Collecting Evidence for St Petersburg Car Accident Litigation
Collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation can be an extremely important part of a personal injury case. During an injury claim, the plaintiff needs to be able to show that the defendant owed them a duty of care, the defendant breached that duty, and that breach ultimately led to their injuries. Evidence in the form of doctor’s reports, photographs, and video media can be used in order to help prove these concepts. If you wish to learn more about what goes into collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation, consider speaking with a dedicated injury attorney today.
Gathering Evidence Before Filing a Claim
The tools of gathering evidence are specific to the attorney, but normally if there are investigations involved, then they have access to public records, private security cameras, and video cameras that exist for traffic monitoring in Florida. Because these recordings can get taped over after a certain amount of time, it can be important to act quickly. An experienced injury lawyer knows how to acquire that necessary information when collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation, and retain it to ensure that it can be used in a case.
What Do Attorneys Look For?
There is evidence that lawyers can collect at the car accident, such as the photographs of the vehicles, the reports from the police officers that arrive at the scene. A general photographic documentation of the actual accident scene itself is very important. Beyond that, the type of case and what its issues are will dictate what other evidentiary concerns that the situation may hold.
An experienced attorney is going to be able to solve those evidentiary problems and they will be able to know what additional resources to look for, such as the black box information from the cars, the videotapes from the traffic cameras, the surveillance footage from local businesses, or the witness statements from individuals that may have witnessed the accident.
Legal Rights to Seek Data
When collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation, the attorney will generally gather the witness statements, the photographs, and the reports from law enforcement in order to document what exactly transpired at the scene. The plaintiff has the right to view public records in the state of Florida. An individual needs to request specific governmental agencies to provide them with information.
An injured individual has the right to seek private businesses and collect data from their security cameras if they allow it. Regardless, if someone notifies them that they have an evidentiary concern, the property is obligated to keep that documentation as long as they provide the appropriate legal notice to do so.
Preparing for Court
If they are litigating a case, an attorney is obligated to provide all of the evidence that they intend to use during the trial to the other side for their review and evaluation. If they do not provide it in what is called discovery, they will lose the ability to use it in the future. The most important thing to note when collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation is that things change very quickly and the window of opportunity to collect the best evidence they can to promote their case closes if they do not gather evidence as soon as it happens.
If you require professional assistance in collecting evidence for St Petersburg car accident litigation, do not hesitate to reach out to a professional injury attorney today to begin your investigation.