Open Intersection Motor Vehicle Accidents
I am Greg Coffey of Friedman Law Offices in Lincoln, Nebraska. Thanks for visiting our blog.
One of the most consistently difficult types of car accident cases is the case of a collision that takes place in an open intersection. An “open intersection” is one where there are no traffic control devices – no stop
Open Intersection Motor Vehicle Accidents
I am Greg Coffey of Friedman Law Offices in Lincoln, Nebraska. Thanks for visiting our blog.
One of the most consistently difficult types of car accident cases is the case of a collision that takes place in an open intersection. An “open intersection” is one where there are no traffic control devices – no stop lights, no stop signs or yield signs – where the rules of the road are that the driver on the left simply yields to the driver on the right. A lot of times, people who have had the right of way and been involved in these kinds of collisions are surprised to find out that the insurance adjuster is telling them that the accident was partially their fault. The reason this happens is that there is more to the cause of an accident than just who had the right of way in an open intersection and there is almost always something that an insurance adjuster will be able to find in order to say that the accident was partially your fault. For example, if you provide the insurance adjuster with a statement and they ask you when you first saw the other car, if you state that the first time you saw them was right when the collision happened, they will say that you failed to maintain a proper lookout, which would have enabled you to avoid the collision. The standard view of most insurance companies and, from our experience most juries as well, is that if you exercise reasonable precautions at an open intersection, there shouldn’t be a crash, even if the other driver violates the rules of the road, because you are taking care not to get hit. Insurance companies and juries tend to believe that any time there is a wreck in an open intersection, both drivers share some of the blame.
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