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Charlotte Truck Accident Lawyer

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Victims of tractor-trailer accidents face an increased risk of suffering a serious injury or death. Trucks can weigh up to 80,000 pounds and the force and momentum of a collision with a tractor-trailer or semi-truck can be devastating.

Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC has extensive experience providing representation to truck accident victims after they get hurt or a loved one has been killed. With decades of collective experience, members of our legal team have helped clients to recover millions in damages. We can help you seek the compensation you deserve so call now to schedule your free consultation with a Charlotte truck accident lawyer.

Why Choose a Charlotte Truck Accident Lawyer From Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC?

At Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC, we believe that every case deserves a dedicated, driven advocate who is both a compassionate listener and a clear communicator about your rights. Our firm has hands-on trial experience at a high level and is unafraid to go to court to represent your interests. Partner Jon Moore is a member of the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA), an invitation-only organization limited to attorneys with at least 10 civil jury trials under their belts. With deep roots in the North Carolina community, he has served as ABOTA’s Membership Chair for the Western North Carolina chapter.

Meanwhile, every single attorney at Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC has been selected for inclusion in the North Carolina Super Lawyers list, either as a Super Lawyer or Rising Star. As a selective firm focused on injury lawsuits, Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC is able to offer advocacy and support to injured North Carolinians from a dedicated team of legal experts.

What Compensation Can I Seek After a Truck Accident?

If a tractor-trailer or semi-truck accident leaves you with injuries you have the right to be fully and fairly compensated for all financial and non-economic losses if you can prove someone else was to blame for the accident. In deadly truck collisions, family members of victims also have the right to wrongful death damages if they can make their claim.

Economic damages include payments for your immediate as well as future costs due to an accident or injury. After a Charlotte truck crash, your attorney might seek compensation for any of the following economic losses and expenses:

  • Ambulance ride
  • Hospital care and overnight stays
  • Surgery and follow up care
  • Diagnostic imaging, such as CT scans, x-rays, and MRI
  • Medication like painkillers, antibiotics, and more
  • Lost wages and income from time off work
  • Reduced future earning capacity
  • Job loss or occupational retraining
  • Compensation for property damage, including repair to your vehicle
  • Retrofitting home modifications in cases of ongoing disability, paralysis, or more
  • Home health care
  • Therapeutic costs
  • Childcare and transportation needs due to the accident

In addition to medical bills and expenses, our truck accident lawyers in Charlotte will also fight for you to receive damages that cover your non-economic losses. These might include payments for your:

  • Pain and suffering
  • Disfigurement or scarring
  • Mental anguish and emotional pain
  • Recovery from anxiety, depression, PTSD, and other mental health fallout from the accident
  • Loss of enjoyment of life, including hobbies and activities you used to perform before the crash
  • Loss of consortium, such as loss of intimacy or companionship

Finally, in some cases involving particular recklessness, your truck accident lawyer might also seek punitive damages. These are payments meant to discourage future dangerous behaviors by the driver, the trucking company, or both.

How Our Charlotte Truck Accident Attorneys Prove Negligence

Securing compensation involves showing negligence occurred or a legal duty was breached. Demonstrating a violation of Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSRs), which apply to commercial drivers, can create a presumption that the driver was negligent. Other examples of negligence might include speeding, driving distracted or under the influence, swerving, or other unsafe behaviors behind the wheel. A trucking company or driver that failed to incorporate safety practices or safety features that are considered industry best-practices could also be considered negligent. For example, overloading cargo, failing to hire experienced drivers, pressuring drivers to meet unrealistic deadlines, or other industry-specific issues can increase a company’s liability after a crash.

Why Do You Need a Charlotte Truck Accident Attorney?

When trying to seek compensation for your injury after a North Carolina truck accident, there is one major obstacle that you will undoubtedly encounter. That obstacle is the pure contributory negligence rule, which is followed by the state of North Carolina. Under this legal doctrine, a plaintiff is prohibited from recovering compensation if he or she contributed to the truck accident in even the slightest way.

North Carolina is one of five states that still follow this outdated and ridiculous rule. Insurance companies in North Carolina, meanwhile, could not be happier about the fact that this legal doctrine still exists in the state because they need to find any evidence that you were in the tiniest way responsible for the accident to deny your claim.

