Alberta Motorcycle Accident Lawyer

Calgary Attorney is Avid Rider, Understands Motorcycle Laws

Video Transcript:

Steve Grover: 

If you're unfortunately involved in a motorcycle accident and you're seriously injured, I mean, hire an expert.

Rob Rosenthal: 

If you're in a crash, all while riding your motorcycle and you're injured, what are your rights, and how do you get help? We're gonna answer those questions and a lot more right now because that's what we're going to ask the lawyer. Hi again everybody. I'm Rob Rosenthal with askthelawyers.com, and my guest is Calgary Alberta lawyer, Steve Grover. I want to remind you right at the outset, if you wanna ask Steve questions of your own, just go to askthelawyers.com, click the button in the upper corner that says Ask A Lawyer, and it'll walk you right through the very simple process right there. Steve it's great to see you. Thank you for making some time to help us out today.

Steve Grover: 

Great, yeah great to see you also.

Rob Rosenthal: 

So just give us a little background on what your experience is with motorcycle injuries and helping people in those kind of cases...

Steve Grover: 

Well, I mean, just my background. I've been a lawyer here in Calgary, Alberta for 22 years now. My focus has been primarily personal injury law involving car accidents, motorcycle accidents, and trucking accidents. We do pretty much all personal injury kind of cases. One of my passions in life is motorcycling, apart from being a lawyer and obviously working hard on the cases, I'm a big motorcycle enthusiastic person. I've been riding motorcycles ever since I was young at my dad's ranch out in Calgary near Bragg Creek, starting out with dirt bikes, eventually getting up to street bikes and sport bikes, and then as you get up in years now I enjoy riding my Cruiser or Harley Davidson or one of my adventure bikes either a Ducati or KTM bike. And our office pretty much focuses on personal injury and primarily on people injured in motorcycle accidents.

Rob Rosenthal: 

Well, and as we're focusing today on motorcycle accidents, do you feel like the fact that you've got so much experience for riding motorcycles, and that you still ride, does that help you in handling these kind of cases, you think?

Steve Grover: 

Yeah, I think it's a huge advantage I have is being a motorcyclist and understanding the rules of road, riding motorcycles people think, "Oh, you're in a motorcycle accident. It's just like an auto accident." I disagree. There's so many other factors that come into the situation if you're dealing with a motorcycle accident, and if you know how to ride a motorcycle, you know what has to be done, what has not to be done, you know what type of riding gear you need and I think that's an advantage I have. I ride throughout the summer here in Calgary, unfortunately, we do have a short riding season about six months, but I try to take time in the weekends, ride anywhere from 5000 to 10,000 kilometers on my motorcycle, so I think it's a big advantage I have as a lawyer, especially focusing on motorcycle accidents.

Rob Rosenthal: 

Sure, it seems like, Steve, a lot of times when there's an accident between a car and a motorcycle, that there seems to be this presumption of guilt that, "Oh it's always the motorcyclist fault." Is that what you found in your experience, and what about that?

Steve Grover: 

Yeah, I'll be truthful with you. The culture is, I remember when I was starting to ride motorcycles and my dad told my mom, "Hey, Steve's gonna get on a bike and to teach him how to ride bike?" And my mom rolled her eyes and said, "Oh great. Hopefully, he doesn't need a blood transfusion." So the perception is is motorcycles are dangerous, but if you know, if you have your riding skills and you know how to ride properly, and a motorcycle is an enjoyable hobby everyone can have. The other issue is culturally, yeah, we hear about the Hells Angels, we hear about the Bandidos, these motorcycle gangs. I mean, there are shows like Sons of Anarchy that put a bad light in motorcyclists and unfortunately the society and even the courts, it goes into the judges. If you're a motorcyclist there's a perception that you may be at fault or partially at fault for the crash.

Rob Rosenthal: 

Let's talk about fault a little bit. How does fault figure in when you're considering working a legal claim after an accident, and what if the motorcyclist happens to be partially at fault. Does that mean they don't have a case?

Steve Grover: 

Well, obviously, the one thing is when you're taking on a case, and like our firm, we do personal injury motorcycle accidents primarily, we work on a contingency fee agreement, which means we work for free. We finance the file, of course, we wanna know who's at fault for the accident. And if the motorcyclist is at fault for the accident, unfortunately, there's nothing much we can do. Here in Alberta and primarily throughout Canada, we have contributory negligence. So say a motorcyclist comes to me, he or she and says, "Hey, you know, I'm partially at fault." Yes, faults gonna be taken into consideration when looking at their case. Under contributory negligence, say their case is worth $100,000 and they're 50% at fault. When we go to settle the case, either in mediation or trial, we have to take a 50% discount on the case, so it does, it's a big factor when we look at a case.

Rob Rosenthal: 

It makes sense. Tell me about the helmet laws in Alberta and Canada as a whole.

Steve Grover: 

Well, unlike in the US, I know there's some jurisdictions like Idaho where you don't have to wear a motorcycle helmet. Fortunately, here in Canada and here in Alberta, we have a law that when you're riding a motorcycle you need to wear a motorcycle helmet. And just out of safety and my own perception is if you're riding a motorcycle, you're out there on the street and you're riding on asphalt or dirt roads, you should wear a motorcycle helmet. The most important part of your body is your head and your brain, and if you're not wearing a motorcycle helmet, it's gonna be a factor to consideration if you're injured in an accident, because if you don't want to wear a helmet and you have a brain injury, obviously, there's gonna be a contributory negligence factor that's gonna be taken in for causing that injury.

Rob Rosenthal: 

So someone's injured on a motorcycle, and unfortunately if it's in auto versus motorcycle collision there's usually pretty serious injuries for the rider. Do they need to have a lawyer, Steve? Is it the kind of thing they go, they can handle themselves and save fees? What's your advice there?

Steve Grover: 

My advice, honestly, is I get this question all the time, and my dad was a general surgeon. I mean, if you have an appendix, are you just going to put yourself on the kitchen table, take out a butter knife and cut out your appendix? No, you need an expert. You need a medical doctor to diagnose that injury. Same here, I mean, if you're unfortunately involved in a motorcycle accident and you're seriously injured, hire an expert. We do this day in, day out. We work on a contingency fee, don't pay us anything up front. We pay for all the experts. Unfortunately, insurance companies don't cut checks for people. We have to fight for every dollar that comes to our clients, and we're trying to put our client in the best position they were before the accident. And if I was in an accident myself, I wouldn't handle it myself. I would hire a lawyer like myself whose expertise is in personal injury.

Rob Rosenthal: 

Great advice, Steve. Lots of good information. Thank you for making some time to answer our questions today. I appreciate it.

Steve Grover: 

Great, thank you. Nice seeing you again.

Rob Rosenthal: 

That's gonna do it for this episode of AskTheLawyer. My guest has been Calgary Alberta lawyer Steve Grover. We remind you again, if you'd like to ask Steve questions of your own, go to askthelawyers.com, click the button at the top that says, Ask A Lawyer. And it doesn't cost you anything to ask a question right there. Thanks for watching, I'm Rob Rosenthal with AskTheLawyers.

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