What Does “Liability” Mean in a Tampa Car Accident Lawsuit?

If you’re approaching a Tampa car accident lawsuit for the first time, you might be encountering many new terms for the first time. Perhaps one of the most important concepts to understand is something called “liability.” What exactly does this word mean, and how might it affect your pathway toward compensation?

Liability Is Responsibility 

When someone is liable for a car accident, they are legally responsible for that car accident. In other words, liability is equivalent to fault. While the goal is to prove that a defendant is “guilty” in criminal court, plaintiffs instead try to prove liability in civil court.

Although liability is roughly the same thing as fault, there is an additional element involved: Compensation. When someone becomes legally responsible for an accident, they also become “liable” for the injured party’s “damages.” In other words, they must pay for the injured party’s medical bills, missed earnings, and any non-economic (psychological) damages.

A person may be liable for a car accident under various circumstances. Perhaps the most obvious examples of liability involve actions. These might include crossing the center line, running a red light, speeding, operating a vehicle while intoxicated, and so on. However, liability may also include “inactions.” For example, a driver might fail to properly maintain their vehicle. They might also fail to yield or fail to use their turn signals.

Liability vs. Negligence

If you’re researching how personal injury lawsuits work, you might have also come across the term “negligence.” How is this distinct from liability? Think of negligence as the first step in this legal process. In order to prove that a defendant is liable, you must first establish their negligence. In other words, negligence takes the form of specific actions or inactions, whereas liability is the “final outcome” of a car accident lawsuit that forces the defendant to cover damages.

Proving negligence is a four-part process that involves establishing a duty of care, breach of duty, causation, and injuries. That being said, proving negligence is not always necessary when establishing liability. In cases involving “strict liability,” injured victims may only need to show that a specific thing (such as a defective automobile) caused their accident.

The Preponderance of Evidence

As with many elements of a personal injury case, the “preponderance of evidence” standard applies when establishing negligence. In other words, injured victims must show that their allegations are “more likely than not” to have occurred. Some also refer to this as a 50 percent threshold.

Can a Tampa Car Accident Lawyer Help Me?

A Tampa car accident lawyer may be able to explain concepts like liability and negligence in more detail. While these terms might seem complex, the underlying definitions are actually quite simple. Furthermore, you don’t need to become a legal scholar simply to get compensation for your car accident. Rely on Anderson & Anderson to help you recover enough to cover medical bills, missed wages, and any other damages you’ve endured.

Sources: 

law.cornell.edu/wex/liability

leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0768/Sections/0768.81.html