You may think that you can handle the insurance claim yourself, but fighting for fair compensation without a lawyer is difficult. If you are without representation, insurance may very well try to take advantage of you and make a lowball offer. A Texas or New York car accident lawyer with experience in Texas or New York car accidents can help you handle the paperwork and the negotiation process while you focus on healing from your injuries.

Where a lawyer can really be beneficial is if you miss work or your injuries leave you permanently disabled in some fashion. Medical expenses and lost wages from work are easily calculated, but your inability to provide for your family, accomplish tasks or any strain on your relationship are not. Our Texas and New York personal injury lawyers can ensure that you receive payment for non-economic damages.

If you have fallen victim to a car wreck in Texas or New York, you need to speak to a car accident lawyer right away in order to protect your rights. Attorney Alfonso Couceiro is a Texas accident lawyer who can help. Do not let the insurance company take advantage of you! You can count on us to negotiate with the insurance company to make sure you get fair value for your claim. Call us now for a free consultation and to find out how much your case is worth.

Slip and fall accidents can occur for a number of reasons, and they happen more often than you think. At first thought, you might think slip and fall injuries aren’t that serious. Unfortunately, in most cases, they are, and they tend to result in missed work and heaps of medical bills. Even a small sprain can lead to time away from work and several hundreds of dollars in medical expenses. Furthermore, slip and fall accidents become more common as we age, and injuries tend to be more severe.

Slip, trip and fall accidents can be serious. They can lead to traumatic injuries such as hip fractures or serious head injuries. They can even be fatal. If you suffered a serious injury or lost a loved one in a slip and fall accident in Texas or New York, contacting an attorney can help you understand the specifics of your accident. A property owner or another party may owe you financial recovery for your losses. A lawyer can walk you through the steps of filing a claim and holding a negligent party accountable for its actions.

Riding a motorcycle can be fun, exhilarating, and for some, practical. A motorcycle is cheaper to buy, maintain, and keep full of gas than a car. Getting around on a bike can be enjoyable and a real money saver. But there is a downside: motorcycles can be dangerous and put your life and health at risk. Even if you take a safe cycling course, observe all traffic rules, and ride with extreme care, you could be involved in a serious accident. Motorcycle accidents, contrary to popular belief, are not the fault of the biker in a majority of cases; a large percentage of collisions are caused by car or truck accidents. It is the biker, however, who usually suffers the brunt of the damage from the crash.

If you or a loved one was in a motorcycle accident in Texas or New York, please call the Law Firm of Pacheco Couceiro for a free consultation at (956) 518-1818. We may be able to help you hold the at-fault party responsible. The initial consultation is free, confidential, and comes with no obligation to hire us.

Americans are a nation of dog lovers, and most are responsible dog owners. While we often view pets as part of the family, it is important not to lose sight of the fact that dogs are animals and must be trained, socialized, and sometimes restrained for the safety of others. Dogs can be unpredictable and territorial, and any dog can bite. Any dog, regardless of its great temperament, should be carefully supervised around children, restrained when the postman and tradespeople are due to arrive, and carefully introduced to people with whom they are not familiar. When off the home property, every dog should be on a leash.

Biting dogs are a problem in Texas—even more so than in other states: State Farm Insurance, a company that writes homeowners’ insurance policies, reports that Texas is number three in the nation in the amount of compensation they paid to animal attack victims in 2012.

Even worse, in 2014, Texas led the nation in the number of deaths from dog attacks, with seven dog bite fatalities, of which six were caused by pit bulls. In spite of these numbers, Texas does not have any breed-specific legislation in place regarding pit bulls or the second most likely breed to kill, Rottweilers.

Buses carrying travelers and students are a common sight in cities and towns across the country, and bus companies offer a cheaper long-distance alternative to a plane ticket for thousands of travelers. With so many of these large vehicles on the road, it's no wonder they are involved in around 63,000 traffic accidents each year (that's according to a recent University of Michigan study).

Any traffic accident can range from a low-speed fender bender to a catastrophic collision, and bus accidents are no exception. Therefore, injuries resulting from bus accidents span the spectrum of severity, from whiplash-type soft tissue injuries to severe head trauma and broken bones.

First, the risk of a rollover or rollover accident is greater for buses than for standard passenger vehicles. Secondly, many buses do not have any type of safety restraint or supplementary safety device; In other words, there are no seat belts or airbags. So, while the risk of a bus accident is lower compared to crashes involving other forms of land transportation, the chances of serious injuries are higher when a bus accident occurs.

A business interruption lawyer understands that when a business owner has paid thousands of dollars into an insurance policy, they expect to be covered when they need it most. However, As COVID-19 rapidly spreads across the country, shutting down entire industries, business owners are surprised to learn that they cannot rely on their insurance policies for relief.

It’s no secret that the insurance industry makes billions of dollars a year by denying legitimate claims. The business interruption policy you’ve been paying is supposed to cover your business’ losses while storefronts are closed or sales are down. As a result of the novel coronavirus, businesses are facing severe financial difficulties. Attorney Alfonso Couceiro will help you answer the question: “will my business interruption insurance cover my COVID-19 losses?”

