The Fine Law Firm has represented seriously injured clients in Albuquerque, New Mexico since 1975. We focus solely on handling personal injury cases, allowing us to provide extensive but focused experience to each and every case we handle. Our Albuquerque injury attorneys have over 100 combined years of experience handling all manner of personal injury cases, including automobile accidents, product liability, medical malpractice and wrongful death cases.
If you or loved one has suffered an injury in an accident in Albuquerque, New Mexico, our Albuquerque car accident lawyers can help.
We will provide an unmatched level of representation in the state of New Mexico. Discuss your case in more detail with one of our Albuquerque personal injury attorneys today. Call (505) 889-FINE.
Our Albuquerque personal injury lawyers have a combined experience of nearly 100 years practicing injury law.
From day one, you’ll enjoy better peace of mind after retaining an accident attorney in Albuquerque.
During the insurance claims process, insurance companies may try to take advantage of claimants and offer less than the case is worth. Some insurance companies will deny injury claims altogether, or unfairly delay settlement payout. The best way to handle the insurance claims process after suffering a personal injury is with help from a lawyer. Hiring a personal injury lawyer in Albuquerque will ensure someone protects your rights during insurance settlement negotiations. It can also give you the power to take your case to court if necessary.
A personal injury lawyer can inform you of your rights, take care of legal paperwork and injury documentation, hire expert key witnesses to testify, build a strong personal injury case, and fight for fair compensation. From day one, you’ll enjoy better peace of mind after retaining an accident attorney in Albuquerque. Your lawyer can obtain a greater settlement or verdict award than you might get on your own. While you concentrate on healing, your lawyer will focus on financial recovery.
The Fine Law Firm has 50 years of experience successfully representing victims of personal injury. We use our talents in various personal injury case types, from autonomous vehicle accidents to nursing home abuse. Contact us after any type of accident in Albuquerque. Even in the event a family member or loved one suffers a fatal accident or injury, a Fine Law Firm Albuquerque wrongful death attorney will assess the circumstances of your case and potential steps moving forward during a free consultation.
Various organizations have recognized our firm and lawyers for excellence, including Super Lawyers, Martindale Hubbell, the Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers, and Albuquerque Magazine. Our goal, however, is not to achieve accolades in these publications, but to benefit our clients. If you or a loved one has injuries from any type of accident in New Mexico, contact us today for legal counsel. We represent many different types of serious injury cases.
The Albuquerque personal injury lawyers at The Fine Law Firm operate on a contingency-fee basis. That means you won’t pay anything unless we secure a monetary award on your behalf. We won’t charge you for our time, effort, or resources if your case doesn’t win a settlement. If we win a settlement or verdict, we’ll deduct our attorney’s fees directly from the amount we obtain from the defendant or insurance company. That way, you never pay for our services out of your own pocket.
The Fine Law Firm keeps its fees at a flat rate of 33% (one-third) of your settlement. If you received a $100,000 settlement, for example, our fees would total around $33,000. We will reduce our fees, if necessary to receive less compensation than our client does. Our goal is to help our clients, not turn a profit. A lawyer representing your case will almost always garner better results – even after subtracting the attorney’s fees – than you could on your own.
The Albuquerque injury lawyers at The Fine Law Firm operate on a contingency-fee basis. That means you won’t pay anything unless we secure a monetary award on your behalf.
A personal injury case allows an accident victim in New Mexico to seek justice and financial compensation for injuries, medical bills, lost wages and other damages suffered through the civil court system. Yet not all accidents in Albuquerque give rise to personal injury claims. There must be a legal foundation for the case, such as someone else’s negligent, careless, reckless or wrongful act.
The majority of personal injury cases in Albuquerque are based on negligence. Someone is negligent if he or she does not exercise the proper amount of care based on the circumstances. Four elements must be proven to establish negligence: duty of care, breach of duty, causation and damages. The accused party (defendant) must have violated a responsibility of reasonable care owed to the injured victim or plaintiff.
If you wish to discover whether you have grounds to file a personal injury claim after a harmful accident in Albuquerque, request a free consultation at The Fine Law Firm. We will listen to your story and analyze the facts to determine whether your case has merit. If so, we can discuss your legal options in detail and help you build a foundation for your claim.
New Mexico personal injury laws give victims the right to seek recovery for a variety of economic and noneconomic damages. Economic damages refer to the financial or monetary losses associated with an accident, such as bills and expenses. Noneconomic damages are personal and intangible losses suffered due to the event, also known as pain and suffering.
Your damage amount will depend upon the injuries and losses you sustained due to someone else’s negligence. Case values can vary significantly according to the specific case. The factors involved in a settlement determination include injury severity, the victim’s age and overall health, the number of liable (legally and financially responsible) parties, and the insurance coverage available.
Economic and noneconomic damages are both types of compensatory damages, which aim to compensate or reimburse a victim for the losses he or she suffered. Economic damages encompass tangible and specific monetary losses. These can typically be established using documentation such as hospital bills and employment records.
