Advocating for You Diligently

Panchenko Law Firm works on a contingency basis on all personal injury matters and on an hourly basis on all other cases. That is, in a personal injury matter, we do not charge you anything at the outset, however, upon settlement of the case we charge a fee of 33% of the final settlement amount. Fees for all other services vary. Please call us today to find out more.

Today more than ever, you need effective counsel in order to recover the full value of your claim. Good faith claims handling and outstanding customer service are pledges often made by insurance companies and insurance adjusters. Unfortunately, the reality is often sadly different. Insurance companies will even promise to pay for your medical expenses, and even if by some miracle they make a full payment, which rarely happens, you will still miss out on other types of damages that you may be unaware of.

Today, most insurance companies are publicly held entities with the overriding mandate to their stakeholders to constantly and continuously improve the bottom line at the expense of the injured. More often than not, adjusters will offer low settlements, as they are aware that you do not have recourse and will likely accept it. In doing so, they improve their bottom line and maximize profits.

The insurance adjuster investigating the accident will attempt to determine who is negligent or at-fault. He or she will consider a number of factors, which generally include: police report, pictures of the accident and property damages, witness statements, statements from both drivers, traffic signals sequence reports and other factors.

North Carolina Contributory Negligence Law (See our Blogs for more details) completely bars a driver from collecting any damages if determined to be even 1% at fault. Thus, in essence, if you contribute to an accident in any way, you may not be able to collect on a liability claim. Any disagreement will ultimately have to be resolved in a court of law, which can be extremely costly.

As such, the insurance adjuster will focus hard on finding fault on your part or for any other reason to deny your claim.

Generally, a buyer picks an attorney that will close a real estate transaction. As such, that attorney will primarily represent the interests of the buyer. Attorney will ensure that the seller actually owns the property and hasn't sold it to someone else, that the seller has the right to convey the property, and that the property is free from encumbrances. An attorney will then obtain a title insurance policy that will protect a buyer from any encumbrances that may have been missed during the title search. Therefore, we strongly recommend to hire an attorney for all of your real estate transactions.

The term "Vicarious Liability" (also referred to as "imputed negligence") refers to the doctrine that makes one person responsible for the negligent actions of another.

Vicarious liability is an exception to the normal principle of individualized fault and enables an injured person to seek redress from another who is not the party primarily responsible.

In a case involving imputed negligence, liability will be imposed on one person for the negligence of another based on the relationship between the parties, or arising from a positive rule of common or statutory law, or contract.