The Baez Law Firm | San Antonio Lawyers and Attorneys

The Baez Law Firm | San Antonio Lawyers and Attorneys
San Antonio Lawyers and Attorneys

Thursday, March 20, 2008

What is Personal Injury Protection (PIP)?

Personal Injury Protection (PIP) is an extension of car insurance available in Texas, which covers medical expenses and, in some cases, lost wages and other damages. PIP pays off regardless of who is at fault and is mandatory in some states, especially those with no-fault laws. PIP coverage may vary from state to state.

PIP can cover within the specified limits, the medical, hospital and funeral expenses of the insured, others in his vehicles and pedestrians struck by him. The basic coverage for the insured's own injuries on a first-party basis, without regard to fault. It is only available in certain states.

Personal injury protection insurance is an option that you can purchase when you buy automobile insurance. PIP pays for your medical expenses and your lost wages when you’re in a car accident or wreck. PIP has two important features. First, there is no subrogation interest; unlike health insurance, if you submit bills to your PIP carrier, you do not have to reimburse the PIP carrier for amounts paid when you receive a verdict or settlement that includes the same bills. And second, you can submit bills to your PIP carrier even if the bills have been paid by your health insurance.

If you have been injured in an accident, we can help. The Báez Law Firm, P.C. is here to protect your legal needs. Call us at (210) 979-9777 or visit our websited http://www.thebaezlawfirm.com or http://www.sanantoniopersonalinjurytriallawyers.com for a free initial consultation. We care about your legal needs.


Saturday, March 8, 2008

Texas wrongful death claims

A wrongful death has occurred when a person is killed due to the negligence or other liability of a person or entity. Surviving beneficiaries and dependents are entitled to monetary damages in instances of wrongful death.

The Texas Legislature in 1860 enacted the original Texas Wrongful Death Statute. The Wrongful Death Act has been amended, codified and recodified over the years and is now Chapter 71 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code.The Act provides the exclusive remedy for wrongful death in Texas, compensating the decedent's spouse, parents, and children for the losses they sustained as a result of the decedent's injury and death. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(a).

A wrongful death action is separate and distinct from a survival action, where the individual's cause of action for injury to his health, reputation or person survives in favor of his heirs, legal representative, and estate. See Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.021.
"A person is liable for damages arising from an injury that causes an individual's death if the injury was caused by the person/agents or servant's wrongful act, neglect, carelessness, unskillfulness or default." Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.002(b).

Suit may be brought under the Act "only if the individual injured would have been entitled to bring an action for the injury if he had lived." Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.003(a). Under Texas law, plaintiffs bringing a wrongful death action are in the procedural shoes of the victim, and the defenses to victim's personal injury action are defenses to plaintiff's wrongful death claim.

The basic elements of a wrongful death claim are:
Death caused, in whole or in part, by the conduct of another person or entity.
Person or entity was negligent, or strictly liable, for victim's death
There are surviving beneficiaries or dependents
Monetary damages have resulted from individuals death.

The wrongful death action is subject to all the conditions to which decedent's action would have been subject had he or she only been injured. If a defendant to a wrongful death action dies while the suit is pending, or if an individual against whom an action could be instituted dies before the suit is filed, the individual's executor or administrator may be named as defendant in his place. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.008(a).

The surviving spouse, children and parents may bring the suit. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(b). If named beneficiaries do not bring an action within three (3) months of the death of the injured party, the executor or administrator of the estate shall bring the action on behalf of the beneficiaries unless instructed not to do so by all the beneficiaries. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(c).

A wrongful death cause of action accrues at death, if it exists at all, 2 years from death.
The two-year statute of limitations is absolute from the date of death. The so-called "discovery rule" does not apply in wrongful death and survival actions. In death cases raising limitations issues in medical malpractice claims, the courts have determined that, as between the statute of limitations for death claims, §16.003(b) of the Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann., and the statute of limitations set forth in § 74.251. for health care liability claims, the latter applied.

