Tampa Personal Injury Lawyer

When you get hurt due to someone else’s negligence, it’s really in your best interest to hire a local personal injury attorney near you. Catania & Catania Injury Lawyers has been a part of the greater Tampa community since 1992.

Our personal injury attorneys have been fighting for families in Tampa for more than 28 years. We live here. We work here. We understand exactly what has to be done to get injury victims on the road to recovery. You can trust us to set you up to walk away with the compensation you need and deserve.

Our legal team has experience defending insurance agencies against the very same types of claims we champion today. As a result, we’ve seen how insurers operate from the inside – and know just how much they rely on experts as they deny and devalue claims like yours. We make it a priority to level the playing field for our clients, which means getting experts to weigh in on cases and testify on their behalves.

Our local Tampa trial attorneys have spent nearly three decades cultivating relationships with the most respected specialists in the Tampa Bay area – and we’re ready to call on them when a case could benefit from their insight. When you hire us, our contacts with these experts will be a huge asset to you from the start.

At Catania & Catania Injury Lawyers, we know that accidents are anything but convenient. We also appreciate the value of getting a personal injury attorney involved in your case early on in the process. That’s why we have a team standing by to take your call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

When you need help, our firm will be there to put you and your family first. Contact us anytime to get started and schedule a free case evaluation.

You’ll need time to heal from your physical and mental wounds. You can’t do that when you are stressed out because of a lawsuit. Putting your case in experienced hands means giving yourself the opportunity to focus on getting better.

Our lawyers will handle every aspect of your pursuit of compensation – from filing the necessary paperwork, responding to other parties, negotiating on your behalf, and litigating your case in front of a jury (if necessary). We will help you make the important decisions and ultimately help to take a lot of the stress out of the situation for you.

Duty is the first element of negligence. An injury victim must show that a party owed them a “duty of care” before the party injured them. Duties are established by law or custom and typically require a party to act reasonably to avoid harming others.

Examples of common duties include a driver’s duty of care to obey traffic laws and drive safely and a property owner’s duty to keep their premises reasonably safe for guests.

The next step in a negligence claim is to show a breach of duty. An injury victim proves this element by showing that a party failed to act reasonably under the circumstances. A jury ultimately decides whether a defendant breached their duty to a plaintiff before an accident.

A jury will find a breach if the defendant failed to act like a “reasonable person” in the circumstances that led to the plaintiff’s injury. A reasonable person is not a real individual; it is a hypothetical person that acts with common sense and prudence to avoid injuring others.

Causation is the third element of negligence. This element requires a victim to prove that a defendant caused their injuries. Causation means that an accident or injury would not have happened had it not been for the defendant’s conduct. It also requires injuries to be a foreseeable result of  — and not too disconnected from — the defendant’s actions. 

You have to suffer damages as a result of the defendant’s conduct to have a negligence claim. If you have no damages, you have no case. Damages can be economic, such as medical bills, lost income, and property damage. Or, they can be non economic, such as pain and suffering, emotional distress, and reduced quality of life.

You will typically prove your economic damages using documentation like receipts, invoices, and pay stubs related to your injuries. You will normally prove non-economic damages through witness and/or expert witness testimony about how your injuries have affected your life. A Tampa personal injury attorney will help you prove the damages you suffered. 

Every single personal injury case is different. The value of your case will depend on:

• How serious are your injuries?
• What are your current out-of-pocket costs?
• What expenses and economic consequences will you probably have in the future?
• Did you contribute to your accident? If so, what’s your proportionate share of the blame?
• How have the accident and resulting injury affected your quality of life?
• Will you be able to go back to work?
• Will your ability to earn an income be affected?

Typically, the more severe the injury and trauma, the higher the value of a related personal injury dispute.

When you’re injured due to the negligence of another, Florida law allows you to seek compensation for economic and non-economic damages. Combined, these awards help to make you financially whole and make up for things like:

• Medical bills
• Rehabilitation
• Lost wages, income, and benefits
• Disability,
• Property damage, 
• Loss of enjoyment of life
• Loss of consortium
• Disfigurement and scarring
• Mental anguish
• Pain and suffering
• PTSD and depression
• And more.

If a defendant acts intentionally or with gross negligence, punitive damages may also be available to you. You can count on Catania & Catania Injury Lawyers to help you get the full value of your award.

Yes. If you share blame for your accident, you can still get compensation from other parties involved in the accident. Florida operates under a pure comparative negligence system. This means that anyone who contributes to an accident shares responsibility for the outcome. 

As long as you’re not entirely at fault, you can recover some compensation for your injuries. Your damages will just be reduced by your percentage of fault for the accident. The less fault assigned to you, the more money you can ultimately walk away with when your case is over.

There are no upfront costs to hire a lawyer to represent you. Usually, it costs anywhere from 33% to 40% of your award. This is because they work on contingency, meaning that their fee totally depends on whether they can win your case.

The statute of limitations for most personal injury lawsuits in the state of Florida is four years from the date of the injury.

You might have more or less time to act, depending on the circumstances. For instance, cases involving the government, death, and medical malpractice are subject to accelerated timelines. That can be anywhere from a few months to two years. On the other hand, you may have additional time if the statute of limitations is tolled because the victim is a minor or the defendant can’t be located.