As an experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney with years of experience investigating and trying lawsuits I am still amazed how badly Tennessee drivers react to serious winter weather. There are a few simple rules that take just a modicum of thought. Be Prepared. If you know that a winter storm is coming make preparations by shopping for food, make sure your car is fueled and properly winterized and if you don’t absolutely have to go out stay at home.

If you have to go out make sure that your windshield, rear windows and outside rearview mirrors are clear. While on the road be alert for poor traction and watch your speed. The number one cause of Tennessee automobile accidents is a distraction that takes the drivers eyes, ears and mind off of the task at hand. In severe winter weather this is even more important. Keep your radio off, wait until you are stopped to use your cell phone and avoid distracting conversations with passengers.

Once the storm has passed and the roads are somewhat cleaned off another danger lurks and that danger is black ice. Icy patches that are difficult to see can send a vehicle into a spin and are the causes of most Tennessee roadway departure crashes. If you are in an accident on icy roads pay particular attention to other cars. Once those cars go out of control they can become deadly to people on the road.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in Tennessee automobile accident contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to learn about your rights and remedies.

Strictly Enforce DUI Laws

As an experienced Tennessee car accident lawyer I want to remind you that driving with a BAC of .08 or higher is illegal in Tennessee and every other state. If you follow my Blog, The Tennessee Auto Accident Attorney”, you will know that in Tennessee we continue to see a tragic number of people with debilitating injuries and deaths as a result of impaired driving. This careless disregard for human life must stop. To help ensure that happens, the Tennessee Highway Patrol and local law enforcement are dedicated to arresting impaired drivers wherever and whenever they find them, no matter whom they are.

Reference a recent report in several Montgomery County media outlets about a Clarksville, Tennessee police officer who was arrested in Henry County on charges of DUI and Implied Consent. The implied consent charge stemmed from his refusal to submit a breath test. While on administrative leave, and before a court appearance and departmental hearing the officer resigned his commission.

My experienced trying Tennessee automobile accident cases tells me that in order to send the right message to the driving public the enforcement of DUI laws has to cover everyone. Lives are at stake and DUI is a dangerous crime and should be treated as such.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident involving a drunk driver you owe it to yourself to contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to learn about your rights and remedies.

Teach Teen Driving Safety

Over the last several Blogs at “The Tennessee Auto Accident Attorney” we have talked about younger drivers and the hazards they face as the travel the highways and byways of Tennessee. As an experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney, I regularly speak to parents of teen drivers, and on every occasion I remind them that simply telling their children to act in a safe manner when they are behind the wheel won’t be much help to them, it is the duty of the parents to teach them by example.

I also share some sobering statistics. In Tennessee and across the nation traffic crashes are the leading cause of teen fatalities, accounting for 38% of all teen deaths. In 2008, about 3,500 teens in the United States aged 15–19 were killed and  more than 350,000 were treated in emergency departments for injuries suffered in motor-vehicle crashes. Young people ages 15-24 represent only 14% of the U.S. population. However, they account for 30% ($19 billion) of the total costs of motor vehicle injuries among males and 28% ($7 billion) of the total costs of motor vehicle injuries among females.

Most Americans typically learn to drive during the teen years, when the brain is not fully mature yet. Recent research is beginning to give us insight why many teens have difficulty regulating risk-taking behavior:

* The area of the brain that weighs consequences, suppresses impulses and organizes thoughts does not fully mature until about age 25.

* Hormones are more active in teens, which influence the brain’s neuro-chemicals that regulate excitability and mood. The result can be thrill-seeking behavior and experiences that create intense feelings.

Chances are, your community has been struck by a tragic accident involving a teenage friend, classmate or family member. Tennessee parents have an excellent resource available at the website of the National Safety Council. Check out http://teendriver.nsc.org/ for helpful tips and suggested study materials.

My experience investigating and trying Tennessee teen driver accident cases tells me that it is never too early to start training your child for the day he or she gets behind the wheel and you watch them drive off into the real world.

If you or a loved is injured in a Nashville or Tennessee automobile accident caused by a teen driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to learn about your rights and remedies.

The Downside Of Driving And Drinking

Since the topic of the day for my Blog “The Tennessee Auto Accident Attorney” is drunk driving fatalities, I was drawn to a report on several Nashville news outlets this morning regarding the arrest and an indictment of a Nashville college student on a number of charges, including vehicular homicide by reckless conduct, vehicular homicide by intoxication, aggravated assault and two counts of vehicular assault, for a one-car accident in which her passenger was killed and the other passengers were injured.

We have recently found out that fatality rates from drunk driving accidents have fallen in Tennessee, which is a sign that educational and enforcement actions are having the desired result. But those statistics are surely no comfort to the parents of a 20-year-old Shelbyville man who was killed as the result of the accident.

The facts are sketchy but it appears the young woman was driving in South Nashville at 4:30 Am when she lost control and drove into a ditch, struck a utility pole and rolled over and ended up on the top.

Historically, most drunk drivers are males but statistics show that the number of women driving under the influence is definitely on the rise. Between 2004 and 2008 in Tennessee, impaired women drivers involved in fatal crashes increased by 4.7 percent.

