“How long is it going to take to settle my injury claim?”
My response is this: “How long is it going to take for you to recover?”
I love answering questions with a question, mostly because I’m a jerk. But this is a legitimate response. The length of time it takes to handle an injury claim is intrinsically tied to the recovery of the victim. It makes absolute sense that the value of a case where someone takes 1 week to recover is going to be less than the value of a case where it takes 1 year for them to recover. How do we know early on which of those situations you have? We don’t! We can’t! What about lost wages? Medical expenses? Permanent impairment? Scarring? How do we find the real depth of these issues without allowing them to reach their nadir?
If you really want a fair valuation of your claim, you have to give it time to develop.
It’s trite, but true: Do you want it done fast or do you want it done right? With respect to injury claims if you want it done fast, you’re not going to get it done right.
When you get a ticket in North Carolina, you have to a) show up for court and work it out, b) hire a lawyer to do that, or, in some circumstances, c) just pay it off.
If you don’t do any of these things, then the court gives you 20 days to get your junk together and go to the court house to say mea culpa and get a new court date. If you do, you then reset and get those options above.
But if you miss your court date and don’t get it rescheduled within 20 days this is reported to DMV. The clock starts running on you then and if you don’t meet DMV’s deadline they will revoke your license indefinitely.
This happens to a lot of people, and some of them call me to fix things. Some of them go to court themselves, some hire other attorneys.
What most people don’t realize is that even if you handle that ticket that revoked you your license is still going to be revoked until you contact DMV to pay a reinstatement fee. A lot of people don’t do this, so even when they think they’re fixed, they’re not.
Just don’t miss your court date. That’s the best way to avoid trouble. Call and attorney or show up.
But if you do miss it make sure you get some help and don’t forget to contact DMV after the ticket is resolved or you could end up with even more headache.
It’s absolutely fascinating, and an intriguing part of NC legal history.
In a nutshell: Two legislators are embroiled in a battle over estate of one of the legislator’s wives; the other legislator represented the wife’s family. The former (Fleming) being as another friend of mine says, “bigger, stronger, and more comfortable with violence,” attacked his diminutive rival attorney (Avery) with a whip and beat him to the point that he could not defend himself.
Weeks later as they both entered the courthouse in Morganton, Fleming was hurling insults at Avery, with no response by Avery. After Fleming was wrapping up his business with the court room clerk, Avery shot him within 5 feet of the judge.
Avery was found not guilty of murder by reason of “emotional insanity.” He would have to be insane to murder someone in front of a judge, right? That’s some fine lawyerin’.
Here’s the gist: Paying off your ticket is pleading guilty. That gets you a conviction. If you are paying off a moving violation, there’s a good chance you’ll get DMV and insurance points. That can get your license revoked and/or raise your insurance rates for three years. So don’t just pay off a ticket without talking to an attorney first. Most attorneys who handle tickets will tell you when paying one off is OK. Call one. Call me!
There is some weird s#!^ out there, and some of it results in lawsuits. This one might be the weirdest I’ve read about, and will almost certainly become a Lifetime movie.
The gist: Principal hypnotizes children at his school – dozens over the years – and several of them commit suicide or die in hypnotic trances. Families bring claims, each family gets $200,000.
What. The. Hell?
So it may not be quite as sinister as it sounds. Apparently he taught a psychology class and this was part of it. He allegedly offered hypnosis as a study and/or performance aid, and several students who participated over the years had not (to date) offed themselves.
But still, the correlation is enough to raise eyebrows.
In 2009 he was ordered to limit his hypno-fun to his psych classes. He was also charged criminally for practicing therapeutic hypnosis without a license and was fined and put on probation.
In the light most favorable to him, he’s a wacky dude who is just going the extra mile to help his students. But in the darkest view, he’s a hypno-predator that can only be stopped by the X-Men.
They can find him in our fine state of North Carolina, where he is apparently living in retirement.
People call me about traffic tickets all the time. They ask lots of questions. There are, admittedly, a limited amount of questions one might ask in relation to this sort of situation. But there is one question that I get a lot and it drives me nuts:
“Can I get a PJC?”
Sometimes they don’t even say “PJC.” Sometimes they’ll say “PFJ” or some other nonsense.
The question is not inherently the problem. The underlying assumption based on decades of legendary misinformation is the problem.
First, if you don’t know what a PJC is, click here. That will iron that out for you. If you don’t know what it is, you have no business asking for one. This video also makes a similar point as I’m about to make below…
Second, people think of the PJC as a panacea for all traffic tickets, all day, all the time. I picture Taco from The League Notarizing everything unnecessarily, or Dave Chappell pleading the 5th every time someone looks at him. The bottom line is a PJC is to be used ONLY in specific circumstances, and only when you know what the consequences will be vis-a-vis your driving record AND the driving record of everyone in your household. Yes, those matter, too.
I often see unrepresented people in traffic court asking for a PJC when they a) don’t need it and b) could actually be harming themselves by getting it. Judges and ADAs can only do so much to protect people from themselves, so this is another reason to get good advice from an attorney – like me!
What most people fail to realize as they are stumbling over themselves asking for a PJC is that in many circumstances an even better plea option would be a 10 or less over the limit. This is the unknown plea option that can make everything all (mostly) better. In North Carolina if you have no convictions of moving violations in the three year experience period around a 10 over (or less) you are not assigned insurance points for that conviction. Of course, a non-moving violation would be even better, but sometimes you can’t get that (for many reasons).
So just remember that a 10 over, with a clean record, is often times better than a PJC. But as with everything in the law it is always best to seek counsel before you go making deals with a prosecutor.
