How to Find a Boating Accident Attorney

How to Find a Boating Accident Attorney

The first thing to know is that most boating accident cases in Florida do not apply Florida law. They apply federal maritime law. Most car accident attorneys do not know this. They believe the same laws that apply to auto accidents apply to boating accident cases. That’s flat wrong.
To find a boating accident attorney you could go to Google, but if you stop at the first ad that pops up you are likely just getting the car accident attorney who doesn’t know anything about boating accident cases—they just paid Google to get a good placement on the page.

Here are some easy ways to separate out whether the attorney you are thinking of hiring knows your boating accident case. Ask the attorney the following questions about your Florida boating accident case.

1. What is the statute of limitations on my case?

2. If I had to file suit, where would that be located?

3. If the other boat operator had no insurance, do I have any recourse?

4. What USCG Rules of the Road apply to my case?

5. What is a Limitation of Liability case, and what does it mean to my boating accident case?

OK, here are the answers. But know this, if the attorney you are looking at to handle your boating accident case does not know the answers to every one of these questions immediately, you are in the wrong place.

1. The usual statute of limitations for a Florida boating accident case is 3 years; however, in some circumstances it can be 4 years. Call us about your specific facts. Be careful. Pursue your case immediately.
2. It depends, most times suit would be filed in state court, but there are times you want to file it in federal court. Call us to discuss why.
3. Yes, potentially you can go after the vessel if there is no insurance. Ask us how.
4. An attorney handling boating accident cases better know the USCG Rules of the Road forwards and backwards, otherwise, run out of there.
5. A Limitation case—which cases are being filed more and more by insurance companies—tries to limit your recovery to the worth of the offending vessel after the incident. (Sometimes a crashed vessel is not worth anything.)

Again, if the attorney you are thinking of to handle your boating accident case cannot tell you the last time they filed suit in a boating injury case, or when they last handled a boating injury case, you should run from that place. You would not hire a surgeon who only does one surgery every 5 years, why would you hire a car accident attorney to handle your boating injury case when we handle boating accident cases every day of the week. This is what we do. This is what we have been doing for 25 years. Don’t trust your important boating injury case to a dog bite or car accident attorney. Call us: we are boating accident attorney specialists.

We Are Ready Right Now.