When you get into a road accident, your immediate thoughts are not to take out your phone and start taking photos, but if you are able to, documenting what happened can help you in many ways down the line. Read the points below to understand why documenting evidence matters in the aftermath of a road accident.
Insurance Claims
To get full compensation for personal injuries and vehicle damage from your insurance company, you have to prove that the car accident is what caused it. To do this, you will need to take as many photos as possible of the vehicles involved and the injuries sustained. The majority of these photos should be taken at the scene and from all different angles, especially if you are trying to prove that you are not the one at fault for the accident.
Other photos should also be taken in the days and weeks to come to show injuries to body parts of the people affected by the crash. There should also be a lot of record-keeping of all of the documents that you receive from the hospital where you were treated. This can mean medical bills, x-rays, and records of procedures that prove that the injuries occurred on the same date as the accident and were due to the accident.
With all of this information put together, you can submit a claim to your insurance company and they can start working to get you your financial compensation. As suggested by truck accident lawyers in Denver, if you have trouble with the insurance company or if you have to work with the insurance company of the person who hit you, then you should find a team of legal professionals who can help you compile your thoughts and your documents and fight for your rights. The more evidence you have to give to an insurance company, the better chance you have of proving that you deserve payment.
Legal Cases
If an accident is bad enough that the person or parties responsible have to go to court, then evidence is extremely important. If you are able to walk around and use your phone in the immediate aftermath of a road accident, then you should first call the authorities and then while you wait for them you should start documenting what happened. If your thoughts are jumbled, try recording a voice memo so that at least you have a fresh version of the events that just took place.
Any bit of evidence will help to build a case against a presumably guilty party. If you were the person driving or you were a passenger and you witnessed the events leading up to the crash, then you are qualified to be an expert witness in the case. Although it is probably not the first thing you are thinking of right after a crash occurs, you will likely be questioned by a police officer once they arrive. When they ask you questions about the crash, it is important to be as detailed as possible because the more information they have, the better. After the police officer takes down your statement, you should also ask for a copy of it or jot down a few notes on your phone so that you know that the information is available if you need it.
In the days following a big crash, you may need to speak with a lawyer to figure out what your rights are in the situation. This is a good time to recount the story again while it is still fresh in your mind. You and anyone else who was in the car with you should give statements to your lawyer so that they can use them to build a case against the party responsible for the crash. These statements paired with any photos taken at the crash sight can help bring you to justice.
Accurate Memory of Events
In the hours, days, and weeks after an accident, memories of details can get fuzzy. This is why police officers often take statements right away if the witnesses are well enough to speak to them. You could tell the story of this crash several times over the next years of your life, but it may get warped or facts might get twisted as time goes by. Getting an accurate statement along with photo and video evidence of the accident site will help the memory of the event stay consistent.
Proof of Fault
If you were involved in a crash where you are one hundred percent certain that it was not your fault, then photo and video evidence is your best shot at proving it. For example, in a rear-ending type of crash, it is usually clear that the vehicle in the back rammed into the vehicle in front of it because there is a damaged rear fender in the back of the victim’s car and damage to the front of the vehicle that ran into it. Getting both close-up and far-away photos of this evidence will help you prove that you were not at fault.
The other parties involved in the crash may try to make false claims about your driving behavior to try to remove themselves from the blame, so evidence like photos and videos that clearly show another story will help you in those cases. Video evidence is especially important because you may catch sound bites of other drivers saying that they are sorry and asking if you and your co-passengers are ok. These statements could qualify as admissions of guilt in a court of law, so keep that in mind when you are considering what kind of evidence you should be gathering.
Improved Future Safety
Photo evidence of different car wrecks is used by car companies to study and analyze how their cars fare in real-life crash scenarios. If you happen to take a lot of photos and videos of your damaged car, you can send them to the maker of your car and they may use that information to improve their safety standards. This means that you can be a part of making the next generation of cars more safe for drivers and passengers.
Although it is not your job to be the investigator of your own traumatic event, collecting some degree of evidence can go a long way in proving your innocence to both insurance companies and lawyers. Documenting evidence is a crucial part of getting to the bottom of why accidents happen, so don’t hesitate to take out your phone after an accident if you are well enough to do it.
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