When you mother dies in a fatal car accident that she did not cause, a wrongful death attorney should be able to help you recover money. A wrongful death settlement for your parent includes lost financial support, funeral expenses as well as some more complicated damages called loss comfort, society and protection.
Who can file a wrongful death suit?
All of the following people can recover money for a mother’s wrongful death:
- Biological children
- Step children
- Foster children
- Illegitimate children.
For siblings and spouses, here is more information regarding a wife’s wrongful death or a sister’s wrongful death:
Your Mother’s Financial Support is Recoverable after Wrongful Death
The main portion of your parent's wrongful death claim will be based on recovering money financial losses that would have been provided by your mother. Financial support can be proved in several ways:
- You mother’s earnings at the time of death
- The value of what your mother would have earned
- Her age
- Education level
- Skill
- Personal habits
- Her career ambitions.
Your wrongful death claim is not limited to your parent’s personal labor if your mother owned her own business and collected money from the labor of others. Your recovery amount may be limited to the life expectancy of either you or your mother, whichever is shorter.
The next thing our wrongful death lawyers investigate is the amount of money your mother would have contributed to you if she had not suffered a wrongful death. This includes maintenance, education and paternal care, but we can also file for the expected cost of many items she would have provided:
- Food
- Clothing
- Shoes
- Housing
- Books
- College tuition
- Haircuts
- Entertainment
- Travel
- Medical and dental care
- Eye examinations and eyeglasses
- Gifts
- Athletic equipment
- Transportation
- Or any other relevant items.
Another factor in your wrongful death settlement entails your relationship with your mother.
The Mother-Child Relationship Can Benefit a Wrongful Death Claim
The other portion of damages -- the ones referred to as loss of comfort, society and protection -- can be proved by discussing your relationship with your mother. This includes but is not limited to shared activities, counsel and instruction she provided.
If you are all grown-up, you can still recover money for your parent’s wrongful death. With claims from grown-up children, we try to highlight a few other parts of the relationship with their parent:
- How often the children and mother visited one another.
- The quality of the mother/child relationship.
- How often they got together for family gatherings.
- We will even note the child’s respect for the late mother.
Call Us Now to Maximize Your Wrongful Death Settlement
Wrongful death claims are very complex and come during a difficult time. For these reasons we strongly recommend that you consult with a wrongful death attorney from our San Diego law offices as soon as possible after your mother’s death. With two decades of experience on our side, we can help make sure that your wrongful death claim is handled professionally with care.
We have found that the responsible party’s insurance company will probably not explain all of your legal rights due to the fact that insurance companies only want to pay you as little as possible. As if that’s not enough, insurance companies will attempt to poke holes in your relationship with your mother, or they’ll even claim that you rarely saw or lived far away from each other.
You should not have to deal with this situation on your own. Call us now at 1-858-551-2090 for a FREE consultation with an experienced wrongful death attorney in San Diego or click here to submit your case for a FREE online review. We handle all cases on a contingency fee basis, which means that you owe nothing until we recover money on your behalf.