Economic damages include:
In general, a victim with serious or catastrophic injuries has greater medical costs and related damages than a victim with a minor injury; therefore, he or she is eligible for greater amounts of compensation. Economic damages are typically calculated by adding all of the plaintiff’s bills and future foreseeable expenses together.
Noneconomic damages refer to the intangible and nonfinancial losses suffered by a victim due to an accident and related injuries. For example, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration describes post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as a real disorder that develops when a person has experienced or witnessed a scary, shocking, terrifying, or dangerous event.
Harmful accidents are more than just expensive and inconvenient; when they cause serious injuries, they can change a victim’s daily life and well-being. The courts in New Mexico allow a victim to recover compensation for these personal losses, as well.
Other examples of noneconomic damages are:
Calculating a noneconomic damage award is more difficult than economic damages. Assigning a value to invisible and highly personal losses requires an assessment of the victim’s daily life and how it has changed since the accident. Insurance companies and juries may assign their own values to these losses with or without using a specific equation.
Recognized Nationally & Respected Locally
No Recovery No Fee
Many injury firms handle cases on a contingency fee basis, which means the only way they are paid is when they are successful recovering money for their client. The Fine Law Firm follows this approach since it means we assume the financial risk of pursuing a case so that our clients can focus on their own lives and avoid some of the worry.
Low Fees
More and more law firms are charging 40% or even 50% of the case value. The Fine Law Firm fees are never more than 1/3 or 33.33%.
Fees Don’t Go Up
Some attorneys increase their fees the longer it takes to resolve a case. We don't do that and instead, keep the fee the same.
Better result
or it’s Free
If an insurance company already made an offer before the Fine Law Firm is hired, we will not charge a fee unless we beat the insurance company’s last offer.
Cases involving
children reductions
Sadly, sometimes children are victims of negligence. The Fine Law Firm understands how difficult these cases can be for children and their families, so we proudly reduce 15% off our total attorney fee in hopes that the funds can further help children after they become adults.
Transparent Fees
Unlike many firms, the Fine Law Firm does not nickel and dime its clients by charging for telephone calls and photocopying. Even though these single charges may be small, most firms meticulously log each and every possible expense on a case and take that money back from their own clients at the end.
Active Duty &
First Responder
Reductions
Any active duty military or first responder receives a 10% reduction off the total attorney fee. It is a small gesture to allow our active duty and first responder clients more freedom and relief from their injuries.
30 Day Satisfaction
Guarantee
If our clients are not satisfied with our work within 30 days of taking the case, they can cancel our representation and not be charged anything.
If you think you have a personal injury case in Albuquerque, it is important not to wait to speak to an attorney to begin the legal process. In New Mexico, a law known as the statute of limitations places a general time limit of three years on the right to file. New Mexico Statutes Section 37-1-8 states: “Actions must be brought against sureties on official bonds and on bonds of guardians, conservators, personal representatives and persons acting in a fiduciary capacity, within two years after the liability of the principal or the person for whom they are sureties is finally established or determined by a judgment or decree of the court, and for an injury to the person or reputation of any person, within three years.”
Unique situations can shorten or extend the filing deadline on a personal injury case. For example, New Mexico has a time limit of four years for property damage. If you need to hold a government agency responsible for a personal injury accident, the deadline is just 90 days from the date of the incident.
With rare exceptions, claims that are filed after the statute of limitations has expired are time-barred, meaning they are not allowed to proceed. It is critical to consult with an attorney as soon as possible to avoid missing your deadline, as this will most likely result in the loss of your ability to hold someone accountable for your injuries.
If an investigation of your accident by an insurance company leads to a percentage of fault being assigned to you, you can still recover financial compensation under New Mexico’s pure comparative negligence law. This rule states that if a plaintiff is partially responsible for his or her own injuries, financial compensation is still available from the other party or parties that share fault.
However, if New Mexico’s comparative negligence doctrine applies to your case, this can reduce the value of your final settlement or judgment award. The courts will reduce your award by an amount equivalent to your percentage of fault. If you are found to be 15 percent responsible for the accident, for example, a $100,000 award would be reduced by 15 percent ($15,000) for a total recovery of $85,000.
The answer to this question depends on the case. However, most personal injury claims in Albuquerque are resolved outside of court with insurance settlements. Insurance companies want to avoid the expense and uncertainty of a personal injury trial. For this reason, they will generally try to negotiate a settlement.
If an insurance provider refuses to offer a fair settlement or rejects the claim and denies liability, the case may have to go to court to pursue a better resolution. Hiring a law firm with a history of taking cases to trial and winning can reduce your odds of going to court. The insurance company will be more likely to try to resolve the case without litigation.
The Fine Law Firm is here for you in your time of need. Contact our lawyers after suffering a personal injury or losing a loved one in an Albuquerque accident. We will go over the details of your specific case for free during an initial evaluation. Call (505) 889-FINE today to speak to an experienced Albuquerque personal injury attorney.