“On top of that, insurance companies representing trucking companies are notorious for trying to undervalue and deny valid claims from truck accident victims,” warns a Charlotte truck accident attorney from Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC.

That’s why it is so vital to hire a Charlotte truck accident lawyer from Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC, to fight for your compensation and prove that the other party’s negligence was fully responsible for causing the crash.

Who Can Be Held Liable for a Truck Accident in North Carolina?

In North Carolina, several parties can be held liable for truck accidents. A negligent trucker can be personally responsible for the losses an accident causes. In addition, his or her employer can be liable. Trucking companies are vicariously liable for the negligence of on-duty employees under agency rules, which means a trucking company can be sued if a driver violated FMCSRs, state driving laws, or was unreasonably careless.

Therefore, victims of collisions involving large trucks have a right to collect money from multiple parties. In fact, more often than not, legal actions stemming from these accidents tend to involve more than one defendant.

Our North Carolina truck accident lawyer at Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC, can help you maximize the sum of money you will recover in your personal injury claim by suing the following parties:

  • The driver of the truck
  • The truckers’ employer (trucking company)
  • The owner of the trucking company, which may not be the same person
  • The owner of the truck
  • The manufacturer of the vehicle
  • The maintenance company or independent auto mechanic who inspected and maintained the vehicle
  • A government entity (city, state, municipality, or other) that contributed to the truck crash by creating or failing to remedy dangerous conditions that caused the accident

What You Should Know About Insurance Requirements for Trucks

Trucking companies are required by federal regulations to have a $750,000 minimum in liability coverage. If the truck involved in the collision was transporting hazardous or toxic material, minimum liability coverage limits may be as high as $5 million.

Trucking companies have to carry large amounts of insurance to make sure there is enough money available to help victims who get badly hurt. The injuries sustained in a truck crash or untimely death can lead to huge medical expenses and a lifetime reduction in earning power if work abilities are affected by permanent injuries.

Will My Truck Accident Case Go to Trial?

While many cases settle out of court, it is still important to work with a firm that has successful trial experience. At times, an insurance carrier refuses to offer a fair settlement or attempts to make a truck crash victim back down by threatening to go to court. In these cases, you need an experienced advocate by your side to ensure that you have the best possible chance of success with your claim.

The Charlotte truck accident lawyers at Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC can help victims and their families to pursue an out-of-court negotiated settlement to seek compensation for truck crashes or can provide assertive legal advocacy during court litigation so victims can make a strong case to convince a jury to fully compensate them for damages.

What Federal and State Laws Govern Truck Accidents in North Carolina?

There are hundreds of federal and state laws that apply to truck drivers and commercial trucking companies in the state of North Carolina. Some of the most basic laws regulating the trucking industry are:

  • The number of consecutive hours a truck driver is allowed to drive without taking a break
  • The training a truck driver must complete prior to driving a large truck
  • The frequency of inspections and maintenance of trucks
  • The weight limit of the commercial truck and its load
  • Drug and alcohol use by the trucker
  • The type and amount of insurance coverage that a truck is required to carry

North Carolina truck drivers are required to follow the traffic laws that apply to all other motorists on our roads and highways.

Where Do Most Truck Accidents Happen in North Carolina?

Each year, nearly 2,000 truck accidents occur in North Carolina, resulting in approximately 30 deaths and 500 injuries. According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, approximately 54% of all fatal crashes involving large trucks occur in rural areas. Meanwhile, 12% of all fatal truck accidents occurred on rural state highways. North Carolina, with its 22 highways and 78 counties classified as rural, more than meets the criteria for dangerous commercial driving conditions.

I-485 in Mecklenburg saw some of the most frequent accidents in the state from 2018 to 2020. Meanwhile, Cliffdale Rd. from Beverly Dr. to Lansdowne Rd. in Fayetteville has the dubious distinction of being named the deadliest stretch of road in North Carolina.

What Acts of Negligence Can Lead to a Truck Wreck?

