Licensed in Missouri and Kansas

3 Ways to Maximize your Recovery in a Dog Bite Case

As personal injury lawyers in Kansas City, our firm handles many dog bite injury cases. Over the years, we’ve developed ways to increase our clients’ recoveries in these cases. Here are a few things we do to help get our clients full and fair compensation in their dog bite cases.


1. Report the dog attack to the police and the dog owners.

Whether you need to walk it in after the fact or call the police at the time, the officer should take down all of the basic information about the incident. This can be used to shore up the basic facts about the dog attack and will help you prove your case during settlement negotiations and, if necessary, at trial. Reporting to the dog’s owner puts them on notice of your claim and will help you find out if the owner had insurance. Reporting to the owner also shows that you are concerned about the attack and don’t want it happening to other people.


2. If you have scarring from the dog attack, get an estimate on how much it will cost to revise the scarring.

Because the dog attack caused your scarring, the dog owner is liable for the cost of revising that scar as much as medically possible. Not every scar can be removed completely, but a good surgeon can minimize a scar’s visibility dramatically. But, this procedure costs money. The dog owner must provide money compensation for the procedure. Having a report from a surgeon with a cost estimate of revision surgery will increase the value of your dog bite case.


3. Make a list of witnesses and get statements from them, if possible.

It’s important that you are able to prove clearly that you were attacked by the owner’s dog. Having witnesses helps a lot with this. Furthermore, you should get the statements as soon after your attack as possible, before memories fade and details are forgotten. This takes away the dog owner’s ability to deny the attack and dodge responsibility.

There are many other techniques we’ve developed over the years of handling dog bite cases in Missouri and Kansas. If you or a loved one has been the victim of such an attack and have questions about getting money compensation, please don’t hesitate to contact our firm at 816.867.8611.
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