subject: What Evidence is Needed in a Minnesota Personal Injury Case [print this page] What Evidence is Needed in a Minnesota Personal Injury Case
When someone files a lawsuit, they need to show much more at trial than someone did something bad. There are many elements of the case that need to be proven in order to recover anything. Here is a quick summary of what needs to be proven in a typical negligence case:
Duty
Legal duties are defined over centuries of "common law" as well as the legislative process. In car accident personal injury cases, the duty is usually to act with reasonable care. In other words, what should a reasonable person do under the circumstances? For example, the reasonable person should maintain proper lookout, be aware of his or her surroundings and follow all traffic laws.
In order to prevail on a lawsuit, you need to prove the existence of a duty that the defendant (or someone for whom the defendant was responsible) owed you.
Breach of Duty
A breach of one's duty is a failure to meet your legal standard. Most of the time, in car accidents, that breach of duty is a failure to drive with reasonable care. Driving while texting, distracted, or under the influence are obvious breaches of one's duty. Other breaches include breaking traffic laws or failing to yield right-of-way.
Proving a breach of duty is necessary to prevail in a car accident claim. If the jury finds that the defendant acted reasonably, you cannot recover, no matter how bad you are hurt.
Damages
Usually, if you are not hurt, you have no case. One might be surprised at how often this comes up. Someone is liable based on his or her bad conduct, but only to the extent that he or she causes harm. There are situations where someone might pursue punitive damages, but for the most part, a personal injury case is valued on the extent of damages done to the victim.
We often hear people say that they could have been seriously hurt and were lucky to escape without a scratch. The response is usually, "That's good news. Be thankful you don't have a good lawsuit."
Causation
It isn't enough that the defendant broke the rules and that you got hurt. The bad conduct must have been the proximate cause of the harm for you to prevail. There are lawbooks full of definitions of proximate cause, but the general rule is based on what is reasonably foreseeable. Obviously, one of the reasonable foreseeable consequences of careless driving is an accident and a potential injury to someone else.
The biggest obstacle in proving causation is usually when there is a preexisting medical condition can be related. Sometimes the defendant's lawyer will say you were hurt already or would have had these problems anyway to challenge you on this necessary element of your case. Because you have the burden of proof, this can be very effective.
Extra requirements based on the situation
Finally, the law can require further elements of a case in order to recover anything.
Damages beyond lost wages and medical expenses are considered non-economic. This includes pain and suffering, lost earning capacity, loss of enjoyment of life and other big harms. The Minnesota No-Fault law requires your injury to meet a threshold in order to recover ANYTHING toward these harms. Proof of the threshold is another necessary element of a case. A jury might award $1,000,000 in pain and suffering but if it determines that you do not meet a threshold, you would get nothing
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