What exactly is a car accident?
“Are you serious?” you ask. “Isn’t that obvious?” Yes, I am serious and no, the answer is not always obvious.
Consider the situation where you get out of your car, close the door, walk around to the passenger side and open the door to retrieve your lunch. You slip and fall on ice. Were you injured in a car accident? What about a circumstance where you are bicycling and a car door opens and strikes you and causes you to fall? Was that a car accident? What if the driver of that car opened the door to deliberately injure you? What if he then gets out of his car and kicks you several times? These can in fact be considered car accidents but the facts of each case are what determine whether or not it is.
Why does this matter?
Accident benefits are available to people injured in a motor vehicle accident. That is true even if you do not have your own automobile insurance policy. Accident benefits include payment for medical treatment and income replacement while you recover. To be eligible for those benefits the injury must arise directly from the use or operation of a motor vehicle.
My auto insurer told me that my injuries were not the result of a car accident, what now?
Talk to a lawyer. A lawyer will ask you detailed questions about what happened. They will be familiar with recent hearing decisions and will know how similar types of disputes are decided.
