Oklahoma Personal Injury Law Overview
Personal injury law is a broad area of law that encompasses accidents and other incidents that cause injury to someone. Personal injury law also includes anything that does financial injury to someone including damage or property or identity theft. Every state has its own specific personal injury laws.
Statute of Limitations
In the state of Oklahoma, the statute of limitations for most types of personal injury cases is two years. The statute of limitations is the time you have for filing your lawsuit after the date that incident or injury occurred. While it may seem pretty clear what the deadline would be to file the lawsuit, statutes of limitation can be very complicated. Medical malpractice is an example of where this can get tricky. With medical malpractice, the time is calculated from the date the injury is discovered or should have been discovered, instead of the date on which the injury was caused. For injured children, the rules are even more complicated.
Only an experienced Oklahoma personal injury lawyer understands the complexities of these laws and can help you through this difficult time.
Modified Comparative Negligence
Even if your own negligence contributed to your accident or injury, you can still collect monetary compensation. Modified comparative negligence states that as long as less than half of the responsibility falls on you, the others responsible parties can be held liable for their portion of the blame.
Several liability
Several liability means that if you sue more than one responsible party for your injuries and you win, you will have to collect from each party separately. It also means that if one party cannot pay you, you cannot collect more money from another responsible party.
Punitive damages
These are damages that are intended to be punishment to the responsible party. In Oklahoma, the amount of punitive damages to which you are entitled depends on the conduct of the defendant. If it is deemed the defendant showed reckless disregard for your rights, punitive damages will be limited to $100,000 or the compensatory damages. If the conduct was deemed malicious and intentional, then up to $500,000 or twice the compensatory damages can be awarded.
Non-economic damages
Non-economic damages include pain and suffering, emotional distress, loss of enjoyment of life, and other damages that don't directly cost you money. Oklahoma law caps this amount at $300,000 in medical malpractice cases.
To learn more about Oklahoma personal injury laws, please contact an experienced Oklahoma personal injury lawyer in your area.
