Fatal Road Accidents – Establishing who was to blame

In any accident, the sooner evidence is gathered, the stronger your claim will be. This is no different for fatal road accidents; however in the immediate aftermath of a fatal accident where a family member has died, you might not feel up to collecting evidence to make a claim on their behalf. At this difficult time a qualified road accident compensation solicitor can help take the burden of your claim, allowing you time to come to terms with your loss.

Finding out who is to blame in a fatal road traffic accident is not always an easy process, especially if the person who was killed was the only occupant of the vehicle. In a hit and run accident, witness evidence will be vital, and it is likely that the police will want to speak to any witnesses in case there is a criminal investigation into the accident, as well as a civil compensation claim. Any details of witnesses to the accident should be passed on to both the solicitor dealing with the compensation claim and the police.

If there were no witnesses to the fatal accident, then other evidence may be required. CCTV or speed cameras may have been filming the scene of the accident. Your road accident solicitor can recover these by contacting the relevant organisations such as the highways agency, the police, or private companies whose cameras may have captured the accident.

Where an accident was the fault of a motorist who cannot be traced, or the accident was caused by another factor entirely, such as ice on the road surface, then a different approach needs to be used. It may be that the claim needs to be made through the Motor Insurers’ Bureau, the organisation set up to pay out compensation for accidents on the road caused by uninsured drivers. If the accident was caused by the negligence of an authority such as the highways agency or the local council, then a solicitor will be able to direct the fatal accident claim towards the appropriate organisation.

Making a claim for compensation after an accident that has resulted in the death of a family member can be a traumatic process, but it doesn’t have to be. At Camps Solicitors we pride ourselves on handling fatal accident claims in a sensitive and respectful manner.