If your love one has been killed due to the negligence of others, please give us a call (210) 979-9777 or visit our websites: http://www.thebaezlawfirm.com http://www.sanantoniopersonalinjurytriallawyers.com for a free initial consultation. Because we care about your legal needs!

Texas wrongful death actions

A wrongful death has occurred when a person is killed due to the negligence or other liability of a person or entity. Surviving beneficiaries and dependents are entitled to monetary damages in instances of wrongful death. The Texas Legislature in 1860 enacted the original Texas Wrongful Death Statute. The Wrongful Death Act has been amended, codified and recodified over the years and is now Chapter 71 of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code.

The Act provides the exclusive remedy for wrongful death in Texas, compensating the decedent, spouse, parents, and children for the losses they sustained as a result of the decedent's injury and death. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(a).

A wrongful death action is separate and distinct from a survival action, where the individual's cause of action for injury to his health, reputation or person survives in favor of his heirs, legal representative, and estate. See Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.021.

"A person is liable for damages arising from an injury that causes an individual's death if the injury was caused by the person/agent or servant's wrongful act, neglect, carelessness, unskillfulness or default." Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.002(b).

Suit may be brought under the Act "only if the individual injured would have been entitled to bring an action for the injury if he had lived." Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.003(a). Under Texas law, plaintiffs bringing a wrongful death action are in the procedural shoes of the victim, and the defenses to victim's personal injury action are defenses to plaintiff's wrongful death claim.

The basic elements of a wrongful death claim are:
Death caused, in whole or in part, by the conduct of another person or entity.
Person or entity was negligent, or strictly liable, for victim's death
There are surviving beneficiaries or dependents
Monetary damages have resulted from individuals death.

The wrongful death action is subject to all the conditions to which decedent's action would have been subject had he or she only been injured. If a defendant to a wrongful death action dies while the suit is pending, or if an individual against whom an action could be instituted dies before the suit is filed, the individual's executor or administrator may be named as defendant in his place. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.008(a).

The surviving spouse, children and parents may bring the suit. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(b). If named beneficiaries do not bring an action within three (3) months of the death of the injured party, the executor or administrator of the estate shall bring the action on behalf of the beneficiaries unless instructed not to do so by all the beneficiaries. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann. §71.004(c).

A wrongful death cause of action accrues at death, if it exists at all, 2 years from death.
The two-year statute of limitations is absolute from the date of death. The so-called "discovery rule" does not apply in wrongful death and survival actions. In death cases raising limitations issues in medical malpractice claims, the courts have determined that, as between the statute of limitations for death claims, §16.003(b) of the Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code Ann., and the statute of limitations set forth in § 74.251. for health care liability claims, the latter applied.

Monday, March 3, 2008

Something about the presidential candidates

Sen. Barack Obama's name could well come up in the trial of his longtime friend and accused Illinois fixer Tony Rezko, according to Chicago lawyers following the case.

Even before Barack Obama graduated from law school, his career as a lawyer and politician was nurtured by a Chicago businessman named Tony Rezko. Now Senator Obama avoids discussing Rezko.The most recent public appearance of the once-dapper businessman was in a federal court, unshaven, wearing an orange jumpsuit and constrained by leg irons.

Senator Obama hopes to beat Hillary Clinton in this week's Texas and Ohio primaries, victories that may ensure his nomination for president. At the same time, prosecutors and defence lawyers are expected to be in a Chicago courtroom selecting a jury to decide Rezko's fate.
In a high-profile corruption case, Rezko is accused of extortion for peddling influence in the administration of the Democratic Governor, Rod Blagojevich. The trial could last until June, over four critical months in Senator Obama's presidential campaign. His campaign aides know Rezko will be a distraction but do not believe it will have serious impact.

"Rezko has been a friend and supporter [of Obama's], as he has been with many politicians," said Senator Obama's chief strategist, David Axelrod. "It's always easy in retrospect to say this or that should have been a warning flag."Mr Blagojevich, believed to be a subject of the investigation though he is not charged, denies wrongdoing. Senator Obama is not implicated. But the US District judge Amy St Eve made it likely that Senator Obama's name would come up in court by ruling that prosecutors may introduce evidence that Rezko used straw donors to make donations to politicians, apparently including Senator Obama.

