No legal claim can undo the loss of someone you love. But when another party may have caused that loss, your family deserves answers about what happened and what Arizona law allows you to do next. Gordi can investigate the circumstances, handle the legal process, and help your family make informed decisions about the path forward.
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After a fatal accident, the insurance company may hear from its driver, employee, insured, or investigators. Your loved one no longer has the opportunity to explain what they saw or experienced. That makes an independent investigation especially important.
What Happened Before the Fatal Event?
Witnesses, video, physical evidence, electronic data, records, and other information may help reconstruct events your loved one can no longer describe.
What Was the Other Party Doing?
Driving behavior, workplace decisions, property conditions, safety procedures, product failures, or other conduct may help establish why the death occurred.
Is Someone Trying to Shift the Blame?
The other side may argue that your loved one’s own actions contributed to what happened. Those allegations should be supported by evidence, not simply accepted because the person who died cannot respond.
Could More Than One Party Be Responsible?
Fatal incidents can involve several contributing causes and potentially responsible parties. A complete investigation should consider each of them.
Is Evidence Being Preserved?
Some evidence can disappear, be overwritten, repaired, discarded, or become harder to obtain as time passes.
Your loved one may not be able to tell their side anymore. The evidence still can.
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That question is central to Arizona wrongful death law. Under A.R.S. § 12-611, a wrongful death action may arise when a person’s death was caused by a wrongful act, neglect, or default that would have allowed the person to maintain an injury claim had death not resulted.
In practical terms, the investigation may ask:
A fatal vehicle collision may involve traffic laws and driver conduct. A fatal fall may involve premises liability. Other cases can involve employers, defective products, unsafe conditions, or different forms of negligence.
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The person most directly involved in your loved one’s death may not be the only party legally responsible. A complete investigation should consider everyone whose conduct may have contributed to what happened.
The Person Who Caused the Fatal Incident
A negligent driver, property owner, professional, or another individual whose actions caused the death may be legally responsible.
An Employer
If someone caused the fatal incident while working, their employer may also become relevant depending on the circumstances and the relationship between the parties.
A Business or Property Owner
Businesses and property owners may face liability when dangerous conditions, inadequate maintenance, negligent conduct, or other failures contribute to a fatal injury.
A Manufacturer or Other Company
When a defective vehicle, component, machine, or consumer product contributes to a death, companies involved with that product may need to be investigated.
A Government Entity
Some fatal incidents involve public vehicles, roads, traffic controls, property, or other government responsibilities. Claims involving public entities can have different, and potentially much shorter procedural requirements.
The investigation shouldn’t stop with the most obvious defendant. It should determine everyone who may share legal responsibility for your family’s loss.
There isn’t a single formula that captures what losing a spouse, parent, or child means to a family. One household may lose its primary source of income. Children may lose years of parental guidance. A surviving spouse may lose decades of companionship. Parents may experience profound grief after losing a child.
Depending on the circumstances, a wrongful death claim may account for:
Understanding damages therefore requires more than adding together expenses, it requires understanding who your loved one was to the family, what they contributed, and what their absence means for the people left behind.
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A wrongful death claim isn’t limited to one type of accident. The central question is whether another person, business, or entity may be legally responsible for the conduct or dangerous condition that caused your loved one’s death.
Wrongful death claims can arise from:
Car, Truck and Motorcycle Accidents
Speeding, distracted driving, impairment, unsafe turns, failure to yield, and other negligent driving can result in fatal collisions.
Pedestrian and Bicycle Accidents
When a driver fails to see, yield to, or safely avoid someone walking or riding a bicycle, the lack of protection around the victim can make the consequences devastating.
Dangerous Property Conditions
Fatal falls, drownings, negligent security incidents, and other dangerous property conditions may raise questions about whether a property owner or another responsible party failed to take reasonable precautions.
Defective Products
A dangerous vehicle component, machine, consumer product, or other defective product may expose manufacturers, distributors, or other parties to potential liability.
Workplace and Commercial Vehicle Incidents
When someone causes a fatal accident while performing work duties, responsibility may sometimes extend beyond the individual to an employer or other business.
Government-Related Incidents
Fatal accidents involving public vehicles, dangerous roads, traffic-control problems, or government property can involve public entities and special claim requirements.
No two families lose someone under exactly the same circumstances. That’s why determining what happened, why it happened, and who may be responsible is the starting point for every wrongful death case.
A wrongful death doesn’t always begin with an extraordinary event. A family can lose someone during a drive to work, while crossing the street, visiting a business, working, or simply going about an ordinary day.
A fatal incident may involve:
What initially appears to have been one person’s mistake may involve additional contributing factors or responsible parties.
A wrongful death investigation should establish not only what happened, but what could and should have happened differently.
In the aftermath of a fatal accident, preserving a potential legal claim may understandably not be your family’s immediate concern. However, certain information and evidence can become harder to obtain over time.
Taking a few practical steps now can help preserve your options while an attorney investigates the circumstances:
Your family doesn’t have to conduct the investigation itself. The important thing is giving the evidence that remains an opportunity to tell the complete story.
