative negligence rules apply.
This is why you need one of the best law firms to handle your personal injury claim. All complications can be easily overcome with the assistance of an experienced lawyer.
When the plaintiff decides to pursue a wrongful death lawsuit, the defendant can claim comparative negligence. If the victim is discovered to be partially at fault, there will be a reduction in the amount of damages and plaintiff’s recovery.
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What is Comparative Intelligence?
Comparative intelligence is a legal mechanism that is aimed at determining how fault is apportioned in an accident when multiple parties share faults.
When an accident occurs, the respective contributions to the accident of all parties involved determine their fault and negligence. As a result, damages for accidents are recovered based on degrees of determined or assigned negligence.
A Comparative Negligence Scenario
Let us consider an auto accident scenario involving two drivers (Driver A and Driver B).
Drivers A and B are approaching the same intersection. Driver A intends to turn left and does so without any reasonable care. On the other hand, Driver B is driving at a high speed. When Driver B notices Driver A, he is unable to stop on time and so collides with Driver A. This leads to severe injury and damage to property.
In this scenario, both parties were observed to breach their duty of care, and so they will have to share the blame. Driver B is clearly the primary cause of the accident for overspeeding. However, Driver A should have exercised more care when and before making his left turn. This also contributed to the accident.
Driver A files a claim against Driver B and claims damages for, say, medical expenses. The suit is presented before a jury that carries out an investigation and finds out that driver B’s negligence also contributed to the accident by 20%. This leaves Driver B with only 80% negligence.
If the jury agrees to the worth of the damages presented by Driver A, he can only recover 80% of whatever damages are claimed. This is the basic principle of comparative negligence. There are other modified forms of this concept, depending on the jurisdiction in which they occur.
Types of Comparative Negligence
Generally, comparative negligence rules are categorized based on the degree of negligence assigned to parties involved in an accident. Depending on different jurisdictions, there are three types of comparative negligence rules. They are
● Pure Comparative negligence
● Modified comparative negligence
● Contributory negligence
Pure Comparative negligence
This type of comparative negligence allows victims of an accident to collect damages even if they’re mostly at fault. However, compensation is awarded based on the victim’s degree or percentage of fault.
Modified comparative negligence
This rule only allows victims of an accident access to compensation if their degree of fault is within a certain threshold. There are two distinct categories of this fault model: the 50% Rule and the 51% Rule.
● The 50% Rule does not allow a party that is 50% or more responsible for an accident to recover compensation. When they are found anywhere below this threshold, compensation is awarded according to their degree of fault.
● The 51% Rule does not allow a party that is 51% or more responsible for an accident access to compensation. If found anywhere below this 51% threshold, the victim is eligible to receive compensation, but according to their degree of fault.
Contributory negligence
Unlike the typical comparative rule, contributory negligence prevents the plaintiff or victim from receiving any compensation for damages if they have a share in the fault. No matter how little the degree of their negligence is, they will lose the right to recover any damages.
