If someone hurts you on purpose, they will be responsible for your injuries.
The vast majority of personal injury cases involve negligence: a person was careless or reckless, and you were hurt as a result. However, in some situations, someone is hurt through the intentional actions of another person, causing injuries. This is known as an intentional tort.
A tort is a wrongful act that causes harm to another person, leading to civil liability. Personal injury cases are also known as torts, because they involve wrongful acts (usually negligent acts) that result in another person being injured. Intentional torts are those torts that were caused on purpose, such as a physical or sexual assault.
In many situations, an intentional tort will result in criminal charges against the perpetrator. If you have been injured in any way, you may also be able to file a civil lawsuit against this person. However, you may find it difficult to recover for your losses in an intentional tort case because the person who hurt you will not be covered by his or her insurance policy. This means that in most cases, you will be able to recover more if a person hurt you by accident (through negligence) than if they did it on purpose.
Coverage for Intentional Torts
Most insurance policies do not cover the intentional or criminal actions of their insured. If a person pushes you down in their home, for example, that person’s homeowner’s insurance will not typically cover your injuries. If a person purposefully rams you with their car, their car insurance will similarly not cover your injuries. That is because most insurance policies have exclusions for intentional acts; if their insured hurts someone on purpose, insurance is unlikely to cover it.
So how can a person be compensated for injuries that they suffered from an intentional tort? There are a few options to recover money for your damages in intentional tort cases. Because your attacker’s insurance will probably not cover the claim, you can file a lawsuit directly against the person who hurt you. This raises the question of whether the person has sufficient money to pay any damages that may be awarded. If you had a significant injury that required hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical care, your attacker may not have the funds to cover these losses. A skilled personal injury attorney can determine if that person has assets — such as a house or car — that can be used in a personal injury case. Alternatively, you attorney may look for other parties to sue — particularly those that have insurance coverage. You may be able to file a claim against a business (or their insurance) if they did not have adequate security to protect you, or against a homeowner (or their insurance) if the person who hurt you was a guest in their home. An experienced personal injury attorney can analyze all available avenues for compensation to help make sure that you get the best possible recovery for your losses.
If you have been hurt through another person’s intentional conduct, contact the Law Offices of Larry H. Parker today at 800-333-0000 or info@larryhparker.com. We will work with you to discover every possible method of recovering money for you, including through filing suit against the person who hurt you and third parties who may also be responsible. Initial consultations are always free, and we never charge you a fee unless we get money for you.
