Dallas Personal Injury Attorney - An Interview with Wesley Johnson
Q. Tell us about yourself and your practice.
A. I have practiced civil litigation law since 1983. I am fully licensed by the State Bar of Texas. I am a member of the State Bar of Texas College (meaning I attend 30 hours or more of continuing legal education annually. 15 hours is the minimum required to keep a license), a member of the Dallas Bar Association, the American Association for Justice (AAJ), the Texas Trial Lawyers Association (TTLA) and the Dallas Trial Lawyers Association (DTLA). The members of AAJ, TTLA and DTLA restrict their services to individuals, families and small businesses. We do not represent insurance companies or major corporations. I am married; have a daughter living in Georgia because her husband is stationed in the army there and has a three year old granddaughter with them, whom I miss a lot. I am a sole practitioner by choice, meaning I am responsible for all aspects of my clients’ cases, not a paralegal or secretary.
Q. If a mom asked you to tell us what does personal injury mean what would you say?
A. Personal injury means primarily bodily injury. The primary problem my personal injury clients have is a traumatic experience, involving a part of their body that may also manifest itself as mental anguish, worry, frustration, fear and the like causing medical bills and lost income. Many a time family discord is caused by a family member who cannot function normally because of aches, pains, mental frustration and lack of income.
Q. People have accidents every day. What separates a simple accident from one where a person should seek your firm’s assistance?
A. An injured party should seek the advice of a lawyer when the injury is caused due to the negligence of an outside party. Examples of such accidents are a car wreck caused by another driver not paying attention to the rules of the road, a slip and fall caused by the condition of the premises where the fall happened, an animal bite caused by an animal owner who fails to control the animal. Most people rightfully believe that if they are injured by the negligence of another party and they are honest and reasonable with the responsible party’s insurance carrier they don’t need to consult a lawyer. Unfortunately, in many if not most cases that is not true. An insurance company makes a profit by paying less in claims, than it collects in premiums. So by nature an insurance company is not fully interested in fairness or truth. It is interested in saving money, which is accomplished by dealing with people who don’t know the business. A lawyer knows the business and places the injured person on a level playing field with the insurance company.
Q. Do you offer free initial consultations?
A. Yes, I offer free initial telephone consultations and if necessary I will travel to a person’s home or a hospital. Equally important, all my clients are working folks, so I will schedule an initial meeting around a potential client’s work or his or her spouse’s work, since it is so important for a spouse to understand what is going on and to ask questions.
Q. What is the process to file a personal injury lawsuit?
A. The process to file a personal injury claim is simple. Contact the responsible party or that party’s insurance company, gather the information necessary to evaluate the claim and try to negotiate a settlement that is fair and just for the injured party. If a fair and just settlement cannot be achieved, a lawsuit is filed in the appropriate court and the amount the injured party should be compensated is left to the discretion of the court or a jury.
Q. How long after an incident does one have to hire an Attorney?
A. An injured party can hire a lawyer immediately or anytime before the statute of limitations expires on a claim. A statute of limitations is the deadline for filing a lawsuit and is designed to prevent stale evidence from witnesses, who do not remember an incident and other stale evidence caused by the passage of time.
Q. What kind of monetary compensation will one get from a personal injury settlement?
A. An injured person is entitled to compensation for medical expenses, lost income, pain impairment, disfigurement and something called mental anguish, such as lying awake all night worrying. The amount of compensation is limited to the damages a party can prove or may also be limited by the amount of insurance carried by a responsible person. For example, if a negligent party carries only $25,000.00 of liability insurance, but the injured person’s medical expenses exceeds $25,000.00 the injured victim’s recovery will be less than the real hurt caused by the responsible party.
Q. Who is responsible when a person is injured?
A. The entity responsible when a person is injured is the entity that had a duty to act in such a way as to prevent the injury. For example, we all have the duty to drive prudently and safely on public streets and highways...if we breach the duty like driving 65 in a 35 mph zone and our speeding causes a wreck injuring somebody else, we are responsible. On the other hand if we have no duty to act we are not responsible...for example one can be walking by a public swimming pool and see somebody drowning but unless one is the lifeguard there is no duty to help and save the drowning person. Duty is the key to responsibility.
Q. What will one have to prove to win a case?
A. Winning a case requires marshalling of evidence and presenting it to another entity in a persuasive manner...it is very similar to having a good teacher. We all remember that special teacher, who took a hard subject and broke it down into pieces simple enough to penetrate our thick skulls. The same concept applies to lawsuits.
