Drunk drivers are a menace to everyone on North Carolina roads. It is an unfortunate truth that many Charlotte residents will personally be affected by the damaging harm that drunk drivers can inflict on their victims. Drunk driving is a crime, but criminal sanctions do little to make the victims who are directly impacted by drunk driving accidents whole again.
When a person is under the influence of alcohol and causes a crash with another vehicle, the drunk driver may be arrested for a slew of drunk driving crimes. Those crimes are prosecuted by a lawyer for the community who has an interest in protecting the public good from the dangers that drunk driving presents.
A criminal trial of this nature does not provide victims with financial compensation for the damages they suffered. To pursue compensation, the victim may need to initiate their own civil lawsuit. A civil lawsuit claims that the negligent or reckless acts of another person caused a victim to suffer harm and their harm should be compensated with damages. The facts of a case and how well a victim can plead their claims will impact their success when their matter is heard in court.
A victim of a drunk driving accident may want justice in the wake of their crash. The arrest and prosecution of a drunk driver may provide them with a sense of relief that the drunk driver is off of the roads, but a civil lawsuit may be a victim’s best course of action to recover the damages they need to get by.