Reports have begun surfacing that businesses filing interruption claims are being denied. Insurers are citing various reasons for COVID-19 interruption policy rejections. Short of a state law aimed at protecting businesses, it’s highly likely that these claims will need to be fought on a case by case basis in U.S. courts. With the right business interruption insurance lawyer on your business’s side, you may be able to get the compensation you’re entitled to.

The law in most states provides several personal injury claims for persons who have been seriously injured by a prescription drug. These claims include strict liability for a defective product, breach of warranty, negligence, and misrepresentation. Damages sought against pharmaceutical companies for dangerous drug side effects and injuries include:

• Physical pain and suffering, mental anguish and physical impairment;
• Medical expenses, past and future; and
• Loss of earnings and/or earning capacity.

In the case of a patient’s death, the family of the victim may file a wrongful death action and seek damages.

If someone is injured by a defective product, they may have grounds to file a lawsuit against the manufacturer, wholesaler, or distributor, depending on the type of defect. The two primary categories of product defects under federal law are design defects and manufacturing defects.

Manufacturing defects

These are caused by an error in assembly and are not intended to be part of the product. This type of defect will typically only be found in a small percentage of a company’s manufactured goods. Based on the theory of strict liability, a manufacturer is liable for any manufacturing defects that occur as a result of faulty construction, regardless of whether they took care throughout the manufacturing process. The plaintiff needs to prove that the defect allegedly responsible for their injury was present at the time of departure from the factory where the good was produced.

Design defect

A design defect is a flaw in the original blueprint of a product that causes it to be unreasonably dangerous and creates a hazard for potential users. This type of defect will typically be found in all of a company’s manufactured products.

Three questions are asked to determine whether a design defect exists:

• Was the product’s design unreasonably dangerous prior to production?
• Was it plausible to anticipate the design of the product could harm a potential user?
• Could the manufacturer have used a superior design that was economically feasible and would not alter the purpose of the product?

If any of these questions are answered affirmatively, the injured party may have grounds for a design defect claim and should contact our office as soon as possible.

Giving birth is a natural and (usually) safe process, with your obstetrician and other medical staff on hand to help it along and assist mother and baby in the event of any complications. During the birth process, babies are especially vulnerable, and if a doctor fails to treat, or improperly treats, a complication or condition, it could result in permanent disability or physical issues for the child.

If your child experienced a birth injury, you may be wondering why and how it occurred. You may be wondering if your hospital is telling you the whole truth about what happened. Was your child’s injury simply unavoidable, or did they suffer due to the negligence and malpractice of a doctor or medical staff?

The National Center on Elder Abuse estimates that over three million Americans now live in nursing homes. According to 2010 NORS data, physical abuse comprises 29% of complaints filed by residents. If you or someone you love experienced nursing home abuse, you may be eligible for compensation.

Residents with dementia or Alzheimer’s may have difficulty communicating. Others may be hesitant to report abuse or neglect for fear of staff retribution. If you suspect that your loved one may suffer from nursing home neglect or abuse, look for these signs:

Victim becomes upset and/or agitated, withdrawn or non-communicative, especially around nursing home staff. 

Loved one exhibits rapid weight loss, weight gain or symptoms of malnutrition (i.e., mouth sores, dental difficulties, bruises easily, poor wound healing).

There are unexplained injuries, such as cuts, bruises or welts healing in different stages.

Victim displays sudden/unusual behavior changes (not wanting to be touched, biting, rocking).

Your loved one has frequent illness, especially if unreported to family members.

Medical malpractice occurs when a healthcare professional provides a treatment that deviates from accepted standards of care within the medical community, thereby causing injury to a patient. If a doctor, surgeon, hospital, or another party was medically negligent, they may be liable for any ensuing losses.

Medical negligence refers to a negligent act or omission – for example, removing the wrong organ or leaving a surgical tool in a patient’s body – that causes injury. If the victim can demonstrate that the negligent act was directly responsible for their injury, they may be awarded various damages (e.g., medical expenses, lost wages, and emotional suffering).

Medical malpractice is alarmingly common in the United States. In fact, a Johns Hopkins study found that medical errors kill more than 250,000 Americans every year, making it the third-leading cause of death behind only heart disease and cancer.

If you believe you or someone you love was the victim of medical malpractice, contact The Law Office of Pacheco Couceiro. Our legal team will review your situation in a free, no-obligation case evaluation. If you have a claim for compensation, we’ll work tirelessly to hold the responsible party accountable and secure full restitution.

In the real world, many personal injuries result in death. At that point, the victim is obviously no longer around to bring claims of any kind. Yet the deceased’s family remains deprived of support, companionship, etc. How does the law keep the death of the victim from somehow working to the benefit of the person responsible for causing the death?

