Construction Accident Settlement Process and Timeline

Answer:

Construction cases take time to resolve. There’s either federal court or state court. We’ve had quite a bit of success in construction cases in federal court because many of these construction companies are from out of state, and they allow us to do a thing called diversity jurisdiction. In other words, we can sue an out of state company for doing business in Wyoming, and we can sue them in federal court. That’s usually beneficial because it speeds up the process. Federal courts are very streamlined in their handling of discover. Defense attorneys don’t like it because the cases move fast. You get a trial date right away.

State court’s a little bit harder when it comes to these kinds of cases. The reason that it’s harder in the state court is because you don’t get a trial right away in many of the state courts. The trial date is what really drives a case. If you don’t have a trial date that’s solid in granite for the defense, they’re going to stall the case every bit that they can. The question is how long does it take to resolve? It’s going to take 9 to 12 months in federal court and 12 months to 2 or 3 years in state court. My preference, of course, is the federal court, but that’s something that is unique to every case. It won’t work in every case, but it’s something you need an attorney that understands so they get you the fastest track you can get for resolution of your case.