If you were injured in an accident for which you were partly responsible, you might be wondering whether you are still legally entitled to compensation. Depending on your degree of fault, you may still be entitled to significant compensation for your injuries and losses.
In South Carolina, the legal doctrine of comparative negligence allows injured victims to recover compensation after an accident, so long as they are not more than 50% at fault. However, reducing fault in an accident to a clean percentage is often more difficult than it may seem. To make sure they do not miss out on any compensation they are entitled to, injury victims in these cases should recruit an experienced personal injury attorney to advocate on their behalf.
Let the attorneys at McKinney, Tucker & Lemel, LLC, fight for you. We are ready to evaluate and handle your case. Contact us today for a consultation with an injury attorney near you. Read on to learn about negligence laws in South Carolina.
What Are Some Preventable Injury Statistics?
Accidents and unintentional injuries are a persistent problem in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there were 24.8 million physician office visits and 97.9 million emergency department visits nationwide to treat unintentional injuries in 2018. The CDC further reports that unintentional injury was the fourth leading cause of death nationwide in 2020. In that year alone, 200,955 people died from preventable injuries.
According to the National Safety Council (NSC), this number represents a 16.1% increase over the 173,040 deaths in 2019. More narrowly, home deaths increased by 21.1%, public deaths by 13.5%, and motor-vehicle deaths by 8.3%. Overall, deaths caused by preventable injuries have increased by a staggering 132% between 2020 and 1992. The top three causes of accidental injury in 2020 were:
- Unintentional Poisoning – 87,404 deaths
- Unintentional Falls – 42,114 deaths
- Motor Vehicle Crashes – 40,698 deaths
The numbers speak for themselves. If you or a loved one were injured in a preventable accident at little to no fault of your own, do not hesitate to speak to a South Carolina personal injury attorney today. The injury attorneys at McKinney, Tucker & Lemel, LLC, are a phone call away.
What Is Negligence?
To understand comparative negligence, it is first necessary to understand negligence, which simply refers to the failure to use reasonable care to avoid harming others through our actions. To recover compensation for injuries caused by negligence, injured victims must prove four legal elements:
- Duty – Defendant owed a duty to use reasonable care
- Breach – Defendant breached their duty
- Harm – Plaintiff was injured
- Causation – Defendant’s breach caused plaintiff’s injuries
If any one of these elements is missing, the plaintiff’s case fails. However, the doctrine of negligence per se —negligence “in and of itself” — provides a somewhat different route to compensation. To recover compensation through negligence per se, injured victims must prove that:
- Statutory Violation – Defendant violated a statute designed to keep people safe
- Harm – Plaintiff suffered an injury the statute was designed to prevent
- Causation – Plaintiff’s injury was caused by the violation
- Protected Class – Plaintiff was among the class of people the statute was meant to protect
For example, there are numerous traffic laws meant designed to keep everyone on the road safe, such as requirements that we stop at red lights and obey speed limits. Therefore, if another driver causes an accident by violating one of these laws, they may be held negligent per se and liable for any injuries that result.
What is Comparative Negligence?
In 1988, South Carolina abandoned the traditional doctrine of contributory negligence, which completely barred injured victims from recovering compensation when they contributed even slightly to the cause of an accident. Fortunately, this harsh rule was replaced with the more lenient doctrine of comparative negligence.
Codified in the South Carolina Contribution Among Tortfeasors Act, injured parties can still receive compensation even when they contributed to an accident. However, there are two caveats. First, their compensation will be reduced proportionately to the degree they contributed to the cause of the accident. Second, if they contribute more than 50%, they recover nothing.
This is best understood by way of illustration. Consider the following auto-accident scenario:
You are cruising down Interstate 77. You are going about 10 miles over the speed limit. As you approach an exit ramp toward Charlotte, you do not slow down to the legal speed limit. Just before you take the exit, another driver going 30 miles over the speed limit cuts you off and causes an accident. You suffer injuries worth $1,000,000.
Neither driver should have been speeding. Therefore, a jury would apply the doctrine of comparative negligence. If the jury determines that you were 25 percent responsible for the crash, your recovery will be reduced proportionately to $750,000. However, if it determines that you were more than 50% at fault, your recovery will reduce to zero.
What Damages Can I Recover for a South Carolina Auto Accident?
Even if you contributed to the underlying cause of an accident, you might still be entitled to significant monetary compensation. In most cases, compensation in personal injury cases comes in two varieties: economic damages and non-economic damages.
Economic damages are meant to compensate for things that easily boil down to a fixed price tag, whereas non-economic damages compensate for intangible losses that are more subjective in nature. Collectively, these forms of damages include compensation for things like:
- Medical and rehabilitation expenses
- Lost income
- Reduced earning capacity
- Pain and suffering
- Emotional distress
- Lowered quality of life
- Loss of consortium
- Wrongful death
- Funeral and burial expenses
- Property damage
Calculating damages is a central issue in any personal injury case, and chances are it will be highly contested. Therefore, it is important that injured victims have an experienced attorney in their corner who will push back when the other side tries to (1) downplay the seriousness of their injuries and (2) exaggerate their degree of contributory negligence.
Is There a Deadline for Filing a Personal Injury Lawsuit?
Yes, the statute of limitations governing personal injury cases in South Carolina gives you three years from the date of injury to file a lawsuit seeking compensation from the at-fault party. Remember that this deadline is strictly enforced and comes with very few exceptions. To avoid seriously compromising your right to seek compensation through the courts, as well as your bargaining power when negotiating an out-of-court settlement with the at-fault party and their insurers, do not miss it.
Speak to a South Carolina Injury Lawyer Today
If you were injured due to someone else’s negligence, you should have your case reviewed by an experienced attorney. Even if you contributed to the cause of an accident, you might still be entitled to significant compensation. The personal injury lawyers at McKinney, Tucker & Lemel, LLC, are ready to evaluate your case. Contact us today for a consultation with a South Carolina injury attorney near you.
