Serious Personal Injury from Drunk Driving Accidents

There is a dirty little secret about drunk driving accidents in Indiana.  Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) has done a tremendous job educating the public about the dangers of drunk driving accidents.  Drunk Driving Accidents cause serious personal injury and wrongful death.  Its affects reach to the families who lose their loved ones or who must become caregivers to those no longer able to do for themselves because of the injuries caused by drunk driving accidents.  As we all know, a drunk driver is not a responsible member of society and may not have enough insurance to pay for the harm they cause.  That is why, at Young and Young, we recommend that you make sure you have at least enough in “Medical Payments Insurance” to pay the deductible on your health insurance policy.  This protects you against out of pocket expenses.  Second, we recommend that you purchase as much Uninsured Motorist Coverage/Underinsured Motorist Coverage AS YOU CAN AFFORD.  This insurance will pay for the damages you have, but for which the drunk driver does not have enough insurance to cover your losses and harms.

Now for the dirty little secret.  You probably know that bars can be held responsible for harm to a person if they serve a person alcohol who is visibly intoxicated, and that person drives off from the bar and causes serious personal injury or wrongful death.  What you don’t know is that the bars are not required to maintain insurance which will pay for your damages if the bar serves a visibly intoxicated person and that person causes a drunk driving accident.  We do not have statistics as to how many bars do and do not carry this coverage, but we do know that a substantial number of bars do not carry such insurance.  This means that the injuries you suffer at the hands of the drunk driver who was over served at a bar will fall to you and your family.  The bar continues to make money, but you can’t work, you have huge medical bills and your family suffers.  We do not think this is right. You may say, well isn’t it really the drunk drivers fault? And the answer is that the drunk driver is to blame, but, if the drunk is in the bar, and is visibly intoxicated, they must not be served and caused to become even more drunk.  We encourage all bars to car liability insurance which will cover the harms caused by this kind of negligence. We also encourage bars to properly train their employees to take seriously their obligation to identify visibly intoxicated persons, and not serve them.