How to Preserve Evidence After a St. Louis Auto Accident

Let’s discuss the importance of evidence, how to preserve it, and how a St. Louis auto accident lawyer can help. 

Car accidents can cause serious damages and injuries. Even when you are fine physically, the collision’s shock and trauma can affect your mental health and make it difficult to go back to your regular life. That’s why victims of car accidents can file a claim against the at-fault party and receive compensation for their injuries, pain and suffering, and damages. To get compensated, you have to prove your injuries have been caused by accident and not another event in your life. 

In this article, we’ll talk about the importance of evidence, how to preserve it, and how a St. Louis auto accident lawyer can help. 

Types of Evidence After a Car Accident

The scene of a car accident might look chaotic, but you should collect and preserve different types of evidence as carefully as possible. 

• Your vehicle: Your car is one of the most important types of evidence in a collision. It will tell the police how the accident occurred and the nature of the damages it influenced. Take pictures of all the damages you notice, as well as the car, from different angles. 

• The at-fault driver’s car: The at-fault driver’s car tells a story just as important as yours, so make sure to take multiple, clear pictures that you can later use to build your case. 

• Footage from nearby cameras: Look around to see if there are any security cameras. Your St. Louis car accident attorney could obtain the footage and use it to prove liability. 

• Videos or photos taken by witnesses: Get the contact information of the people who’ve witnessed your accident and ask them to send you any videos or photos they’ve taken. 

Other types of evidence that you should preserve as soon as possible include a police report, medical records and receipts, car maintenance records, and so on. 

The Importance of Preserving Evidence After a Car Crash

If you’ve been in a car accident, you’re probably experiencing many emotions: confusion, shock, anxiety. Together with the pain caused by your injuries, these emotions may make it difficult to think straight and understand what you need to do next. However, the evidence you collect at the scene of the crash will play a crucial role in determining liability and estimating the amount of compensation you will receive. If you don’t feel up to it, ask someone to take pictures of the crash scene, ask for a copy of the police report, and talk with the witnesses. It may seem like a nuisance right now, but all this information will help tremendously in building your case. 

Should You Work with a Lawyer?

Liability is not always easy to establish. However, an experienced St. Louis car accident lawyer will generally have the resources to obtain evidence that can impact your case drastically.  For example, they may be able to get cell phone records and prove that the other driver was talking on the phone and build the case based on distracted driving. Or they might get access to the event data recorder and obtain information about the vehicle’s speed and braking before the accident. 

To ensure your legal right to compensation is protected right from the start of your claim, discuss your accident with an experienced St. Louis car accident attorney at The Hoffmann Law Firm, L.L.C.