If you are seriously injured, you will be up against a large company and/or large insurance company with their own defense attorneys, investigators and support personnel.

Our firm understands that you need your own team! Hoey & Farina will assign you YOUR OWN TEAM:

Your Own Lawyer Your Own Paralegal
Your Own Investigator

If you decide to choose Hoey & Farina for your legal needs:

• Your Team at Hoey & Farina is prepared to initiate immediate court action. The firm's attorneys and staff are available 24 hours. For example, it may be necessary to file a lawsuit within hours of an accident in order to obtain an "injunction" to preserve evidence. Without an injunction, evidence that would help to prove you case can disappear. Further, getting the right expert to examine the scene as soon as possible can be crucial to your claim. In some cases, an expert on the scene shortly after the accident can help investigate -- and prove at trial -- what negligence caused the accident. Your Team will be able to determine what type of expertise is needed (medical, mechanical, engineer, "human factor" expert, or experts on safe procedures in specific industry).
  

• Your Team will evaluate the evidence and legal rules and doctrines to help figure out who caused an accident and who can be held liable. In some cases, more than one person or company can be sued in Court for causing the same accident.
  

• Winning a case often depends on what facts you can prove and what legal rules and doctrines apply to your case. In civil cases, you typically have to prove the facts by a "preponderance of evidence." But winning often turns on what little-known rules and regulations can be uncovered by a thorough review of the facts. Your Team has years of experience fighting these types of legal battles. 
  

• Insurance companies and corporate defendants are determined to minimize the amount of money paid out for accidents. You need smart, tough lawyers who will fight against these powerful interests to maximize your recovery.

Successfully handling a case involving a serious injury requires a tremendous amount of time, hard work, investigation, research, fights with defense attorneys, trips to Court, and duels over the applicable legal rules and doctrines.

You need a law firm with an established track record of delivering winning results. You need a Team that can will take your case to the courtroom and before the jury. For seriously injured people, we are the Team. We have the experience and the track record to prove it.

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Construction workers are exposed to a wide variety of hazards and face a greater risk of work-related injury or fatality than employees in any other U.S. industry. Such risks include the following: 

• Falls from Roofs, Ladders, and Platforms; 
• Accidents involving Mobile and Operating Equipment, Trucks and Cars; 
• Scaffolding Accidents, Lifting Equipment Failure; 
• Electric Shock; 
• Trench Collapses; 
• Fires and Explosions; 
• Compressed Gas and Welding Accidents. 

Although injury and fatality rates in many industries have declined significantly in the more than three decades since the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was created, this has not been the case in construction industry. According to the most recent annual Bureau of Labor Statistics data, in 2001 there were 481,400 nonfatal injuries and illnesses in U.S. construction work. Accident rates for nonfatal injuries and illnesses were 7.9 per 100 full-time workers in construction compared to 5.7 per 100 full-time workers in all private industry in 2001. There were 1,225 fatal occupational construction injuries in 2001, not counting the 58 construction workers who died in the September 11 attacks.

Every construction injury case is unique and you need to talk to an attorney to help find out exactly what your legal options might be in your specific case. Contact a Hoey & Farina attorney with any questions regarding a construction accident toll free at 1-888-425-1212, or send an email to info@hoeyfarina.com.

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Work-related Injuries & Workers’ Compensation

If you have been hurt on the job, you likely have many questions that you need answered, such as: 

• What types of benefits are available?
• Who provides the benefits?
• For what injuries and diseases are benefits paid?
• Can I be compensated for a pre-existing condition?
• Are workers’ compensation cases handled as lawsuits in court against your employer?
• Can an employee be fired because he or she reported an accident?

Every workers' compensation case is unique, and you need to talk to an attorney to help find out exactly what your legal options might be in your specific case. Contact a Hoey & Farina attorney with any questions regarding a workers' compensation issue toll free at 1-888-425-1212, or send an email to info@hoeyfarina.com.

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Auto Accidents

If you travel regularly by car, there is a very high probability that you will be involved in a motor vehicle accident during your lifetime. Every 10 seconds, someone in the United States is involved in a car accident, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The NHTSA reports that in 2001, over 3 million people were injured due to motor vehicle accidents nationwide, including 41,300 injuries resulted in death. It will not come as a surprise that automobile accident cases are by far the most common type of personal injury case in our courts. 

Generally, people who operate automobiles must exercise "reasonable care under the circumstances," and failure to use reasonable care is considered negligence. A person who negligently operates a vehicle may be required to pay for any "damages", either to a person or property, caused by his or her negligence. 

The injured party, known as the plaintiff, is required to prove that the defendant was negligent, that the negligence caused the accident, and that the accident caused the plaintiff's injuries. Courts look to a number of factors in determining whether a driver was negligent, including the following:

• Disobeying traffic signs or signals
• Failing to signal while turning
• Driving above or below the posted speed limit
• Disregarding weather or traffic conditions
• Failing to drive on the right side of the road
• Driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol

At Hoey & Farina, we will promptly investigate a crash, determine fault, and seek to recover all legal damages. Regardless of who was at fault in the accident, car accident victims should seek the counsel of an experienced attorney to protect your legal rights.

