Help Your Fellow Biker After A Wreck—Witness Identification
Can Witness Information Help?
Being a motorcycle accident attorney, this is something that I see constantly that becomes a big problem in motorcycle wreck cases, and that is police officers seem to almost consistently not put witness information on a police report.
So, you get in a wreck and have one or more people that saw it. They stop and talk to the police. Time and time again, I get the police report, and the client tells me, “Oh yeah, there was this lady or that guy stopped, you know, he was in a truck.”
We have no clue who it is, we have nothing to identify that person, and we can’t find them. It’s unbelievable. I’ve trained police officers on how to do this, yet they still don’t do it.
How Can I Be Prepared?
Here’s what you guys need to do to help protect each other. If you’re riding in a group and one of your fellow bikers goes down, you’re a witness there. Yes, you need to help them first and foremost with any injuries until the police, ambulance, firefighters, etc. arrive.
If there are witnesses and you’re talking to them, get their name, number, and address if you can. You have to protect your fellow bikers, because unlike in cars when you’re in an accident, you can often walk away and get this kind of info yourself as the injured party.
When it’s a biker, you’re often times incapacitated, you’re dealing with a broken bone, and you’re not consumed with who all saw the accident, who they are, and what’s their information. When we’re there with a fellow biker, get that information for your friend, give it to them and give it to their lawyer.
Let me give you an example, I’ve got a recent case where a truck ran into the rear of a motorcyclist waiting to turn left at a stop sign. At the scene, he was conciliatory, admitted fault, and was so sorry.
It seemed like a very straightforward rear-end collision, well guess what? We get involved, the insurance companies are involved, and he changes his story to his own insurance company. They’ve delayed the property damage claim for weeks because they’ve got their insured saying something different that sounds like the motorcyclist might have some comparative negligence.
No witnesses are on the police report, even though we knew one was there. We even have a picture of his truck. Still, we don’t have a license, we don’t have any other kind of identifying information to find this guy who can blow it up and say this is precisely what happened, it was a rear-end collision and this guy’s entirely at fault.
Let’s Help Our Fellow Bikers
So, now the insurance company is delaying processing this motorcycle accident claim to investigate further. In the end, we’ve got to help our fellow bikers get that information on witnesses for them so they can worry about their injuries and getting to a hospital.
When you become our client at Spaulding Injury Law, you’ll be represented by a thoroughly experienced Atlanta personal injury attorney like Theodore A. Spaulding. For over 15 years, Mr. Spaulding has helped victims of negligence across the state of Georgia resolve personal injury cases, and he’s received a remarkable number of awards and honors from the legal community recognizing his commitment to clients and to the metro-Atlanta area.
Mr. Spaulding has been named one of the Top 100 trial lawyers in Georgia by the National Trial Lawyers for six successive years.
He is honored as a lifetime member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum ® by the Top Trial Lawyers in America ®.
Charter Member of the Distinguished Justice Advocates.
Member of the Atlanta Bar Association.