Wrongful death cases can be very complex. Recovery depends on establishing that the defendant—the person being sued—is legally responsible for the death. Since any number of different accidents may have caused the death—vehicle accidents, gunshots, falls, and countless other mechanisms—you need a Texas lawyer with wide experience in personal injury cases of all types, in addition to specific experience with the technical requirements of the wrongful death laws.

Identifying what caused your family member’s death is one of the first steps toward bringing a wrongful death claim. Attorney Alfonso Couceiro can help you investigate the recent fatal accident for its root cause. One or more parties could be liable for your loved one’s death if it negligently failed to prevent the deadly accident. Attorney Alfonso Couceiro and Attorney Marco Pacheco can spot negligence, collect evidence, and help your family build a case against the defendant(s). No matter what you believe killed your loved one, contact us for counsel.

Driving next to a large truck or an 18-wheeler can be intimidating, scary, and even a bit dangerous. A traffic accident involving a commercial truck, such as an 18-wheeler or big rig tractor-trailer, can be much more catastrophic than an ordinary car accident. Semi-truck accidents cause a significant number of car accidents, as well as fatalities, each year. A wreck with an 18-wheeler truck can devastate a life instantly.

With their tremendous size and sheer power, large trucks are one of the more troublesome aspects that drivers of smaller passenger cars have to overcome on a daily basis. With heavy (and sometimes dangerous or hazardous) goods being transported all across the country via truck (especially Texas, Houston, and New York), there is an overwhelming amount of semi-truck traffic that passes over Texas roads and New York highways.

A typical, fully loaded large commercial truck can weigh 80,000 pounds. Because of the large size of semi-trucks, any collision between a semi-truck and another vehicle is likely to result in serious, even fatal, injuries.

An accident involving a large commercial truck may create liability for not just the driver of the trailer, but also the owner of the container being transported and the owner of the load in the container. If you or a loved one is involved in a truck accident, you may be entitled to recover compensation for your injuries by bringing a legal claim against any and all responsible parties.

A train accident can be a devastating incident resulting in serious injury or even death to the victims involved. Whether it is a derailment, a train-vehicle collision, a railroad crossing accident, an accident involving hazardous materials or any other type of railroad accident, many people may be harmed. Where negligence on the part of railroad employees, the train company or a governmental agency, or equipment manufacturers has been the cause of such an accident, they may be held liable for damages connected with resulting injuries or deaths.

A personal injury or wrongful death case stemming from a train accident can be a complicated matter in determining the cause of the accident, who is legally responsible, and if the train was operating under specific laws and statutes of limitations. Investigating and gathering all of the evidence pertaining to the accident will be a crucial part of the process as well as documenting the nature and the extent of the injuries and making financial projections of how such injuries will affect the victim or his family in the future. All of this will require the legal skills and oversight of a personal injury attorney who is well-versed in all of the technical and legal aspects of such cases. At our firm, you can count on the outstanding professionalism of our attorney and legal staff, who have a solid track record of successful case results to their credit.

Thousands of people each day depend on mass transit to perform their daily duties, such as getting to work, shopping, attending a business conference, arriving at a vacation destination, or visiting friends.

When you step on an airplane subway, train or bus, you expect to arrive safely at your destination without incident. However, that is not always the case. In 2012, there were 3,379 accidents involving mass transit. During that same year, there were 1,297 accidents involving air travel. In those accidents, 449 people died in airplanes while 266 people died using mass transit.

There are many types of accidents that could result in a mass transit accident claim. Accidents involving subways, charter buses, trains, taxi cabs, or planes all qualify for mass transit accident claims. Most personal injury cases require that the person filing the case must demonstrate negligence in some way in order to collect on a claim. However, mass transit accidents may fall under what is known as “common carrier law.” Common carriers are businesses or individuals that provide public transportation in any form.

If you get injured on a motorboat or a sailboat, you must be able to prove that your injury resulted from someone’s negligence in order to be able to recover damages from that person. The fact that you got hurt does not mean that anyone was negligent. Negligence is the failure to act with reasonable care. This means that you must be able to prove that someone failed to act with reasonable care, and that, as a result of that negligence, you got hurt.

To better illustrate how a negligence claim would work, it helps to identify the main types of boating accidents. The majority of pleasure boating accidents are the following:

• your boat hits another boat
• your boat hits another boat’s wake
• your boat hits a wave
• your boat hits a submerged object, rock, or land

Most commonly, we hear of the criminal aspect of sexual assault, but there are also civil claims that a victim may be able to bring against the party (or parties) responsible. Depending on the facts of the case, the responsible party, or defendant, may be the assailant, their employer, or another person that was involved in the assault. The victim may be able to bring personal injury claims for injuries suffered as a result of the sexual assault committed against him or her. When bringing a personal injury case, the plaintiff (injured party or loved one bringing the lawsuit on the injured party’s behalf) must be able to prove certain elements to the court. The elements are these:

• The injured party was sexually assaulted by the assailant.
• The injured party suffered damages as a result of this assault (damages may be physical or emotional injuries).
• The defendant was the cause of the victim’s injuries and the cause was either intentional or negligent in nature.