In a debate in January, Senator Clinton jabbed Senator Obama over his legal representation of Rezko "in his slum landlord business in inner-city Chicago". Senator Obama said the characterisation was not accurate.Senator Obama had represented the non-profit Woodlawn Preservation and Investment Corp, founded by Bishop Arthur Brazier of the Apostolic Church of God.

Woodlawn was a partner of Rezko in four low-income housing projects. In 1994 Senator Obama represented Woodlawn on a troubled project it later shared with Rezko.The city of Chicago sued, alleging Woodlawn failed to provide tenants with heat in the winter, and Senator Obama represented the landlord in court.


In 1975, a 27-year-old Hillary Rodham, acting as a court-appointed attorney, attacked the credibility of a 12-year-old girl in mounting an aggressive defense for an indigent client accused of rape in Arkansas — using her child development background to help the defendant....
In her 2003 autobiography "Living History," Clinton writes that she initially balked at the assignment, but eventually secured a lenient plea deal for Taylor after a New York-based forensics expert she hired "cast doubt on the evidentiary value of semen and blood samples collected by the sheriff's office."...

"She was vigorously advocating for her client. What she did was appropriate," said Andrew Schepard, director of Hofstra Law School's Center for Children, Families and the Law. "He was lucky to have her as a lawyer ... In terms of what's good for the little girl? It would have been hell on the victim. But that wasn't Hillary's problem."...

Presidential contender John McCain has a lawyer joke that he routinely tells when he is on the stump, the Wall Street Journal Law Blog reports.The well-known—and rather old—joke goes like this:What is the difference between a catfish and a lawyer? One is a scum-sucking bottom dweller. The other is a fish.

McCain also told the joke on the Tonight Show. When asked to comment, McCain spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker simply told the blog, “It’s a joke.”The blog’s comments section included several more jokes, including this one:A junior partner at a national law firm dies in an accident. He meets St. Peter at the pearly gates and protests, “This has to be a mistake, I’m only 35 years old.”St. Peter replies, “No mistake. According to your billing diaries, you’re 110.”

Huckabee was born in Hope, Arkansas, to Mae Elder (1925-1999) and Dorsey Wiles Huckabee (1923-1996), both natives of Hope. His surname is of English origin. His father worked as a fireman and mechanic, and his mother worked as a clerk at a gas company. His father was a strict disciplinarian, and left a lasting impression. Speaking to Charles Gibson of ABC News, he explained with a grin: "My father was the ultimate patriot. You know, he’d lay on the stripes, and I’d see stars."

Huckabee's first job, at 14, was working at a radio station where he would read the news and weather. He was elected Governor of Arkansas Boys State in 1972 and is a Hugh O'Brian Youth Leadership Alumnus. He was president of Hope High School in 1973. He has one sister who is a middle school teacher.Huckabee married his wife, Janet McCain, on May 25, 1974. He graduated magna cum laudefrom Ouachita Baptist University, completing his bachelor's degree in Religion in 2½ years before attending Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, where he dropped out after one year.

He has two honorary doctoral degrees: a Doctor of Humane Letters, received from John Brown University in 1991, and a Doctor of Laws from Ouachita Baptist University in 1992.

The Baez Law Firm does not endorse any political candidates or their campains. This information is for public use and may be disseminated as needed. If you need to talk to an attorney, please contact us at (210) 979-9777 or visit our websites http://www.thebaezlawfirm.com or http://www.sanantoniopersonalinjurytriallawyers.com for a free initial consultation.

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Find Personal Injury Trial Lawyers that will treat you with dignity and respect. The Baez Law Firm, P.C. is dedicated to help those less fortunate. Our San Antonio Lawyers also handle family law, criminal defense, business law, immigration, social security disability, patent law, trade marks and much more. We are professionals that care about your legal needs. Our motto is simple: “Minimizing Legal Worries!”℠ Visit us at http://www.thebaezlawfirm.com or call us (210) 979-9777. Have a blessed day!

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