Elevator Accident at a Storage Facility

[dklittl]

What is the name of your state? Georgia

This weekend, I was at the storage facility that I pay to store some of my property near closing. I was taking the old loft style elevator, with the wood grate door that must be lifted and then you must seperate the main outer metal door to get out, down to the first floor. I lifted the wood door up to the ceiling and was in the process of opening the outer metal door, when the rope holding the wood door broke and it landed on both my arms and sent me to the floor. I had to have one of the workers open the broken door to let me out, but took some pictures with my camera-phone of the now broken door. I drove to the hospital where I had swelling on both arms and a serious contusion on one, but nothing broken, but was given a brace and a week's supply of Vicaden.

I am wondering what kind of case do I have and since I'm self-employed and make about 1200 a month and I'll probably only be out of commission for the week, what kind of damages should I be looking for including the pain and suffering for almost losing my arm there? Also if I should just try to settle with the insurance company and not get a lawyer involved? I'm not at all looking to get rich, I just want to know what a fair settlement would be in my case.

Derrick
Atlanta

[You Are Guilty]

Whoa, slow your roll there, amigo. Exactly who is offering you a settlement? The storage company? The owner of the property? The elevator maintenance company?

[dklittl]

I haven't been offered anything yet. I'm just looking at how I should proceed. I might be naive, but my thinking was that because of how clear the negligence was and the fact that that the injuries were severe, that I might be able to settle this relatively easy. But I could be being naive.

[You Are Guilty]

Well, you never know, but just because the rope broke doesn't automatically equate to "negligence". (It might, but there's no way for us to judge that without more background information that you don't have).

But the easiest way to value your case is to go find a local PI lawyer that offers free consults, sit down for 20 minutes with them and at the end, ask them what they think they can get out of the case. (The value of a claim is highly dependant on where it is, and it's doubtful any of the lawyers here are from your area so as to give you a meaningful answer).