Ultimately the driver of the vehicle is the one responsible for saying no to drunk driving, but when youth is involved the thing that is going make a difference is parental training. How did we as parents teach our children about the dangers of drinking and driving. Teaching our children is more than just telling them not to do it, bad things will happen, it’s about teaching by example. How we drive is how they are going to drive.

If you or a loved one is killed or injured in a Tennessee automobile accident involving a drunk driver you owe it to yourself to take advantage of a free consultation with the experienced Nashville car accident lawyers and find out about your rights and remedies. I mean, what do you have to lose? Choose a certified civil trial lawyer with years of “boots on the ground” experienced. That lawyer can be found at Phillip Miller & Associates.

Alcohol Related Fatality

As my goal with this Blog, “The Tennessee Auto Accident Attorney” is to educate my readers in the hope that you all will practice safe driving and instill in your family and friends the need to do the same, today I thought I would share a tragic story reported on the website of News Channel 5.

It appears that the crash happened just before midnight when a 27-year-old man veered from the highway in his SUV, hit a concrete culvert and flipped over several times, ejecting and killing him instantly. Investigators say that alcohol was a factor in the accident and that the young man was not wearing his seatbelt. They also said that he was driving on a suspended license and had a long history of driving offenses

How tragic that a young man has to lose his life because he just didn’t get it. It’s impossible to say what caused him to lose control of his vehicle, it might have been the alcohol, he might have fallen asleep or he may have been distracted by a cell phone or radio.

Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher. That is down from 377 people killed in 2007 with a BAC of .08 or higher, but even one death is too high of a rate.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates and find out about your right and remedies.

Distracted Driving Kills

As a Tennessee automobile accident lawyer I am aware that these days, people are bombarded with devices that can help accomplish more in less time. With people spending an average of about one hour and 15 minutes in their vehicles every day, unfortunately, other activities, from talking to the kids to eating dinner, often take place behind the wheel.

Experts estimate that drivers are doing something potentially distracting more than 15 percent of the time their vehicles are in motion. So little time, so many multi-taskers. If you’re driving your vehicle, you are already multitasking. At a minimum you are: operating a piece of heavy machinery at high speed; navigating across changing terrain; calculating speeds and distances; and responding to all the other drivers and obstacles around you. Putting one more activity in the mix –even talking to your passengers or changing a radio station — can be enough to make you lose control of your vehicle or fail to respond in an emergency.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration driver inattention is the leading factor in most crashes. Nearly 80 percent of crashes and 65 percent of near-crashes involved some form of driver inattention within three seconds before the event.  Primary causes of driver inattention are distracting activities, such as cell phone use, and drowsiness.

With those facts in mind I reference an article on the website of the Kingsport Times-News reporting on a fatal Tennessee automobile collision in which a van, owned and operated by a not-for-profit, crossed the center line and crashed head-on into another vehicle killing it’s driver.

As an experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorney I ask myself what causes a driver to be so distracted that he/she crosses the center-line and head-on’s another car? In the hundreds of cases that I have handled I have seen hundreds of distractions. Cell phones, texting, reaching for cigarettes, fooling with the radio, talking to passengers, thinking about things unrelated to driving, day-dreaming, and the list goes one. Fortunately for investigators the distracted driver here is alive to answer questions.

As an experienced Tennessee automobile accident lawyer I implore you to think about the distractions in your daily driving experience and try to avoid them. If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a distracted driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates to learn about your rights and remedies.

Sleeping Drivers Kill

As the economy begins it’s recovery, one of the first signs will be the increasing numbers of tractor-trailers on the highways and byways of Tennessee.  As an experienced Tennessee tractor-trailer accident attorney , I have handled dozens of cases involving tractor-trailer wrecks on Interstate highways and when investigating these accidents, drowsiness or drivers falling asleep as a cause, are the hardest to prove, unless the driver survives.

However, there are a number of clues at a crash scene that tell investigators that the person fell asleep at the wheel. For example, drowsy driving accidents usually involve only one vehicle where the driver is alone and the injuries tend to be serious or fatal. Also, skid marks or evidence of other evasive maneuvers are usually absent from the drowsy driving crash scene.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates conservatively that each year drowsy driving “is responsible for at least 100,000 automobile crashes, 71,000 injuries, and 1,550 fatalities.” But among all the major factors that cause or contribute to crashes, like speeding, alcohol use, and weather situations, drowsiness is the most difficult for police and other crash investigators to detect and quantify.

Sleepiness and driving is a dangerous combination. Most people are aware of the dangers of drinking and driving but don’t realize that drowsy driving can be just as fatal. Like alcohol, sleepiness slows reaction time, decreases awareness, impairs judgment and increases your risk of crashing.

Reference an article on the website of Knoxville TV station WVLT which reports on two men injured in an early morning tractor trailer accident in East Knox County. In this case the driver and his driving partner survived the crash and he told investigators that he had fallen asleep and as he veered off the road he awoke and over-corrected causing the trailer to overturn. Thankfully no one was killed or seriously injured.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile tractor-trailer collision you owe it to yourself to contact the experienced Tennessee tractor-trailer accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to find out about your rights and remedies.

