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Articles Posted in Uninsured Motorist

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Summer break has ended here in Florida and schools are back in session. Consequently, there are an abundance of inexperienced teenaged drivers on the road. Many of these teenaged drivers are under 18 and driving their parents’ car. In 2015, there were 42,874 teenaged driver car crashes in Florida according to the Department of Highway Safety. At The Grife Law Firm, we have a wealth of experience representing people who have been seriously injured due to young, reckless drivers. Frequently, we are asked: Who can I hold responsible for the damages caused by a reckless teenaged driver?

Pursuant to Florida’s dangerous instrumentality doctrine, the owner of a vehicle is liable for damages caused by the negligence of permissive users. This doctrine was first recognized in the landmark 1920 case of Southern Cotton Oil Co. v. Anderson, wherein the Supreme Court of Florida held that, “[O]ne who authorizes and permits an instrumentality that is peculiarly dangerous in its operation to be used by another on the public highway, is liable in damages for injuries to third persons caused by the negligent operation of such instrumentality…” The rationale is that a motor vehicle is a potentially deadly piece of machinery that can cause serious harm, so the owner must bear some responsibility for damages caused by it. The hope is that the dangerous instrumentality doctrine will encourage vehicle owners to entrust only safe drivers to operate their cars. For purposes of our discussion, if a teenager drives in a reckless fashion and causes a car wreck, the owner of the at-fault vehicle will be held legally responsible for personal injury damages such as medical expenses, lost wages and pain and suffering.

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In an exciting win for Florida personal injury plaintiffs and their physicians, the state’s Supreme Court issued a recent landmark decision in the case of Worley v. Central Florida Young Men’s Christian Ass’n, Inc. The main issues in Worley were the permissibility of discovery as to who referred a plaintiff to her treating physicians and the financial relationship between those treating physicians and the plaintiff’s attorney. These hotly contested issues permeate many personal injury cases. In a very cogent opinion, the Supreme Court resolved these long-standing conflicts in favor of Florida personal injury plaintiffs by fully restoring the attorney-client privilege and making treating physician financial discovery off-limits.

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The increasing popularity of ride-sharing companies such as Uber and Lyft have given rise to a burgeoning area of law and personal injury claims. Many of us rely on these companies to get us home safely, but sometimes Uber and Lyft drivers can cause automotive crashes. Other times, another driver negligently causes a collision with an Uber or Lyft vehicle. Regardless of fault, there are certain insurance and legal issues that you should be aware of if you are involved in a ride-sharing automotive crash.

Uber and Lyft both market that they have secured high-limit insurance policies for the protection of their passengers. Currently, these two companies advertise that they have $1 million in liability and uninsured motorist coverage per incident (see our website on why you need Uninsured Motorist coverage for your personal automobile policy). This means if you are in a ride-sharing vehicle and that drivers causes a crash, you and all other injured parties have up to $1 million combined in liability coverage for your damages. Likewise, if an uninsured or underinsured driver crashes into your Uber or Lyft vehicle, you (and the other injured persons) will be covered up to $1 million combined from the ride-sharing company.

While $1 million might sound like a lot coverage, what happens if an Uber or Lyft driver causes a crash where there are a multitude of injured people whose aggregate claims are above $1 million? A negligent ride-sharing driver can severely injure or kill passengers in his or her vehicle and other drivers and their passengers. If this tragic event occurs, the injured parties will certainly want to make a claim directly against the ride-sharing company to collect more than the $1 million in insurance coverage. Under the agency law, the ride-sharing companies will likely argue that their drivers are independent contractors and not employees. That would mean under agency law that Uber or Lyft might not be held responsible for the damages.

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Drunk driving is a very serious crime that causes horrific car crashes.  Often times the drunken driver reaches egregious speeds and does not keep a proper lookout, which causes very heavy impact collisions. Having represented injury victims in Florida for over a decade, I have represented many people who were injured due to drunk and intoxicated drivers.  Often times, victims of drunk drivers and their loved ones feel particularly traumatized knowing that someone acted with such reckless indifference towards their safety – that the accident “did not have to happen”.

Florida law recognizes the extremely reckless nature of crashes caused by drunk drivers and offers punitive damages to their victims. Punitive damages, as prescribed by Fla. Stat. §768.72, are a special kind of damages that are not available in most cases.  They are designed to punish those who cause injury as a result of a, “conscious disregard or indifference to the life, safety, or rights of persons exposed to such conduct.”  Florida law ensures that drunk drivers are included in
that category.

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So you’re driving down I-95 with your family on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.  There’s traffic ahead so you slow down. As you are breaking…BOOM…you are rear-ended by a careless driver. Unfortunately, you suffer injuries to your neck that requires costly medical care. Your car is totaled and you miss time from work.

In the above scenario, if the at-fault driver were one of the 3.2 million uninsured drivers in Florida (2nd highest in the nation), you likely would not recover a dime for your injuries unless you had Uninsured

Motorist (“UM”) coverage. The reason: most if not all uninsured drivers have little or no assets to recover.  And as the saying goes, you cannot get blood from a stone.

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