If you are employed in the construction industry and have recently sustained work-related harm, it’s important to understand that you don’t have to simply “tough it out.” Workplace legal protections exist for good reasons but they don’t do victims of work-related harm any good if they aren’t put into practice.
If you’ve been sidelined by occupational illness or work-related injuries, you may be entitled to a significant amount of compensation due to the harm you’ve suffered. Depending upon the nature of your work situation and the circumstances that led to your harm, you may be entitled to receive workers’ compensation benefits, pursue personal injury damages, or to take advantage of both opportunities for financial recourse.
Workers’ Compensation Benefits
As long as you’re eligible for workers’ compensation coverage, you are likely entitled to receive workers’ comp benefits regardless of how you sustained your work-related harm. Workers’ comp covers accident-related injury scenarios, occupational illness challenges, and harm sustained as a result of repetitive strain, work-related exacerbation of existing conditions, and other work-related harm circumstances regardless of fault. The workers’ comp system doesn’t generally care if you were at-fault for your harm or not. It cares about whether your harm was work-related. The notable exceptions to this rule involve drunk or high workers, workers who get harmed while instigating aggression, and those who purposefully get hurt in order to commit workers’ comp fraud.
Personal Injury Damages
As an experienced personal injury lawyer – including those who practice at Yearin Law Office – can confirm, you may also have strong grounds upon which to pursue personal injury damages, even if you’re eligible to receive workers’ comp benefits. Personal injury cases are generally filed when another’s negligence, recklessness, or intentional conduct caused (or contributed to the cause) of a victim’s harm.
It is worth noting that those employees who are eligible for workers’ compensation benefits aren’t generally empowered to name their employers as defendants in any lawsuits that they may file concerning their injuries. Although employers may be held civilly liable for discrimination and other forms of mistreatment, they generally enjoy liability protection as it concerns the work-related physical harm of their employees who are eligible for workers’ compensation benefits.
Exploring Your Legal Options Proactively
It is critically important to explore your legal options as soon as you can in the wake of sustaining a construction injury. It is understandably tempting to delay this process until you’re feeling better. However, pursuing workers’ compensation benefits is arguably the most time-intensive process related to compensating injury victims.
Additionally, failing to connect with an attorney promptly may ultimately undermine the strength of any personal injury case you might file, given that such cases often turn on the strength of evidence presented and evidence can be compromised or destroyed during the time it takes a victim to seek legal guidance. If you’ve recently been injured in a construction-related work capacity, the time to seek legal assistance is now.