Yield To Emergency Vehicle

As an experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorney I regularly critique other drivers as I travel on the highways and byways of Tennessee. One of the things that I observe on a regular basis is drivers who fail to yield to emergency vehicle. You know the guy, you pull over to yield to an ambulance and he whips around you to get ahead.

In Tennessee we have what is called the “Move Over Law” which is part of the “Failure To Yield To Emergency Vehicle” statute. In a nutshell, the law requires a driver to take certain actions when an emergency vehicle is present. The driver of every other vehicle shall yield the right-of-way and shall immediately drive to a position parallel to, and as close as possible to, the right-hand edge or curb of the roadway clear of any intersection, and shall stop and remain in such position until the authorized emergency vehicle has passed, except when otherwise directed by a police officer. A driver must also keep clear of any intersection in the event that the emergency vehicle needs to turn.

When the emergency vehicle is stationary, and off to the side of the roadway,  the driver shall proceed with due caution, yield the right-of-way by making a lane change into a lane not adjacent to that of the authorized emergency vehicle, if possible with due regard to safety and traffic conditions, if on a highway having at least four (4) lanes with not less than two (2) lanes proceeding in the same direction as the approaching vehicle

A short but important article about an automobile accident in Bradley County appeared on the news website of Chattanooga TV station News Channel 9 the other day that offers us the opportunity to discuss this important Rule of The Road.  Bradley County detectives were responding to a call with lights and siren operating when they collided with another car at an intersection. The offending driver must have been distracted as she went through the intersection and failed to yield. Luckily the detectives were not seriously injured.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associate and take advantage of a free consultation to find out about your rights and remedies.

Reduce Intersection Crashes

My experience as a Nashville automobile accident lawyer and my study on the subject of intersection crashes tells me that Red Light Cameras (RLCs) reduce the number of fatalities, personal injuries and property damages to a huge extent.

A recent Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study in Oxnard, California, showed that red light running violations dropped a total of 42 percent after well publicized photo enforcement was introduced. Another study in Fairfax, Virginia, showed that violations declined about 40 percent after one year of photo enforcement. A key to all effective traffic law enforcement is publicity; without it there is no deterrent effect, and the purpose of red light cameras is deterrence.

In a recent national survey of voters, Public Opinion Strategies found that fully 69% of Americans support the use of “red-light cameras” at the most dangerous intersections in their states, while just 29% oppose them. Those voters “strongly” supporting red-light cameras outnumber those who strongly oppose them by a wide 45%-18% margin.  The study showed support for these red-light cameras is not only very strong nationally, but cuts across all demographic and attitudinal groups, including men and women, young and old, Republicans and Democrats, and conservatives and liberals.

In Tennessee a number of cities and towns use the cameras and the results are positive. There is a move from some political persons to ban the use of RLCs statewide, claiming that they are a violation of our Constitution. I suggest that these political people, for whatever their reasons, leave the job of traffic enforcement to the local governments. Despite the fact that the statistics show a decrease in accident and injury, they simply deny the facts. It’s time for some leadership from our elected officials. To those “flat world politicians”, I suggest that we embrace technology in the spirit of saving lives.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee intersection accident you are going to need an experienced Tennessee automobile accident lawyer, one who understand the myriad avenues of seeking just compensation for victims. Intersection accidents may well be the fault of the designers of the roadway as well as the speeding or negligent driver who hits you. At Phillip Miller & Associates we have just the kind of experience tht you need to assure you are adequately compensated.

Police Chase Crash

Maybe it’s just me, but as an experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney, I don’t think it’s a smart idea when you are wanted by the police, on felony warrants, in Nashville, Dickson County, Georgia and Maryland, to go through a small town like Millersville, Tennessee at a high rate of speed, several times the speed limit, with a woman passenger hanging out of the car yelling for help.

According to a report on the website of Nashville TV station WSMV, that’s exactly what happened on Saturday last. It appears that 47-year-old Michael DeLoach had been spending time with a female friend. When she decided that she had had all the fun she wanted to have, she asked him to let her out of the car. He wouldn’t, and he took off.

A Millersville PD officer gave chase and then realized from her actions that he had a kidnapping and hostage situation on his hands and called for assistance. The chase lasted for some time and took police through three communities before it came to an end when Mr. DeLoach crashed into a vehicle containing a family of five in front of Cornerstone Church on Old Hickory Blvd.

The father is in serious condition at Vanderbilt Hospital. The mother and three children were taken to Skyline with non-life-threatening injuries. My prayers go out to the injured man and his family. I have often written in my Blog “The Tennessee Auto Accident Attorney” about the need to stay vigilant at all times when you are on the road. I doubt, with the way Mr. DeLoach was driving, there was anything the father could have done to avoid being hit by this manic, but the lesson here is that you never known when danger lurks,

Michael Deloach is currently locked up in the Sumner County Jail charged with kidnapping and evading arrest, and many other charges.  If you or a loved one is injured or killed by a driver in a Tennessee police chase accident you need an experienced Nashville automobile attorney to help you navigate your way through the minefield of liability issues, that’s why you should call the experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates for a free consultation to learn about your rights and remedies.