If you a specific question about an auto accident injury, please call a Hoey & Farina attorney toll-free  at 1-888-425-1212, or send an email to info@hoeyfarina.com.

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Riverboat Injuries

The Jones Act is a law that provides special protection to workers on boats. The definition of seaman is broad: even a dealer at a riverboat casino who is injured after falling at work may be covered by the Jones Act.  If the injured worker can prove that his employer was negligent, i.e. failed to take "reasonable" steps to make the workplace reasonably safe, then the injured worker can get paid for lost wages and benefits, pain and suffering, disability and full compensation. A Jones Act case can be worth much more than a Workers' Compensation case because Workers' Compensation has strict statutory limits on payments. An injured worker also has the option of having the case heard by a jury, unlike Workers' Compensation.

If you or someone who know has been injured on a riverboat casino, please call us toll-free  at 1-888-425-1212, or email us at info@hoeyfarina.com. You have rights of which you may be unaware.

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Medical Malpractice

Medical malpractice claims can be difficult and expensive. Almost all malpractice claims against health care providers require expert testimony by physicians, nurses or other professionals in the same specialty as the defendant. There are many important issues that are taken into consideration in a medical malpractice case, including:

Every year, 100,000 people die and 1.5 million are hospitalized because of adverse drug reactions alone. According to a national physician group, The American Academy of Family Physicians, about one in 50 hospitalized patients is injured due to negligence, and yet only one in 10 file a lawsuit.

If you believe that you or a loved one has been injured because of medical malpractice, it is important to choose a highly qualified attorney that has been consistently successful in achieving the best results. If you a question about a medical malpractice claim, please contact a Hoey & Farina attorney toll-free  at 1-888-425-1212, or send an email to info@hoeyfarina.com. 

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Fall Down/Premises Liability

"Slip and fall" or "trip and fall" are the terms for injuries that occur as a result of dangerous or hazardous conditions on someone else's property. This concept is known as Premises Liability. 

Property owners are responsible for injuries that occur as a result of dangerous conditions on their property, which the owner created, knew about, or should have known about. The hazard may be obvious (such as a wooden pallet in a walkway) or hidden (like a hole under a floor mat). In general, an owner will be considered as having had knowledge of a dangerous or hazardous condition if it is a permanent condition. With temporary conditions, the length of time that the condition existed before the accident occurred can be crucial. For example, the discoloration of a piece of fruit on the grocery store's floor may be used to prove the length of time that the fruit in the walkway -- the hazardous condition -- was on the floor. The argument would be that a reasonably careful (non-negligent) storeowner wouldn't let a piece of fruit sit on the floor for such a long time before it caused an accident.

Defective & Dangerous Products

"Products liability" is the term used to describe situations in which a person or property is injured or damaged in some way due to a defective or dangerous product or service. Defective products are responsible for causing many injuries each year.

Manufacturers can be held accountable under three basic theories of liability: negligence, breach of warranty, and strict liability. Under "strict liability," a defendant who was injured by a machine can sue a manufacturer and recover damages if (i) the product was defective, (ii) the defect existed when the manufacturer delivered the product, and (iii) the defect caused plaintiff's injuries. This means that even if the manufacturer tried to prevent a defect but the machine was in fact delivered in a defective state, the injured party has a good case and can possibly recover substantial damages.

Products liability can also apply when a product wasn't properly designed or there weren't proper warnings.

There are laws aimed to protect consumers against unsafe products. These laws provide a powerful incentive for manufacturers to be very careful about what they put on the market. However, product liability cases often require sophisticated expert witnesses, like engineers. 

If you have a question regarding a product involved in an injury, please call us toll-free at 1-888-425-1212 or send an email to info@hoeyfarina.com.

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Information Mission
It is important that you understand your rights. Every case presents unique problems that must be properly addressed. This Web site is aimed at providing information to injured people so that they will make the best decision regarding their particular circumstances. The menu on the left provides major topic headings for subject areas where you will much information addressing many general questions or concerns. However if your question does not fall within the listed categories, or, more importantly, if you have a specific question about an injury, please call us toll-free at 1-888-425-1212 or email us at info@hoeyfarina.com.

Experience
Selecting a personal injury attorney is an important decision. Suffering a personal injury due to someone's negligence can have life long consequences both for the injured person and his or her family. Hoey & Farina's experienced trial lawyers will provide dedicated representation. Our skill, commitment to clients and team efforts produced our great track record. We believe the trust of our clients is earned everyday. 

Se Habla Español? 
We work in a bilingual environment, counseling individuals who are English and/or Spanish speaking.

Hoey & Farina's Location
Conveniently located just outside of Chicago's Loop in the Printer's Row neighborhood, just steps away from the Federal Courthouse. 
|Hoey & Farina Map|

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