Fresno Child Injury Lawyers

Frequent Causes of Injuries to Children

In fact, unintentional injuries are the single biggest cause of childhood deaths across the United States and in California. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that approximately 12,000 deaths of children 19 years of age and less occur each year from accidental injuries. Not only that, but more than 9.2 million children receive medical treatment every year for these types of injuries, including emergency department trips and hospital stays.

Vehicle accidents are by far the largest cause of accidental childhood injuries. Children receive injuries from riding in a car, truck, school bus, or other vehicle that collides with another vehicle or from suffering an accident while riding bicycles or simply walking.

But the many other sources of child injury in Fresno include accidents in schools or homes, with toys or other products that cause injuries, or accidents in places of amusement like swimming pools.

The most frequent causes of child injury are:

• Motor vehicle accidents, between vehicles or between vehicles and pedestrians
• Suffocation
• Drowning
• Poisoning
• Fires
• Falls

These are overall results, but variation in causes by age exists. Drowning, for example, is the #1 cause of death when children are between 1 and 4 years old. Suffocation causes two-thirds of deaths if children are less than 1 year old. For children in the span between 5 and 19 years, vehicle accidents are the most likely cause of both injuries and deaths.

These common sources, unfortunately, do not exhaust the potential dangers to children. Children can suffer injuries from fires in a home caused by improper installation or use of or hot water heaters. A dog may bite or maul them. They can suffer sports injuries like concussions due to improper supervision or equipment. A wide variety of products used by children and families might be defective and cause injury.

Any time your child suffers injuries that are not the fault of the child’s actions, you may be eligible to seek compensation from the negligent party. We discuss who is at fault in the next section.

Who Is at Fault for the Injury: A Crucial Question

Child injury law depends on a crucial question: who is at fault for the injury. When a child suffers injuries due to the actions of another person (or a failure to take proper action), or an organization such as a company or school, the person or organization might be deemed negligent. If they are negligent, they are financially responsible for the injuries the negligence caused. (The legal term for financial responsibility is liability.)

People are expected to act with reasonable prudence and safety precautions and not to cause other people harm—both children and adults. A car crash provides a useful example of how negligence works. All drivers are expected to operate their vehicles safely, obey traffic laws, and keep their vehicles in good working order. This is known as the duty of care for all licensed drivers.

A driver who passes improperly and hits another car head-on, for example, has violated the duty of care. That driver is negligent. The driver, therefore, is financially responsible for the injuries.

The duty of care applies to companies that manufacture products, landlords, school districts, supervisors of places where children play (such as swimming pools and parks), caregivers, owners of private homes, and more. Any of these entities who violate a duty of care that a reasonable person or organization would have fulfilled may have exhibited negligence. If they do, they are financially liable.

Receiving Liability Compensation

How do children and their parents or guardians receive liability compensation? (The law terms this damage compensation.) There are several avenues.

The first is to pursue damage compensation through the at-fault party’s insurance company. This is probably the most frequently used method of pursuing damage compensation.

If you and your child are in a car crash, for example, always exchange insurance information with the other driver. (This is an action that should be taken at any time, whether the other driver is at fault or not or even if you don’t then know who is at fault.)

California is a fault state for car accidents, meaning that injured people can pursue compensation from the at-fault party (rather than their own insurance, as is expected in no-fault states).

The second method is to file a lawsuit.

Note that these two methods are not necessarily mutually exclusive. You can begin by filing an insurance claim with the at-fault party’s insurance carrier and move to a lawsuit if the insurance carrier doesn’t settle the claim fairly.

Judges and juries are often more sympathetic and likely to rule in the injured party’s favor than insurance companies. For that reason, the idea of a future lawsuit is often a spur to insurance companies to settle fairly.

These methods are available for all childhood injury cases. If your child is injured by unsafe equipment at school or a swimming pool, for instance, the school district insurance company handles the liability claim (or you can file a lawsuit). If you rent and the property is unsafe for children, your landlord’s insurance may come into play. If your child is injured in someone’s home, their homeowner’s insurance would be involved. If a product injures your child, the manufacturer’s insurance would come into play.

At times, negligent parties may not have insurance or may be underinsured. Talk to your lawyer about cases like these; a lawsuit in court is always an option to get you and your child just compensation.

The Statute of Limitations

If your child is injured, you have from two years of the date of injury to file a lawsuit for damage compensation, by California law. This is called the statute of limitations. After that date, the court will no longer accept a legal filing on the case.

This may sound like a long time. In fact, the best course of action is to file a suit as soon as you know the at-fault party (or when the insurance company has had a reasonable time to settle). Successful court cases require evidence, such as eyewitness testimony, medical evidence of the injuries, or police reports. All forms of evidence can be lost, misplaced, or fade with time. The sooner a case is pursued, the more likely the evidence is to be available and sufficient.

If you are drawing close to the two-year deadline, consult a lawyer as soon as possible. It’s best to call us long before that, however.

