Can a Car With In-Vehicle Tech Be Used to Prove Distracted Driving?

Distracted Driving

Car accidents are traumatic, and more so when they literally come out of nowhere and completely derail an otherwise average day. You could be driving down the road one minute and suddenly a driver in the other lane swerves into you for some unknown reason. However, in a large number of accidents, distracted driving can be at play. When it is, you can use distracted driving as a cause for the accident in your personal injury case to prove negligence and make sure all your medical and repair bills will be paid in full for something that wasn’t your fault.

When the term “distracted driving” is brought up, the mind still drifts to the old standard. You know, a person talking on a cell phone or trying to do their make up while eating a bowl of cereal. However, with many states adopting anti-distracted driving laws, cell phones aren’t really as much of a worry as they once were. Unfortunately, there is a new menace on the road, and it is being increasingly pushed out by almost all car manufacturers – in-vehicle technology.

In-Vehicle Technology

In-vehicle technology can be everything from your navigation system to touch screens and even voice activation systems. It was meant to actually cut down on distracted driving, but new studies have found that it has had quite the opposite effect. TheAAA Foundation for Traffic Safetyhas found that these new systems often take away driver attention for an average of 40 seconds. That is terrifying news considering that taking your eyes off the road for two seconds doubles your chance for an accident.

Of course, the problem with distracted driving as a cause for an accident is proving it. Certainly, with cell phone records, you could track the times of calls and texts to the time before the accident. If they were using the wireless devices in their car at the time, this is still a valid route in pursue. However, it can be more difficult if the driver was doing something less easy to prove like messing with their navigation, an act that has been found to be one of the biggest distractions one can do while driving.

In these sort of accidents, you will want to trust in the ability of the police to investigate. Be very clear on the circumstances of the accident, and bring up that you may suspect that distracted driving was at play. You may also want to see if you can find any witnesses to the accident that may have seen suspicious activity such as swerving or a random increase or decrease in speed before the accident, as this heavily suggests distraction.

Once you made sure that the police filed a report for the accident, unfortunately, much of the rest of gathering evidence lies with you and your chosen lawyer. Your personal injury lawyer will have a number of different resources at their disposal, so if you suspect distracted driving as a cause, be sure to let them know it. If a driver can be proven to be distracted and that caused your accident, this can be a huge boon to your case to make sure that you get the compensation that you require.

Your Biggest Weapon

Have you been in an accident on the road? Even if distracted driving is probably not the cause of your accident, we can help you. A lawyer is your biggest weapon in personal injury cases, and you need to make use of it to get the compensation that you deserve.Contact ustoday to see what the Law Office of Freeman & Freeman can do to help you get your justice for your injury.