Do I have any legal recourse after an auto accident if I was not seriously injured?
Question: Do I have any legal recourse in an auto accident if I was not injured? I am a truck driver involved in an accident in a company truck. The other driver admitted to being at fault along with two witnesses that stated it was his fault. He had minor injuries and was taken to the hospital. I had a stiff neck for a few days, but did not seek medical attention. I was laid off a week later. I had a clean driving record until this happened. Now I'm having a hard time getting driving jobs because of this accident. Do I have any legal recourse against the other driver from this accident?
Question: Do I have a case against the car manufacturer for airbags that did not deploy? I was in a accident where my vehicle was struck in the rear, my passenger side air bag deployed and the driver’s side air bag did not. I had nothing sitting in the seat on the passenger side of the vehicle. I was going 60 MPH when I was struck by a vehicle going 95+. My vehicle then struck the dividing barrier on the driver’s side. (Referring to 2nd generation air bags)
Hancock County, Iowa - I’ve been reading about these accidents and one guy has a blog dedicated to accidents where trailers become unhitched and crash into other cars, trucks or motorcycles. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen one in Iowa, right up until this week, that is. It happened on December 5, 2011 at around 5:58 a.m. on Highway 18 about 2 miles west of Garner. A 2000 Peterbuilt semitruck pulling a trailer (driver shown on police report as being from Garner, Iowa – 38 years old) was westbound on Highway 18 when as the officer describes it, “VEHICLE 1 (THE SEMI ) WAS WESTBOUND ON HWY 18 WHEN ITS TRAILER BECAME DETACHED FROM THE TRACTOR THE TRAILER THEN SLID ACROSS THE CENTER LINE AND STRUCK THE EASTBOUND VEHICLE 2 HEAD ON.”
A recent article I read interested me from a professional standpoint towards workplace safety but I thought it missed a major point about litigation. This article of interest explores the dangers of being a farmer, but ignores the contribution of civil trial lawyers. With this I take exception.
The dangers of Anhydrous work - In Pilot Mound, Iowa a Boone County farmer died a 74-year-old man, Richard Shaw died after exposure to 
My office mate and I recently litigated and successfully settled a cow-in-the-road case in southern Iowa. The facts are as simple as a black cow weighing 1,000 pounds out on a county road after dark where there are no lights doesn't show up in your headlights until it's too late to stop. In that case the driver's wife died. The driver was a family doctor and we thought that would help him in the community with farmers who admired his dedication to Iowa families. Think again. No one in the community came forward to admit ownership of the cow.
We’ve previously covered ATV accidents, ATV accidental death and ATV accidental injuries in Iowa. Follow this 
This time it was a 12 year old boy from Sioux Center. The news report has the youngster losing control and striking a utility pole. On the ATV was a five year old passenger. This story brought to us by Radio-Iowa. 
There are times when as a personal injury lawyer who does a lot of car, truck, motorcycle accidents along with workers’ compensation claims I am completely baffled. This week I got a call from an out-of-state resident who visited Iowa and was injured at a hotel. The matter was a trip-fall type of claim. We lawyers refer to them as premise liability cases. Premise liability is a difficult case to prove, you really need an artificial defect in the property to win these cases. By artificial defect I mean something created by the owner, the lessee or the business that increased the risk of injury.
I received an email from Allen Wright, who works with a home monitoring company advising they had created a post on the ten most common causes of house fires. In line with my posts on mobile home fires it appears this one should be noted. Follow the link to read the entire article.
A few years ago it seemed whenever we filed dog bite cases we’d get contacted by local owners of vicious dogs along with the national and local dog owner’s associations, who would tell us we had it all wrong. They would then go on ad nauseam about how a 4-year-old had teased the dog and that the mauling of a toddler was somehow justified. As if the 4-year-old should have known better and that parents who allowed their children to play outside in their own yards, were somehow bad parents. Give me a break. I’d listen to them just for the pleasure of knowing how moronic my opponents were. For several years I haven’t had to put up with this nonsense and it seemed like the number of attacks has been decreasing or at least these stories were out of the news. But this week it seems like the tide has finally come back ashore – there is even the 
The question asked this week was, what is a PTO, a power take off shaft and what does it do?
This lawyer's website info looks all about 
No but you can get a CT Scan.
I'd had one of those days; you probably can't understand because I've been doing this long enough that like Oreo I've had just about enough some days. Not with my clients mind you, but with the insurance adjusters who could care less about people and more about some stupid inane corporate policy, that they get a bonus to blindly apply.
