Have you lost a loved one and have questions about the available wrongful death benefits in Tampa Bay? Watch this video and give our attorneys a call.

Often when a death occurs due to the negligence of another party, a party who’s going to become a defendant, we’re asked the question what are the damages that the estate can recover. A personal representative is set up to represent the estate, and then the estate, that representative, recovers all of the damages for the estate, on behalf of the estate. People get confused and they think that they’re evaluating – that the damages in a wrongful death case are I’m going to evaluate the value of the loss of the decedent. For example, in a case where you have a father who is wrongfully injured and dies from those injuries due to the negligence of another, a child may think as a statutory survivor, they’re evaluating the value of my father’s death, but that’s not the case.

The damages, in that situation where you have a surviving spouse and a child and the father had died, the spouse has a claim, an individual claim, for loss of consortium, the loss of her society, affections, companionship, of her spouse who’s no longer here, and the children have a similar type of claim, the loss of the companionship, advice, nurturing, guidance of their father. The medical bills, if there are any, that were incurred as a result of the negligence before the death occurs, those are an element of damages, and any loss of what we call net accumulations to the estate. If the father in our example was working at the time of his passing due to the negligence of another and the family was saving money, and we can show evidence of that savings, that accumulation of wealth, that’s the element of damage. We don’t get every penny that the decedent would have earned over the course of his lifetime, normal life expectancy, because as we live, we consume, and some people consume everything they earn. It is only the savings that the estate would accumulate, so those are the elements of damages that can be recovered in a wrongful death action in the state of Florida.

Did you lose a loved one from the negligence of another in Boise and have questions about the available wrongful death benefits? Contact experienced Tampa Bay Wrongful Death Attorneys at Morgenstern & Herd today for a free legal consultation and case evaluation.

свернуть