Hi. I’m John Burns and I’m a car accident and personal injury attorney in Orange County in the San Juan Capistrano – Mission Viejo area. The person who was the driver of the car occupied by the Ohio family is the brother of a former client. That’s how the case was referred to me. They called me and asked me to take a look at the case and so I did. What happened was as follows.
The Car Accident
My client was driving in his car with his fiancé in the right front seat. In the left rear seat was his fiance’s daughter by a previous marriage, a teenager, and in the right rear seat was his fiance’s mother. They were hit by an off-duty fireman who was driving drunk and the accident caused the engine of the car to actually come into the driver’s seat of the vehicle my clients were in.
My clients were all taken to the hospital. Unfortunately, they didn’t have health insurance so I flew back to where they were in Ohio. It was on the border of Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. I went to see them and by this time, they were out of the hospital, but here are the damages and injuries that they had.
The Injuries They Had
The driver of the car had a foot that had been crushed when the engine came into the car and his toes had been bent straight up. The surgery in the hospital was done by a doctor/podiatrist who handles foot matters, and unfortunately, the surgery didn’t work out too well.
The right front seat passenger, his fiancé, she had some cuts and bruises but really was not in too bad of shape. The little girl in the back hit her head on the back of the driver’s seat although she had her seatbelt on, and received a scar right in the middle of her forehead. A horrible scar. And the mother in the back hit her head and had vertigo and dizziness, and some cuts and bruises.
The Problem of No Health Insurance
The major problem they had was for the driver, his fiancé and the little girl, they had no health insurance. So what I did was, I went to the local trial lawyers association in Pittsburgh, met the president, and I was able to find doctors who would treat all of them on what’s called a lien. We call it l-i-e-n and that means the doctors will treat them but wait to get paid until the end of the case.
I showed the doctors that the liability and fault was clear, that there was at least a million dollar policy and that we would be able to get them paid at the end. We took the driver of the vehicle to Pittsburgh which turns out to be a world class center for medical care. When the doctor looked at the toes of the driver, he was shocked and asked me, do you want me to give you a report, or you want me to fix this? I said to my client, do you want this fixed, and my client said, of course.
We arranged to have the surgery done on a lien so that my client didn’t have to come up with out of pocket money. The little girl we got to a plastic surgeon. Unfortunately, the plastic surgeon said most people think that scars can be fixed with plastic surgery, but unfortunately, they cannot. The only thing I can tell you, he said, is that we can either sand it down a little bit, or we can leave it and it should resolve, it shouldn’t be such an obvious scar in the years to come, although she will have a scar.
Significance of A Scar On a Young Girl
And for a little girl to have a scar is very important, of course, because that may affect who her husband to be might be, someone that she might marry won’t like someone with a scar, so it’s very critical for a young girl to get adequate compensation for her. The mother we got to another specialist to handle the vertigo.
So, we were able to get that resolved and get the liens. We went to a mediation again, which is a meeting between myself, all my clients, the insurance company, and the people who represent the people who caused the accident, and a retired judge.
Settlement Negotiations
We negotiated all day and were able to get them a large settlement which was six figures and in particular, for the little girl, we were able to get what’s called a structured settlement. It will pay her a certain amount of money and when she turns 18, there will be enough money to get a reasonable car, not a sports car, but a reasonable car. There will be another sum to pay for her college, and then later in life there will be enough for her to buy a house.
We structured it that way with those needs in mind. So although she’s got a scar which the plastic surgeon said should get better over time, although it’ll always be there a little bit, financially she’s going to be set for life so that she’ll be in good shape, including having a home of her own. So that was the kind of case I felt good about where I was able to help my clients.
Why Call Attorney John P. Burns?
So why should you call me if you have a situation like this or know someone with a situation like this? You can see that went to Ohio to help them get this case resolved. I went to extra lengths to get them the medical care that they needed, and I got it done and just personally stayed with that family and then especially took care of the little girl to make sure she had the kind of compensation that she would need to get her through her life.
So thanks for watching. I hope you call me soon. I’d like to talk to you. My phone number is (949) 496-7000, and my email is john@johnburnslaw.com. Thanks for reading this post and watching thevideo. Have a great day.