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Motion To Calm Yourself: Understanding Motions In Your Personal Injury Trial

9 February 2018

Deann Miles

If you have been injured and are now filing suit against the at-fault driver, you may be entering the trial stage of your case. Personal injury cases can go on a long time, and even when you finally get to trial the process doesn't get any smoother. Delays, hearings, postponements, and motions are all part of the game when you litigate, but understanding what the other side is trying to do in your case is important. Read on to learn more about some common defensive motions before the time comes.

The Dispositive Motion

Some kinds of motions are mostly administrative and are not likely to change the case in any real way. These are known as nondispositive motions and are nothing for you to be concerned about. Since you can consider the base of that word to be "dispose," dispositive motions seek to dispose of the case entirely or to have the case dismissed for one reason or another. Here are some common motions to dismiss, all of which are considered dispositive motions.

Motion to Dismiss the Case

You can almost be assured that the other side will attempt to nip things in the bud by filing a few of these motions right at the beginning of the case, and these are actually routine. That doesn't mean that you should just ignore these motions, but don't get worried about them either. These motions usually ask the judge to dismiss, or "throw out" the case due to its lack of merit or other reasons.

Wrong Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction refers to not only the place but the subject matter. When it comes to personal injury cases, the case must be brought in the state where the accident happened and not where one or more of the parties reside. Subject matter jurisdiction refers to the correct court in that state. There are many different kinds of courts, from state and federal to civil and criminal. The correct court for a personal injury case is civil, and depending on other factors it might be heard in small claims court or other types of civil court. Any case brought in the incorrect jurisdiction will be dismissed and will need to be refiled in the appropriate court.

Too Late

All states have a statute of limitations, but there are exceptions to the rules. For example, if you had no way of knowing about the harm done several years ago, you may be able to overcome that rule. Toxic exposure and other slow-acting injuries are some examples of these types of discovery of harm cases. If the other side claims that the statute of limitations has expired, your attorney will combat that claim with proof that you did not know about the harm done until more recently.

Issues with the Summons

This is where a small technicality could have your case in jeopardy. The summons that asks parties to appear must be letter perfect.

Defendant Not Responsible

The lack of claim motion seeks to convince the judge that the wrong party has been sued. For example, they will claim that the brake manufacturer should be sued instead of the driver of the car that hit you.

Speak to your car accident lawyer about these motions.

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