Can I Appeal a Personal Injury Verdict in New York?

You have the right to appeal if the verdict in your personal injury case is against you at trial, and you can ask the higher court to appeal the verdict and overturn it. Basically, it is necessary to establish a procedural mistake by the lower court in appeals court cases.

An Appeal Is Not a New Trial

You cannot file an appeal because you lost your personal injury case or did not receive as much compensation as you desired. There must be an appeal because mistakes in the lower court processes undermine your case. Examples of legal mistakes include; the jury was given the wrong directions in deciding your case, the court excluded material that should have been admitted, your expert witness was not permitted to testify, and an irregularity such as jury misbehavior occurred.

The Appeal Process

It is crucial to submit the proper papers while appealing. Your lawyer must also explain why the law supports your case and why the jury’s verdict was incorrect. The attorney is required to submit all necessary supporting papers.

A Notice of Appeal must be filed to begin the process. There is always a short time to file, and you must appeal the decision within 30 days after receiving an Order or Judgment with a Notice of Entry. Remember that the respondent’s attorney will nearly always file a motion to dismiss the appeal once the notice of appeal is filed.

The appeal must be perfected in the following stage. Perfecting entails getting the argument ready for the appeals court. The appeal will be scheduled on the court’s calendar once your attorney obtains the trial transcript and the appeal record and writes and serves a brief. It contains a ton of paper. Essentially, the court considers all the paperwork while issuing its ruling.

You will not be allowed to make new arguments or evidence at the appeal. Your attorney’s duty is to ensure that the trial records are full and included in your appeals case because the appellate judge will only deliberate on the records and evidence from your trial.

Lastly, it is still possible to appeal to the New York Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court, if the appellate court sustains the lower court’s ruling.