Here is a news item from Cloquet, Minnesota that I found of interest. It involves an I-35 overpass accident that appears due in part to poor snow maintenance. The way the accident happened should be a concern to state highway department snow clearing crews and the public in general. Snow that accumulated on an overpass appears to have created a ramp of sorts, that allowed a skidding car to be ramped up and over the side rail and onto the interstate highway below. The smashed up car created a bit of a conundrum for the police. When they arrived, the police found the car upside down with the roof crushed and pointing in the wrong direction on I-35. There were no skid marks and no other cars involved. The officer needed to walk up the incline to the overpass before he could figure out how the car got in the north bound lane. 
Making fun of the Fountain Lady shows just how miserable and desperate America has become.
Shoeless Joe
A few years ago I heard about this kind of an accident, but have no knowledge of such it occurring in Iowa; till now. In the December 31, 2010 Des Moines Register tells a story of it ice falling from the top of a semi-trailer on Interstate 80 and a female passenger being injured. This one occurred in Colfax, Iowa on Interstate 80, Jasper County. The people in the car are from Pekin, Illinois. Apparently a thick sheet of ice came off the truck’s trailer, slid down into the windshield of the oncoming car and struck Linda Mickley seated in the front passenger seat. She was taken to the Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines. There is no indication as to the exact details.
Yes you read that right; you can get up to two free smoke detectors installed by the Iowa Fire Marshall’s office in a residence in Iowa. That’s a pretty sweet deal. How can you go wrong? You can’t so get off your fanny and contact them. The only requirement is that a child younger than junior high live there.
I read the story about the Fayette County, Iowa mobile home fire that killed two children and an adult this past Saturday, January 01, 2011. The Des Moines Register news story gives few details about causes or ownership so from that story I can draw no firm conclusions. [ 
Hickory County, Missouri – I ran across this little noticed news story about an accident in Missouri where one Iowa resident was killed and another person injured. The person that died was only 45-years-old, the driver 49. According to the 
The headline reads “
Today is one of those very busy days in the practice of law and nothing is really catching my attention to write about. It looks like a good day for a compilation of personal injury news. Let us see the various ways people are becoming injured or killed from accidents and other mishaps around the State of Iowa. Every so often on The Iowa Edict we will provide a mini compendium of current Iowa personal injury and property damage news of recent events. The idea is to provide a shorter version of available stories to personal injury lawyers, adjusters, those engaged in a law suit involving personal injury or workers’ compensation or those folks just plain interested in PI News. Or in some instances stuff we find curiously interesting. This is one of those days. 
There seems to be a tidal wave of legal questions swirling in the murky waters of Iowa lately. The more rain we get the wetter are basements and legal briefs. The wetter that basements get, the more that claims will be made to insurance companies. The more claim files grow, the more important it is for the insurance industry to protect the float through delay and subrogation. 
Don’t you hate lawyers? After all aren’t the lawyers responsible for all those frivolous lawsuits? Here sing with me. Rain, rain, go away come again another day. Many Iowans with some form of water damage are mad and will probably be madder after they speak with their good neighbor or the guy who they are supposed to be in good hands with; your homeowner’s insurance company. They will call the lawyer right after the homeowner finds out that their good neighbor isn't so good or that they aren't really in a pair of good hands.
At the University of Iowa a staff person was injured when eight balloons exploded during transport. The worker filled what is reported as 
Today in the email bag was a question and although it’s a bit before 7:00 a.m. as I’m trying to understand what the person is asking me I have to wonder if I’m 30-years younger and going through the experience of once again being a 1-L. A 1-L is how we refer to first year law students. 
For my east coast friends who remain geographically challenged Missouri is a state, a part of the United States and just south, that’s down, of Iowa. Missouri is the “Show Me State” which once again Iowans are stuck showing them the errors of their ways. Missouri’s elected officials are picking on exotic dancers a-g-a-i-n. If Missourians are going to pick on exotic dancers then we may as well debate the merits of that age old tradition, the demolition derby. Boiled down to its essence, assuming there is an essence, the demolition derby is a contest that seeks to find several people dumb enough for a small cash prize, to climb into a car or truck and ram other contestants until you’re the last fool moving. Sounds a little like some marriages, but let’s leave that comparison for another day. In the derby the cash prize comes from a promoter who sells beer, pretzels, popcorn, hotdogs and maybe a t-shirt or two. Exotic dancers on the other hand are usually young woman dancing on a stage or in someone’s lap for tip money. The promoter is a bar owner who charges an entry fee and gets paid handsomely for selling inebriated patrons watered down drinks containing a small portion of alcohol. They aren’t selling t-shirts; in fact clothing is optional, well … at least it is for the dancers. 