Injury by our dog on our property

What is the name of your state? Texas
We do not have homeowners insurance. A child was playing at our house and was injured by our dog. We contacted his parents and took him to the hospital. Since we live in a small town the child was airlifted to a bigger hospital so the bills are high. We told the parents that we would take care of medical bills and even signed a paper at hospital stating the same. Child got 7 stitches and was released and sent home the same night. I went to parents the next day and again told them that we would take care of medical expenses. Father said that they had insurance so it shouldn't add up to much. Now we are getting a letter from lawyer for medical bills and damages adding up to $90,000. What do we do now? I would appreciate any help you can give me.

needhelp7 said:

What is the name of your state? Texas
We do not have homeowners insurance. A child was playing at our house and was injured by our dog. We contacted his parents and took him to the hospital. Since we live in a small town the child was airlifted to a bigger hospital so the bills are high. We told the parents that we would take care of medical bills and even signed a paper at hospital stating the same. Child got 7 stitches and was released and sent home the same night. I went to parents the next day and again told them that we would take care of medical expenses. Father said that they had insurance so it shouldn't add up to much. Now we are getting a letter from lawyer for medical bills and damages adding up to $90,000. What do we do now? I would appreciate any help you can give me.

Click to expand...

Since you don't have homeowners insurance you have to go out and get a lawyer to defend your case. Don't worry about the 90K too much. Lawyers always ask f/ ridiculous amounts initially. This will cost you some money though. How come this child had to be airlifted? If the child only got 7 stitches why wasn't she sewed up at a local clinic?

I would go out and get homeowners insurance right away. If something more serious happened on your property you could lose everything you have. If not, I wouldn't let anyone on my property as you could be liable if someone else is injured.

The injury was on the neck and they were afraid that it had penetrated a major vein but once at the large hospital they determined that is was a soft tissue injury and I'm sorry I was wrong in my first post, he got 10 stitches.

Point of clarification - the meds may have added up to $90k (or some equally crazy amount under $90k), but most of them will have been covered by insurance, and thus, any amount paid by insurance is not compensatable as part of a damage award. (Google "collateral source").

That's just one of the (many) reasons you might want to retain an attorney to fight this for you and not try to do it yourself.

Lynx 36 said:

...I would go out and get homeowners insurance right away. If something more serious happened on your property you could lose everything you have. If not, I wouldn't let anyone on my property as you could be liable if someone else is injured.

Click to expand...

A lot of homeowners policies are not covering dog bites/injuries anymore. If you do get insurance, make sure you are covered for that.

And if your dog is not totally reliable around kids, known or unknown to the dog, you have no business allowing them together. WE dog owners take on a serious responsibility when we add a dog to our household, especially if we add a dog who is large enough to potentially cause serious injury. And being a dog owner is an even greater reson to have homeowner's insurance.

If this dog has injured a child, I doubt you will fiind an insurer who will not exclude claims for bites from this particular dog.

seniorjudge said:

A lot of homeowners policies are not covering dog bites/injuries anymore. If you do get insurance, make sure you are covered for that.

Click to expand...

When the insurance guy came to check out the house when our policy was issued, our schipperke-mix stood up on his hind legs and greeted him with a squeeky toy in his mouth. WE have no such exclusion.

"Point of clarification - the meds may have added up to $90k (or some equally crazy amount under $90k), but most of them will have been covered by insurance, and thus, any amount paid by insurance is not compensatable as part of a damage award. (Google "collateral source")."

My understanding of the original post is that the kid's insurance carrier is the one demanding reimbursement for what the carrier paid.

Plus you are not correct concerning collateral source. An injured party is entitled to recover all of their damages, even amounts paid by insurance. The insurance payments would be the collateral source that would not be mentioned to a jury. the basis for this position is that a negligent party should not benefit because an injured party had the foresight to have insurance coverage.

It's not the kid's insurance company, it is the kid's parents who are talking to the lawyer. We haven't had to deal with their insurance company, yet.

thanks for the clarification. Since you signed for the medical treatment, have you received any of the billing from the hospital?

We have not received anything from the hospital and the hospital would not give us any information but there are copies of the medical bills in the packet from the lawyer. They probably total to around $20,000 and that includes what has been paid by insurance.

needhelp7 said:

We have not received anything from the hospital and the hospital would not give us any information but there are copies of the medical bills in the packet from the lawyer. They probably total to around $20,000 and that includes what has been paid by insurance.

Click to expand...

Needless to say, have nothing to do with these people again and go get a lawyer.

needhelp7 said:

The injury was on the neck and they were afraid that it had penetrated a major vein but once at the large hospital they determined that is was a soft tissue injury and I'm sorry I was wrong in my first post, he got 10 stitches.

Click to expand...

Understandable then.

stephenk said:

"Point of clarification - the meds may have added up to $90k (or some equally crazy amount under $90k), but most of them will have been covered by insurance, and thus, any amount paid by insurance is not compensatable as part of a damage award. (Google "collateral source")."

My understanding of the original post is that the kid's insurance carrier is the one demanding reimbursement for what the carrier paid.

Plus you are not correct concerning collateral source. An injured party is entitled to recover all of their damages, even amounts paid by insurance. The insurance payments would be the collateral source that would not be mentioned to a jury. the basis for this position is that a negligent party should not benefit because an injured party had the foresight to have insurance coverage.

Click to expand...

You repeated what I said in different words, but I'm wrong and you're right?

Jury doesn't hear about insurance payments, but plaintiffs sure as heck don't get the part of the award for medical expenses that was reimbursed by insurance. So you can (and often do, thanks to contingency cases) have (and win) a claim for say, $90k in meds, even though $89,900 was reimbursed by insurance.

Not sure why we're arguing this one

" but plaintiffs sure as heck don't get the part of the award for medical expenses that was reimbursed by insurance."

that's where you are not totally correct. Some carriers have reimbursement clauses in their policy, some don't. Some carriers never get around to figuring out that their insured filed a third party claim and as a result never get reimbursed. Some carriers are even willing to reduce the amount of reimbursement from their insured.

However, you are right that the jury never hears that a carrier paid for the medical bills except for a certain instance. Insurance payment comes into play if a carrier pays less than the bill and the doctor/hospital accepts the lesser amount as full payment. At that point, the lesser paid amount becomes the reasonable medical billing amount for purposes of damages.