What Damage Compensation Can Your Child Receive?

At The May Firm we strive to be involved and connected to our local community. For example, this past holiday season we organized bicycle and Christmas tree giveaways for individuals in our community. Our goal is to be a positive force for good in the local community and give back in some small measure to those we can serve. We receive satisfaction and joy from serving our clients and will continue to look for ways to be of assistance to the community as a whole. We receive positive energy from the community when we are involved.

We have listed a few of the local organizations we support and look forward to growing our outreach in the future. If you have any suggestions for ways we can be of service or support, please reach out to us.

Specific Causes of Injuries

At times, specific laws apply to specific causes of injuries. We briefly discuss dog bites and criminal behavior below.

Dog bites. Dog bites are, unfortunately, one of the most frequent childhood injuries. Under California law, an owner of a dog that bites anyone is always strictly liable as long as the person was in a public place (such as a park) or legally in a private place (such as a home or yard to which they were invited). That means that you have no duty to prove that the owner was negligent; strict liability means the dog’s owner must compensate you for injuries from a dog bite.

The strict liability rule only applies if the injury is a bite, however. A different set of laws applies to other types of injuries dogs can cause, such as knocking your child off a bicycle.

What happens in the cases of these other types of injuries? While the strict liability dog bite statute won’t apply, other laws may. You can try to prove negligence, by proving that the dog’s owner didn’t take a reasonably prudent person’s care in restraining the dog by a fence or a leash or other barriers.

In addition, if dogs have bitten someone before, California law specifies that the owners need to take prudent steps to “remove any danger” of attacks.

If a dog has bitten a human twice separately (or, in the case of a trained attack animal, one severe bite), and a civil lawsuit is filed against the owner, the court may order the owner to take reasonable steps to protect public safety, by (for example) destroying the dog or sending it to live elsewhere.

If a dog is deemed a dangerous dog, animal control needs to file a petition. (This can occur because of public complaints.) The court may order the owner to keep the dog in a secure location away from children, such as behind a fence or to always be restrained on a leash.

Crimes. Most common child injuries stem from accidents. Unfortunately, however, some stem from crimes, such as abuse or shootings.

These cases are treated differently from accidents and negligent behavior, and in an entirely separate court system. First, the cases are handled in criminal courts, which are different from the civil courts that hear lawsuits.

Second, the state brings charges in a criminal case, rather than the individual injured people. Third, the goal of a criminal case is punishment for the wrong-doer, not financial compensation for the injured.

In some cases, you may pursue child injury compensation if your child is injured in a crime. A criminal charge does not affect your ability to do this, as the goals of the two systems are different. Consult our child injury attorneys today.

If You Need a Child Injury Lawyer in Fresno

At The May Firm, our personal injury lawyers handle child injuries in our local Fresno office. Our first consultation is always free. We can help you investigate who or what caused the injury, negotiate with an insurance company, and file a legal suit. We fight to see that justice is done for the families of Fresno. Contact us today for your free consultation.

If You Want to Talk to a Fresno Child Injury Attorney, We’re Here for You

The May Firm has long experience representing the injured. We offer a free one-hour consultation to discuss your case at your convenience. We can help you with insurance negotiations, gathering evidence, estimating your damages, and investigating the causes of your child’s injury. The most important thing is to get your child’s life back on track, and vigorous pursuit of just damages can provide a crucial ingredient. Contact us today or call us at any time at (559) 385-2090.

Community Involvement

At The May Firm we strive to be involved and connected to our local community. For example, this past holiday season we organized bicycle and Christmas tree giveaways for individuals in our community. Our goal is to be a positive force for good in the local community and give back in some small measure to those we can serve. We receive satisfaction and joy from serving our clients and will continue to look for ways to be of assistance to the community as a whole. We receive positive energy from the community when we are involved.

We have listed a few of the local organizations we support and look forward to growing our outreach in the future. If you have any suggestions for ways we can be of service or support, please reach out to us.

Where Compassion Meets Experience

We take pride in working hard for each of our valued clients and will help you recover from your injuries and losses, including lost wages, mental anguish, future earning potential, disability or continued health care needs and lost or damaged property.

Our Fresno injury lawyers stay well-informed and up-to-date on all applicable legal changes, so you can be confident that you will always receive relevant, current legal advice.

If you have suffered a personal injury or are a victim of an accident that is not your at fault for, contact our award winning Fresno attorneys 24/7 to schedule your free case consultation. You can also call our Fresno office at 1-(559)-385-2090. Let us be your personal injury and accident advocate.

“My number one goal is to help others. When you step foot into our firm, you’ll be treated like family, period.”

Robert May, Attorney | Founder

Fresno Child Injury FAQs

The May Firm is dedicated to providing justice for Fresno-area children injured due to the negligence of another and their families. If your child suffers an injury, you may feel overwhelmed and stressed. Here, we provide answers to the most frequently asked questions (FAQs) we receive and explain how a lawyer can help.