Atlanta Personal Injury Lawyers Blog

An everyday car trip can make the turn from routine to tragic in a matter of mere seconds. All it takes is one driver who doesn't follow the rules of the road.

Recently, one teen has become forced to live with the catastrophic effects of someone else's negligence. He was paralyzed from the neck down following a Georgia car crash.

Eleven people died this week, including at least three from Georgia, in a tragic multi-car pileup on Interstate 75 near Gainesville, Florida.

The fatal accident occurred after a mix of thick fog and smoke from a nearby brush fire blinded drivers, reducing visibility to just a few feet. The road had been closed earlier, and was reopened just 39 minutes before the first vehicles collided.

All told, at least 12 cars, six semi-trucks and one motor home were involved in the crash.

A fifteen-year veteran of the Atlanta Police Department was killed this week after being struck by a drunk driver.

The 46 year-old officer was assisting with a traffic accident on the interchange ramp that connects southbound Interstate 75 to northbound Interstate 85. She had just exited her squad car when she was hit by a 22 year-old woman. The officer died at the scene of the car accident.

A lot of attention gets paid to the immediate aftermath of serious car accidents. But, once the road is clear and the news cycle changes, the public tends to forget about what happened.

The accident's survivors are rarely that lucky. Many will have to live with the consequences of their catastrophic injuries for the rest of their lives.

In 2007, a 3 year-old boy named Tyler was nearly killed in car accident. Even though he was buckled in a car seat, he was ejected from his vehicle after it rolled at least seven times. Tyler spent four months in a coma in an Atlanta hospital - even when he started to wake up, doctors warned his parents that he would never lead a normal life.

A six year-old Georgia girl suffered serious injuries last week when she was struck by an eighteen-wheeler while she was riding her bicycle.

The girl was apparently hit by the rear trailer tires. The driver did not stop to help her.

The girl experienced catastrophic injuries and was airlifted to Egleston Children's Hospital in Atlanta. There, she received a blood transfusion and had surgery to repair damaged organs. She also suffered several broken bones. The most recent report on the girl's condition stated that she still required the aid of a ventilator to breathe and was in critical, but stable, condition.

Getting behind the wheel after drinking is one of the most dangerous things any driver can do. As if drunk driving wasn't bad enough, some intoxicated drivers try to evade responsibility for their actions by fleeing from the scene after causing an accident.

Sometimes, police are able to catch hit-and-run drunk drivers and bring them to justice.

One such case is currently playing out in the Georgia courts. An assistant principal at Booker T. Washington High School was charged this week with seven criminal violations stemming from her decision to flee the scene of two Atlanta drunk driving accidents on December 21.

What if your employer withheld information about your job, and limited the availability of safety equipment that could have protected you from injury? That's exactly what former football players are suing the NFL for. The players say the NFL knew that concussions could cause irreversible brain injuries as early as the 1920s.

In the lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court in Atlanta, the former NFL players allege the league knew for decades that the rough hits they take and the concussions some players received from playing football caused severe brain damage, but neglected to make the information public until last year.

Sometimes people need help for various mental illnesses and seek out the help of a therapist to guide them. This person has to be someone they trust, and they tell things they wouldn't tell anyone else. Unfortunately, a Georgia teen who was seeking help for mental illness was shot and killed by police in front of his family and therapist.

The family doesn't believe lethal force by police was necessary. The teen allegedly got into a disagreement with his therapist when he brought out a machete, prompting the therapist to call 911. The therapist was trying to reason with the teen, when police drew their guns in this fatal accident.