One of the fundamental challenges in a wrongful death case is that the person who died cannot explain what they saw, what happened immediately beforehand, or why another person’s version of events may be incomplete. That makes independent evidence especially important.
Depending on the case, Elmm Law Group can work to identify and preserve:
Each piece of evidence can help answer a different part of the same question: Why did this happen, and who may be legally responsible?
Your family shouldn’t have to rely on an incomplete explanation when additional evidence may provide answers.
A wrongful death claim isn’t simply a personal injury case with larger damages. Your loved one can no longer explain what happened, important evidence may be controlled by other parties, and the claim must account for losses that can affect your family for years to come.
17+ Years of Arizona Legal Experience
Gordi brings more than 17 years in Arizona’s legal system to the statutes, evidence, procedures, and liability issues that may affect your family’s case.
Former Arizona Assistant Attorney General
Her previous legal experience helped shape the analytical and investigative approach she now uses when examining responsibility and challenging opposing arguments.
Direct Access to Gordi
You can communicate directly with the attorney responsible for your case. Gordi remains familiar with the evidence, the family’s circumstances, and the important decisions that arise throughout the claim.
Personal Injury and Wrongful Death Focus
Elmm Law Group represents injured people and families affected by wrongful death, allowing the firm to focus its work on the issues surrounding serious and fatal accidents.
No Attorney Fee Unless We Win
There are no upfront attorney fees. Elmm Law Group receives an attorney fee only when compensation is recovered for your family.
Knowing Phoenix isn’t about filling a page with freeway names and neighborhoods. It’s understanding which local agencies, records, government entities, courts, and evidence sources may become important after a fatal incident.
For a Phoenix wrongful death case, that can mean knowing:
Elmm Law Group is based in Phoenix and handles wrongful death and personal injury cases in the state of Arizona.
Who Can File a Wrongful Death Claim in Arizona?
Arizona law limits who may bring a wrongful death action. Under A.R.S. § 12-612, the claim may generally be brought by a surviving spouse, child, parent or guardian, or the personal representative of the deceased person or an eligible surviving family member. Which family members may recover, and how a claim should be brought, can depend on the family’s circumstances.
How Long Do You Have to File a Wrongful Death Claim in Arizona?
Wrongful death claims are subject to legal deadlines. In many cases, Arizona’s two-year statute of limitations applies, but different and potentially much shorter requirements can arise when a government entity is involved. Because evidence can also disappear long before a filing deadline expires, waiting until the deadline approaches can create unnecessary problems.
What Do You Have to Prove in a Wrongful Death Case?
A wrongful death claim generally requires establishing that another person’s or entity’s wrongful conduct caused the death and would have allowed the deceased person to pursue an injury claim had they survived. That can require investigating both liability and the connection between the defendant’s conduct and the death.
What If My Loved One Was Partially Responsible?
Arizona follows a comparative-fault system. An allegation that your loved one contributed to the incident does not necessarily prevent the family from pursuing a wrongful death claim, although any percentage of fault attributed to the deceased can affect the recovery. Those allegations should be investigated rather than simply accepted because an insurer raises them.
What Compensation May Be Available?
The damages available depend on the circumstances and the losses suffered by the eligible survivors. A wrongful death claim may account for financial contributions as well as the loss of companionship, guidance, care, and other aspects of the relationship. Other related claims or damages may also need to be evaluated depending on what occurred before the death.
What Does It Cost to Speak With Gordi?
The initial consultation with Elmm Law Group is free. There are no upfront attorney fees, and you do not owe an attorney fee unless the firm recovers compensation for you.
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Gordana “Gordi” Mikalacki, Esq. is the founder and lead attorney of Elmm Law Group. She earned her J.D. from Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, clerked for the Arizona Court of Appeals, and served as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Arizona before focusing exclusively on personal injury and wrongful death representation. That background means she has seen how the state and its insurers defend these cases from the inside, and she uses that knowledge to advocate for Phoenix families.
Attorney Mikalacki handles wrongful death cases personally. She is not a settlement mill where a case manager handles your file and you rarely speak with a lawyer. When you hire Elmm Law Group, Gordi is the attorney working your case, reviewing the evidence, making the strategic decisions, and appearing in Maricopa County Superior Court when necessary.
She is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and consults with clients in English, Spanish, and Serbo-Croatian. Losing a family member is one of the most devastating experiences a person can face. Gordi approaches every wrongful death case with the seriousness and compassion that moment demands.
Related Resources:
What to Expect from a Wrongful Death Settlement in Arizona
Average Wrongful Death Settlement Amounts in Arizona
Given our firm specializes in and exclusively handles personal injury cases, we’re able to provide one-on-one Client-Attorney contact to ensure our clients feel heard. Also, we don’t get paid unless you do! Our team can provide multilingual services in English, Spanish, and Serbo-Croatian.
If you’ve been injured in a car crash, motorcycle wreck, pedestrian accident, trucking collision, or from a dog bite, call our Phoenix personal injury lawyer today for a FREE consultation. We’re available 24/7!
Take your first step towards speaking with our office by contacting us for a FREE consultation today. Call us at (480) 329-5084 or complete the form below. We look forward to evaluating your case!