An insurance adjuster reviewing your claim has every incentive to argue you share the blame, because West Virginia law lets them pay you nothing if the jury decides you’re more at fault than everyone else combined. The less documentation exists about what actually happened, the easier that kind of argument is to make.
You need someone documenting the crosswalk, the driver’s speed, and what actually happened while those facts are still fresh, before the insurance company finishes writing its own version of the story and moves on.
Attorney Edmund Wagoner has represented Bridgeport pedestrian accident victims for years after spending the earlier part of his career representing insurance carriers and hospital systems, and he secured a judgment of more than $2,000,000 in a West Virginia pedestrian fatality case. As a Personal Injury Lawyer, that background means he knows the arguments an adjuster is likely to make, because he used to make them. Past results do not guarantee a future outcome.
Contact us before you say anything further to the insurance company. We’ll help you understand what your claim may be worth.
| Best Lawyers – Tier One Firm 2024 | National Trial Lawyers Top 100 | Avvo Client’s Choice Award | 30+ Years Combined Experience |
Bridgeport pedestrian accidents rarely look the same twice, from a Charles Pointe parking lot to a residential crosswalk off Johnson Avenue, but the fight with the insurance company usually does. We help with:
West Virginia gives pedestrians the right of way in a marked or unmarked crosswalk, and a driver has to yield even without a traffic signal (W. Va. Code § 17C-10-2). But that right of way may get called into question once an insurance company gets involved.
Was there a crosswalk? Were you inside it? Could the driver have stopped in time? The answers to every one of those questions can become ammunition for the adjuster’s file. Adjusters are trained to gather that information before you have even finished your first round of treatment, often through recorded statements and social media that get twisted out of context.
West Virginia also follows a modified comparative fault rule: if a jury finds you 51% or more at fault for the accident, you recover nothing at all, and anything below that still cuts your payout by your percentage of blame (W. Va. Code § 55-7-13a). A pedestrian struck outside a marked crosswalk, or one an adjuster claims stepped out too quickly, is exactly the kind of case where that rule gets used hardest against you.
If your claim ends up in court, it will be heard in Harrison County Circuit Court in Clarksburg, and the gap between a fair settlement and a low offer usually comes down to how well the crosswalk, the lighting, and the driver’s speed were documented in the first days after the crash, not months later once memories fade and surveillance footage has already been deleted.
Every case turns on its own facts, and no past result guarantees what happens in yours, but these outcomes show what our attorneys have secured for pedestrians and other injured road users across West Virginia.
| Outcome | Case Type |
| $2,000,000+ | Pedestrian Fatality / Motor Vehicle Judgment |
| $1,200,000+ | Motorcycle Wrongful Death Settlement |
| $1,800,000+ | Multiple Wrongful Death Settlements, Off-Road Vehicle Accident |
These results depended on the specific facts, evidence, and injuries involved in each case, and past outcomes do not predict or guarantee the value of your claim.
We work on a contingency fee, so there is no upfront cost and no attorney’s fees are owed unless we recover money for you.
You generally have two years from the date of the accident to file a lawsuit, though certain circumstances can shorten or extend that window. It is worth confirming your deadline early rather than assuming you have plenty of time.
Fault being obvious to you does not stop an insurance company from disputing it, and adjusters routinely offer far less than a claim is worth once they realize no attorney is reviewing the file.
Value depends on your medical costs, lost income, and the severity of your injuries, along with how strong the evidence of fault turns out to be. We can give you a realistic range once we have reviewed the specifics of what happened to you.
Yes. Traffic volume, posted speed limits, and whether a marked crosswalk even existed all shift depending on where along Bridgeport’s roadways the accident happened, and each of those details affects how fault gets argued later.
Crossing 51% fault is the whole ballgame under West Virginia law, and that’s exactly the number an adjuster is working to push you past. Whether you were crossing on Route 50, cutting through a lot near Charles Pointe, or walking a residential street off Johnson Avenue, the facts of that specific moment decide whether you recover anything at all.
Attorney Edmund Wagoner spent years on the insurance side before he started building pedestrian injury cases instead of defending against them, and he knows which details actually move a claim and which ones adjusters use to shrink it. Reach out and tell us what happened. We’ll tell you where your case stands and what we can do to protect your right to fair compensation.
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