Truck drivers are often under pressure to meet deadlines and save the company money, which can lead to dangerous conditions on North Carolina roads. Truck drivers may operate thousands of pounds of heavy machinery, but they are also among the top three professionals most likely to be sleep-deprived at work. Additionally, they may be operating improperly maintained or loaded vehicles unbeknownst to them while thinking they can shave time off of a delivery. Because of this, truck driver negligence encompasses both general traffic violations as well as industry-specific concerns. Some examples of negligence that can cause a truck crash include:

  • Speeding
  • Talking on the phone
  • Fatigue
  • Failing to maintain a safe following distance
  • Neglecting a truck’s extended blind spots
  • Equipment failure
  • Improper loading causing uneven distribution of weight
  • Lack of maintenance in between trips

What Kinds of Injury Cases Do Your Charlotte Truck Accident Lawyers Take?

Road accidents involving large trucks account for some of the most devastating crashes on our roads in Charlotte and all across North Carolina. While it is pretty apparent to anyone that motor vehicle accidents involving large trucks tend to cause severe injuries and damages, obtaining adequate financial compensation after a truck accident is never easy, mostly because the victims have to deal with both the truck driver and his or her trucking company. At Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC, we represent people who have sustained injuries such as:

  • Spinal cord injuries, including partial and total paralysis
  • Brain injuries
  • Neck injuries
  • Broken bones and lacerations
  • Internal bleeding and organ damage
  • Burns and road rash
  • Loss of limbs
  • Loss of vision or hearing
  • PTSD and psychological damage
  • Wrongful death

Common North Carolina Truck Accident Types

Some of the most common trucking accidents on North Carolina roadways include:

  • Jack-knifes: When a semi-truck has to brake suddenly, its back end can swing out suddenly, forming an angle with the front of the cab.
  • Underrides: While underride crashes are often fatal, a smaller car that slides under a tractor-trailer can also lead to some of the most devastating head, neck and spine injuries in this kind of truck accident.
  • Rollovers: Many 18-wheelers have higher centers of gravity and are especially prone to tip-overs on uneven roads and when taking sharp turns.
  • Wide turn accidents: Flatbeds need more room to turn, and have wider blind spots, than the average car driver might realize. When a car is traveling in its blind spot, or a truck driver fails to signal an upcoming turn, a wide turn accident can easily occur even in slower traffic.
  • Rear end accidents: The load of a semi-truck greatly affects its drivability, which can easily lead to issues with rear end accidents. For instance, factors like how much stopping distance it needs, as well as how much speed it picks up when traveling downhill, are both impacted by the size of a truck’s load. Even in ideal roadway conditions with no debris or bad weather, a heavy semi-truck that is loaded-to-GVWR* condition still requires a distance of about two full football fields to stop.

*Gross vehicle weight rating

Do You Have a Truck Accident Lawyer Near Me?

Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC are available to help injured North Carolinians with locations in Asheville, Charlotte, Concord, Gastonia, Huntersville, Kannapolis, Monroe, Mooresville, and Shelby. Our personal injury lawyers take on local clients and support injured North Carolinians. Our firm can also help you handle a commercial insurance claim when you have been harmed by an out-of-state truck driver passing through Charlotte.

Strategic Truck Accident Attorneys in Charlotte

Don’t hesitate to get the help you need after a truck accident – you want to make sure you do everything you can to make a successful claim so you can get the best medical care and not face financial worries. Call toll-free today, 704-335-1500, or fill out our contact form to schedule your free consultation with a truck accident lawyer in Charlotte. Brown Moore & Associates, PLLC serves clients in Charlotte as well as in surrounding areas throughout North Carolina.

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"They held my hand through the whole process, they were patient enough to explain the steps in detail and helped me to articulate my pain and suffering. They think outside of the box and aggressively fought for me and my best interests. I can’t thank them enough for their hard work and their ability to make me feel like we were family and that my little problems were a priority."
A. Vue
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"Working with Brown Moore and Associates was the best thing that I have done when it came to my case. No doubt about it, I will be using this firm if I were to ever need them again."
Daija Rogers
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“It was a great pleasure working with Brown and Associates. They were very professional and handled our case great. We were very pleased with them and would highly recommend them.”
Marilyn Cantrell
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“I had the pleasure of working with Brown Moore. My main contact was Jenny Maynard and throughout the entire process they were helpful, insightful, and even compassionate. I cannot recommend them enough for whatever you need.”
Will Soistman