Kirkland Maritime Accident Attorney
Commercial Fishing Injuries & Recreational Boating Accidents
Commercial fishing or recreational boating accidents can be devastating, career-ending, and fatal. If you find yourself dealing with a serious maritime accident, you need to hire a personal injury attorney immediately. An experienced legal advocate can investigate the circumstances of your accident and obtain corroborating statements from witnesses on the vessel or in a recreational boating accident to support your claim.
When dealing with these types of cases, you need to establish proof of liability through witness statements and other various means. The underwriter of any vessel in a commercial fishing or another vessel on the high seas should be able to obtain statements of witnesses who are critical to your case, and our attorney can help facilitate the investigation. After a job is finished, crew members often disappear, moving on to other vessels or returning home, which is why acting fast to build your case is absolutely essential.
Let Attorney Rob Kornfeld Help You
At Kornfeld Law, our experienced legal team has the resources and the experience necessary to help you after a maritime accident involving a commercial or recreational boating incident. Attorney Robert Kornfeld has more than 38 years of legal experience and he has obtained more than $35 million in compensation for his clients. If you were seriously injured, you have a right to seek compensation for the resulting damages and our firm can help you fight for the justice you deserve.
Injured After a Boating Accident? We Can Help
Following a serious accident, it is absolutely crucial to take statements when the vessel is in port. Once an accident has taken place, you must inform your attorney of all possible eyewitnesses who could have seen the incident in question, or the conditions that led to the accident. Doing so better enables the investigator may obtain statements from all possible witnesses, supporting your case.
Potential Damages in a Maritime Accident
Next, proof of damages must be established. Typically, the damages you claim will include anything that affects the loss of past, present, or future earnings. For example, the vessel owner and crew might have earned future wages through ongoing fishing contracts with the same or other employers in seasons to come, if the accident hadn’t occurred. Therefore, an injured seaman may be entitled to lost future earnings and deserves compensation for the potential earnings, just like anyone injured in a car accident who is unable to return to work.
This injury may affect future anticipated contracts of employment with this or other vessels, or other work in the private sector. In the meantime, regardless of liability, injured seamen (which includes women) are entitled to recover medical treatment and ongoing maintenance, a daily wage. This care will continue until the seaman reaches maximum medical improvement, according to his or her treating physician.
Crews are often required to work under onerous and hazardous conditions in hopes of increasing the vessel’s revenues, which can be exceedingly risky for all of those involved. These conditions can lead to serious injuries, property damage, and may even cause fatalities. In short, asking a worker to continue working in hazardous circumstances is dangerous, careless and negligent. If you were injured because of the negligence of an employer or an operator and owner of any type of sea-going vessel, or any condition aboard the vessel is an “unseaworthy” condition aboard the vessel (this is a legal term of art Rob can explain to you), you may have a Jones Act claim. A Jones Act claim may provide you with an easier opportunity to prove negligence and allow you to an opportunity to recover your lost past and future wages, compensation for medical expenses, for pain and suffering, and other general damages.
If you were injured in a boating accident, whether it’s aboard a sea-going vessel or a recreational boating accident on a river, or lake, you may be entitled to compensation for the following:
- Decreased quality of life
- Loss of the capacity to work
- Loss of wages or future earnings
- Past and future medical expenses
- Pain and suffering
- Permanent disability
- Wrongful death
What Makes Our Firm Unique
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40+ Years of
Proven Legal Experience -
Aggressive & Personalized
Representation
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Committed to Securing
Justice for Each Client -
No Fees Unless
We Win Your Case
Call Attorney Rob Kornfeld at (425) 657-5255
Boating can be exceedingly dangerous, especially for those employed on commercial vessels. Working conditions can become challenging and hazardous when the weather is poor, or if the vessel sustains damage. Additionally, the employer could fail to equip the boat with adequate safety supplies, or they may overlook necessary boat maintenance, putting the entire crew in danger. Even on recreational boats, an injury is entirely possible. Another boater might cause an accident, or you could be faced with faulty mechanics or unmarked debris in the water. In any case, if you were injured due to someone else’s negligence or mistake, you have a right to take legal action and recover for your damages.
Robert Kornfeld handles claims involving the commercial fishing industry and all seagoing vessels and recreational boating injuries. Commercial fishing may involve individuals injured while working on fish processors or as crabbers, or ferry workers. He also provides legal representation in all wrongful death situations. Boating accidents are not unlike car accidents—both can be traumatizing for the injured and they can result in major physical damage. Having survived a car crash himself, Attorney Rob Kornfeld understands precisely what you’re going through and the anxiety of paying your personal bills and covering all expenses of your injury, while you are unable to work. He understands this frustration and he knows how to win.
Contact Kornfeld Law to speak with our legal team. We accept cases in Kirkland, Bellevue, Seattle, Everett, and the Greater Washington State Area. Plus, we take out-of-state cases.Call (425) 657-5255 today for a free consultation, or email Rob at Rob@Kornfeldlaw.com for a quick answer to your legal questions.
Our Settlements & Verdicts
Our top priority is to devise customized legal strategies that are tailored to the unique legal needs of our clients, no matter how simple or complicated their situations, might be.
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$200,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
A third-party insurance company tendered its $100,000 policy limits and our client’s insurer tendered its $100,000 underinsured motorist (UIM) limits after a rear-end accident resulted in whiplash, acute pain to the right knee and lower back, muscle spasm of the back, closed compression fractures, and osteoarthritis of the right hip and knee.
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$145,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
After our client was rear-ended at 50 mph and his vehicle was totaled, our attorneys got insurance companies to pay out $50,000 policy limits and $95,000 underinsured motorist (UIM) limits to account for his injuries.
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$111,540 Motor Vehicle Accident
We helped our client settle with a third-party when he was a passenger in a vehicle that was rear-ended.
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$275,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
Our client received a $275,000 third-party settlement after he was rear-ended and recruited our firm. The accident took a toll on our client’s spine and abdomen. He suffered a cervical strain, right trapezius strain, chest wall contusion, and abdominal wall contusion. Our client also sprained his left foot and ankle, sustained A.C. arthrosis and degenerative labral tears, and suffered mild chronic rotator cuff tendinosis.
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$8,500,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
We recovered $8.5 Million for the families of two victims who were killed in a head on collision after an impaired driver over the centerline on a highway on Whidbey Island.
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$250,000 Motor Vehicle Accident
Our client was involved in a rear-end collision on the I-5 near Federal Way, caused by a car who careened into their vehicle at 60 miles per hour. As a result, our client suffered various injuries and medical conditions, ranging from concussion to a significant injury to their left arm, necessitating surgical treatment. The client’s medical bills tallied to more than $86,000.00. Sentry Claims settled the case for $250,000 during mediation.