Home > Causes > Automobile Accidents

Automobile Accidents

Name: Phone: Email: State: Your Question: We value your privacy and security. Click here for WrongfulDeathNetwork.info's privacy and security policy.

Car accidents are damaging events involving road traffic, particularly automobiles. They can cause damage to vehicles, people or structures. Car accidents — also called traffic collisions, auto accidents, road accidents, personal injury collisions, motor vehicle accidents, and crashes — kill an estimated 1.2 million people worldwide each year.

Types of accidents
 
Car accidents fall into several major categories:

• Head-on accidents
• Rear-end accidents
• Side accidents
• Rollovers
• Single-vehicle accidents
• Multi-vehicle accidents
• Level crossing accidents
• Suicide

Car accidents often carry legal consequences in proportion to the severity of the accident. Nearly all common law jurisdictions impose some kind of requirement that parties involved in a collision (even with only stationary property) must stop at the scene, and exchange insurance or identification information or summon the police. Failing to obey this requirement is referred to as hit and run and is generally a criminal offence. Most car claims are settled without using an attorney.

Parties involved in an accident may face criminal liability, civil liability, or both. Usually, the state starts a prosecution only if someone is severely injured or killed, or if one of the drivers involved was clearly grossly negligent or intoxicated or otherwise impaired at the time the accident occurred. Charges might include driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, assault with a deadly weapon, manslaughter, or murder; penalties range from fines to jail time to prison time to death (although the death penalty is not applicable in many jurisdictions). It is notable that the penalties for killing and injuring with motor vehicles are often very much less than for other actions with similar outcomes.

As for civil liability, automobile accident personal injury lawsuits have become the most common type of tort. Because these cases have been litigated often in the developed First World nations, the legal questions usually have been answered in prior judgments. So, the courts most usually decide solely the factual questions of who is at fault, and how much they (or their insurer) must pay out in damages to the injured plaintiff.

Another element of liability involves the administrative fines or license suspension/revocation that may be imposed by civil or criminal authorities when a driver has violated the rules of the road and thus the terms of a driver's license. Such complaint may be filed by a police officer or sometimes by other witnesses of an incident.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia