A motor vehicle accident can create problems that extend well beyond the damaged vehicles. Serious crashes may result in emergency treatment, surgery, months away from work, permanent restrictions, insurance disputes, and uncertainty about who will ultimately be responsible for the financial consequences.
At Robert Edens Law Office, we represent people injured in motor vehicle accidents throughout Lake County, McHenry County, Cook County, and surrounding Northern Illinois communities. Bob Edens has represented injured people since 1991, and motor vehicle accident litigation has been a significant part of our personal injury practice for decades.
We handle claims involving passenger cars, commercial trucks, motorcycles, pedestrians, bicyclists, uninsured and underinsured drivers, and other serious roadway collisions.
Our job is to investigate what happened, identify all potentially responsible parties and available insurance coverage, document the medical and financial consequences of the injuries, and pursue the compensation supported by Illinois law.
Call us at (847) 395-2200 or contact us to discuss a Northern Illinois motor vehicle accident.
Motor vehicle accident law encompasses much more than ordinary two-car collisions. Liability, available insurance, evidence, and potential damages can change substantially depending on the vehicles and parties involved.
Car crashes can result from speeding, following too closely, distracted driving, unsafe lane changes, failure to yield, impaired driving, dangerous turns, and other traffic violations.
Liability is not always obvious from the location of the vehicle damage or from what one driver says at the scene. We may need to examine photographs, police documentation, witness statements, traffic-camera footage, vehicle data, roadway evidence, and the applicable traffic laws.
Our Illinois Car Accident Claims Guide provides a detailed explanation of fault, evidence, insurance claims, medical treatment, comparative negligence, and settlement issues.
A commercial truck accident can involve substantially more evidence and more potentially responsible parties than an ordinary passenger-car crash.
Depending on the circumstances, liability may involve the truck driver, motor carrier, vehicle owner, maintenance company, freight broker, loading contractor, or another business.
Relevant evidence can include electronic logging records, driver qualification documents, dispatch communications, inspection and maintenance records, onboard electronic data, cargo records, and company policies.
We investigate these cases with the understanding that important commercial records may need to be identified and preserved quickly.
Motorcyclists have little physical protection when struck by a passenger vehicle or commercial truck. Even a collision that would cause relatively modest damage between two cars can produce devastating injuries to a rider.
Our motorcycle accident practice includes cases involving unsafe turns, failure to yield, lane violations, distracted drivers, speeding, and other negligent conduct.
We also address attempts to blame the motorcyclist simply because the rider was operating a motorcycle. Liability should be based on evidence rather than stereotypes.
A pedestrian struck by a motor vehicle may suffer fractures, traumatic brain injuries, spinal injuries, internal trauma, permanent scarring, or fatal injuries.
Our pedestrian accident cases may involve crosswalks, intersections, parking lots, school areas, road shoulders, turning vehicles, distracted driving, and failure-to-yield disputes.
Because the injured pedestrian cannot provide vehicle-based evidence of their own, nearby surveillance cameras, witnesses, vehicle damage, electronic records, and scene documentation may be particularly important.
Bicyclists can be injured when drivers fail to provide adequate space, turn across a bicycle’s path, open a door into a rider, fail to yield at an intersection, or otherwise operate a vehicle unsafely.
Our bicycle accident practice focuses on establishing what occurred while also documenting injuries that can have long-term medical and occupational consequences.
Sometimes the driver who caused the crash has no insurance or does not carry enough liability coverage to compensate for a serious injury.
Your own automobile insurance policy may provide uninsured motorist or underinsured motorist protection. These claims are made under your own policy, but that does not mean the insurer will automatically agree about liability, medical causation, or the value of the damages.
Our insurance coverage dispute practice addresses coverage questions that can arise after a serious collision.
Your immediate priority should be safety and appropriate medical care.
Illinois law requires a driver involved in a crash causing personal injury or death to stop at or near the scene and remain until the statutory duties have been satisfied. Drivers involved in qualifying crashes must also exchange required identifying information and render reasonable assistance to injured people.
Depending on the crash, practical steps may include contacting police, obtaining medical attention, exchanging driver and insurance information, identifying witnesses, and photographing vehicles and the surrounding scene.
Illinois currently requires immediate notice to law enforcement for crashes involving injury or death and for certain crashes involving specified levels of property damage or school buses.
Do not speculate about fault or make statements about injuries that you are not medically qualified to evaluate. A person who feels relatively well immediately after a collision may develop significant symptoms later.
A motor vehicle accident claim is ultimately an evidence-based claim.
Useful evidence may include photographs of vehicle damage and the roadway, video from businesses or residences, traffic-camera footage, witness information, vehicle event data, phone records when legally obtainable, medical records, repair estimates, towing records, and employment documentation.
In commercial cases, additional evidence may include electronic logging data, safety records, inspection information, maintenance histories, dispatch records, and corporate policies.
Evidence can disappear quickly. Vehicles are repaired or destroyed, digital video is overwritten, road conditions change, and witnesses become harder to locate.
For that reason, investigation should begin well before a lawsuit deadline approaches.
Fault depends on the conduct of everyone involved and the evidence establishing what occurred.
A driver may be negligent because of speeding, following too closely, failing to yield, making an unsafe turn, disregarding a traffic signal, driving while distracted, or failing to maintain proper control.
Some crashes involve more than one contributing factor or responsible party.
For example, a commercial collision may involve driver negligence and inadequate vehicle maintenance. A roadway collision may involve multiple drivers. A defective vehicle component may introduce a product-liability issue.
We evaluate the complete chain of events rather than assuming that only one person or company should be investigated.
Illinois follows modified comparative negligence for covered negligence claims.
You can generally recover compensation when your contributory fault is 50 percent or less, but your recovery is reduced by your percentage of responsibility. If you are found more than 50 percent responsible for the proximate cause of the injury, you are barred from recovering damages.
Suppose your proven damages total $200,000 and you are found 20 percent responsible. The potential recovery would be reduced by 20 percent to $160,000.
At exactly 50 percent responsibility, you may still recover 50 percent of the proven damages.
An insurance adjuster’s initial allocation of fault is not a final legal determination. We compare that position with the physical evidence, witness accounts, applicable traffic laws, and other available proof.
The damages available after an Illinois motor vehicle accident depend on the injuries and evidence.
A claim may potentially include compensation for past and future medical expenses, lost income, diminished earning capacity, pain and suffering, disability, loss of normal life, emotional consequences, and disfigurement when legally recoverable and supported by the evidence.
Property damage to the vehicle is a separate component.
Serious cases require particular attention to future losses. A person who needs additional surgery, cannot return to the same occupation, or has permanent physical restrictions may have losses that extend well beyond the medical bills already incurred.
We do not evaluate a significant injury claim solely by adding up past medical bills.
The forces involved in a crash can injure multiple parts of the body at the same time.
We handle cases involving cervical and lumbar spine injuries, herniated and bulging discs, radiculopathy, shoulder and rotator cuff injuries, knee injuries, fractures, concussions, traumatic brain injuries, nerve damage, spinal cord injuries, internal trauma, scarring, and other serious conditions.
Medical treatment can range from emergency evaluation and physical therapy to injections, orthopedic surgery, spinal surgery, rehabilitation, and long-term specialty care.
The value of the case depends not simply on the diagnostic label but on how the injury affects the individual person.
A prior medical condition does not automatically prevent recovery.
A collision may aggravate arthritis, a degenerative disc condition, an old shoulder injury, or another preexisting problem. The legal question is whether the crash caused new injury or materially aggravated the prior condition.
Insurance companies commonly review earlier medical records and may argue that symptoms existed before the collision.
We compare the medical history before and after the accident, including prior symptoms, treatment, work capacity, diagnostic findings, and functional limitations.
Being accurate about previous injuries is important. Concealing prior treatment generally creates credibility problems that can be more damaging than the preexisting condition itself.
An insurance adjuster represents the insurance carrier, not the injured person.
The insurer may investigate liability, request a recorded statement, seek medical authorizations, examine prior medical history, challenge treatment, dispute lost income, or make an early settlement offer.
An early offer may arrive before the injured person knows whether surgery will be needed or whether permanent limitations will remain.
Once a full settlement release is signed, the claim generally cannot be reopened simply because additional treatment or disability later develops.
We deal directly with the involved insurers when we represent a client and evaluate settlement proposals against the medical evidence, damages, available insurance, and litigation risk.
Illinois generally requires a lawsuit seeking damages for personal injury to be commenced within two years after the cause of action accrues.
The two-year rule is not universal.
Claims involving governmental defendants, minors, wrongful death, product defects, legally disabled claimants, and other circumstances may involve different limitations periods or related procedural requirements.
The deadline should therefore be determined for the specific accident rather than assuming that every case follows exactly the same timeline.
Waiting can also hurt the case long before the statute of limitations expires because important evidence may disappear.
A collision occurring during employment may create an Illinois workers’ compensation claim in addition to a personal injury claim.
For example, an employee driving for work who is struck by an unrelated negligent driver may potentially pursue workers’ compensation benefits from the employer while also pursuing a third-party negligence claim against the at-fault motorist.
The claims provide different types of compensation and must be coordinated because the workers’ compensation employer or insurer may have lien and reimbursement rights.
Our Illinois Workers’ Compensation Complete Claim Guide explains the workers’ compensation side of a workplace vehicle accident.
Bob Edens has represented injured people since 1991. His practice increasingly focused on automobile injury litigation within his first several years as an attorney and expanded to include trucking, motorcycle, pedestrian, uninsured and underinsured motorist claims, arbitration, and trials.
At Robert Edens Law Office, personal injury and workers’ compensation are the focus of our practice. We do not attempt to be a general-practice firm handling unrelated areas of law.
We maintain an extensive collection of motor vehicle accident resources, case results, injury information, and client testimonials to help injured people better understand the issues that can affect a claim. The existing site also documents prior matters involving car crashes and serious orthopedic and neurological injuries.
Prior results do not guarantee the outcome of a new case. Each collision must be evaluated based on its own evidence, injuries, available insurance, and applicable law.
Illinois requires immediate notice to law enforcement for crashes involving injury or death and certain crashes involving property damage or school buses.
Even when a reporting requirement is disputed, obtaining law-enforcement assistance after an injury crash can help document the parties, vehicles, witnesses, and scene.
You generally are not required to provide a recorded statement to an opposing liability carrier simply because the adjuster requests one.
Your own insurance policy may impose cooperation obligations, so communications with your own carrier require a separate analysis.
The other driver’s statement does not decide legal responsibility. Fault can be established through physical evidence, photographs, video, witnesses, vehicle data, traffic laws, and other proof.
You may still recover when your fault is 50 percent or less, although your damages are reduced by that percentage. Recovery is barred when your fault exceeds 50 percent.
Your uninsured motorist coverage may provide compensation depending on the policy and circumstances. Underinsured motorist coverage may become relevant when the at-fault driver’s liability coverage is insufficient.
An early settlement should be evaluated carefully when medical treatment is continuing or the prognosis remains uncertain. Once you sign a full release, later treatment or complications generally do not create a second opportunity to recover from the same claim.
Yes. An injured passenger may potentially have a claim against one or more negligent drivers. The available insurance depends on the vehicles, drivers, policies, and circumstances surrounding the collision.
Potentially. A negligent driver can be responsible for aggravating a preexisting condition when the evidence establishes that the collision caused additional injury.
There is no reliable average settlement. Value depends on fault, comparative negligence, medical evidence, treatment, future care, permanent impairment, wage loss, earning capacity, available insurance, and litigation risk.
Our Illinois Car Accident Claims Guide provides detailed information about the claims process. You can also visit our consolidated Illinois Personal Injury And Workers’ Compensation FAQs for answers to common insurance, medical, deadline, and settlement questions.
A serious vehicle accident can create medical, insurance, employment, and financial problems at the same time. You do not have to rely solely on an insurance adjuster’s assessment of fault or claim value.
We represent injured drivers, passengers, motorcyclists, bicyclists, pedestrians, and families throughout Antioch, Waukegan, Grayslake, Lake Zurich, Gurnee, Round Lake, Lake Villa, Libertyville, Woodstock, McHenry, Crystal Lake, Barrington, and surrounding Northern Illinois communities.
Call Robert Edens Law Office at (847) 395-2200 or contact us to request a consultation about your Illinois motor vehicle accident claim.
Every claim depends on its individual facts and evidence. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome, and this page provides general legal information rather than legal advice concerning a particular collision.
The Law Offices of Robert T. Edens, Personal Injury and Workers' Compensation Law Office, have offices in Antioch, Waukegan, Grayslake, Woodstock and Barrington. We represent clients throughout the communities of Antioch, Waukegan, Grayslake, Barrington, Woodstock, Buffalo Grove, Deer Park, Gurnee, Lake Zurich, Round Lake, McHenry, Cary, Crystal Lake, Libertyville, Lincolnshire, Mundelein, Vernon Hills, Wheeling, North Chicago, Zion, Inverness, Palatine, Wauconda, Island Lake, Fox Lake, Barrington Hills, Spring Grove, Lake Bluff, Lakemoor, Long Grove, Lake Villa, Kildeer, Wadsworth, Indian Creek, Fox River Grove, Lindenhurst and other cities within Lake and McHenry Counties Illinois.
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