Insurance companies have a quiet word for injured people who handle claims alone: profitable. A Manchester personal injury lawyer at Altman Nussbaum Shunnarah exists to take that word away from them. Our trial attorneys have recovered more than $1 billion for injured clients by treating every claim like it is headed for a jury, because the ones that are prepared that way are the ones that get paid fairly.
You are probably angry right now. Good. Anger, pointed in the right direction, becomes leverage.
Point it at (800) 229-7989 and let us do something with it. The consultation is free.
Table of Content
- Injured in Manchester? Here Is the Playbook Being Run on You
- Hurt on Someone Else's Property This Winter?
- What Are Your Rights After a Dog Bite in New Hampshire?
- Hurt at a Bar, Venue, or Parking Lot? Security Failures Are Claims Too
- Injured on City or School Property? The Rules Flip Against You
- Does New Hampshire Cap Wrongful Death Damages?
- What Raises the Value of a Manchester Injury Case?
- The Numbers Behind Our Name
- FAQs: Manchester Personal Injury Lawyer
- Make Them Take Your Injury Seriously
Injured in Manchester? Here Is the Playbook Being Run on You
The moment a claim gets reported, a process starts that has nothing to do with fairness. It has three moves, and they rarely change: delay, dispute, devalue.
Delay looks like unreturned calls and requests for paperwork you already sent, all while your bills gather interest. Dispute looks like questioning whether the fall on the ice really caused the injury, or suggesting your back hurt before the incident. Devalue is the endgame, a settlement offer built on the assumption that you are too tired, too broke, or too uninformed to fight.
Every part of that playbook works better against a person than against a law firm with a courtroom record. Our job is to make each move cost the insurer more than paying you fairly would. When a Manchester personal injury attorney with trial history enters the file, the calculation on their side of the table changes fast.
Hurt on Someone Else's Property This Winter?
You may have a premises liability claim, meaning a claim against whoever controls the property where you were hurt, because owners in New Hampshire owe visitors reasonable care, and in this climate, that duty has teeth. A Granite State business cannot act surprised by ice in January.
Manchester's building stock makes this personal. Millyard offices with worn brick stairways, aging apartment complexes with unshoveled walkways, and the vast parking lots along South Willow Street all generate falls every winter, and most of them trace back to a maintenance decision someone made or skipped. Broken railings, dim stairwells, and unsalted entrances are choices, not accidents.
The Merrimack Valley's freeze-thaw pattern makes the danger worse, since daytime melt refreezes into black ice by the evening commute. Owners who salt a lot at dawn and ignore it the rest of the day have not met their duty. They have performed it once for show.
New Hampshire's Revised Statutes Annotated (RSA) give you three years to sue, at RSA 508:4, but a premises case lives or dies on early evidence. Ice melts by noon, maintenance logs get thin, and cameras record over themselves. Photograph everything the day you fall, then get us involved while the proof still exists.
What Are Your Rights After a Dog Bite in New Hampshire?
Strong ones, because New Hampshire holds dog owners strictly liable for the harm their animals cause. Under RSA 466:19, you generally do not need to prove the owner was careless or that the dog ever bit anyone before. The injury itself carries the claim, with narrow exceptions for people trespassing or committing another wrong when it happened.
That rule matters most for families, because bites to children tend to produce the most serious claims. Permanent scarring and lasting fear are valued as real damages in New Hampshire, not as afterthoughts. A claim built only around the first bill leaves most of its value behind.
Most people hesitate because the dog belongs to a neighbor or a relative. Understand what actually happens: homeowners or renters insurance pays these claims, which is exactly what the policy was sold to do. We press the insurer, not your neighbor's wallet.
Hurt at a Bar, Venue, or Parking Lot? Security Failures Are Claims Too
Not every injury on someone's property comes from ice or a broken stair. When a fight erupts at an Elm Street bar with no working security, when a poorly lit parking garage becomes the scene of an assault, or when a venue oversells and understaffs an event, the business's choices are part of what happened to you.
New Hampshire premises law does not stop at the physical condition of a property. Businesses that invite the public in and profit from the crowd owe reasonable steps against dangers they can foresee, and Manchester's downtown nightlife generates plenty of foreseeable ones. Prior incidents at the same address, ignored complaints, and bare-minimum staffing all became evidence of a risk the business saw coming and budgeted away.
These cases demand aggressive investigation because the person who directly hurt you often has no insurance and no assets worth pursuing. The business's liability coverage is usually the only real path to recovery, and insurers defend these claims by pretending the attack was unforeseeable. A Manchester injury attorney who can produce the venue's own incident history takes that defense apart.
Injured on City or School Property? The Rules Flip Against You
Claims against the City of Manchester, its schools, or other government bodies play by a separate rulebook written to protect the government. Under RSA 507-B:4, recovery is capped at $325,000 per person and $1 million per incident, no matter how severe the harm, and the jury never even hears those numbers.
The traps multiply from there. Under RSA 507-B:7, notice must reach the clerk of the governmental unit by registered mail within 60 days of the injury, stating the date, time, and place. Immunity doctrines, the rules that put certain government decisions beyond challenge, shield many of them entirely, and one missed step can end a strong case on procedure.
There are also openings that most people never find. A governmental unit that carries liability insurance above the statutory cap may have exposure beyond it, which is one of the first things we check. Finding that coverage takes a firm that knows how to look for it.
Does New Hampshire Cap Wrongful Death Damages?
Partly, and the split surprises grieving families. There is no cap on what the estate recovers for the person's suffering, medical and funeral costs, and the earnings a life would have produced. But under RSA 556:12, a surviving spouse's award for lost comfort, society, and companionship is capped at $500,000, and each child's or parent's award for the lost relationship is capped at $300,000.
Those numbers are higher than they used to be, and they still feel small against what a family actually loses. The practical lesson is strategic: because parts of the recovery are capped, the uncapped elements must be developed fully, with economists proving earning capacity and testimony establishing what the person endured.
We handle these cases with the weight they carry. Accountability does not restore anyone, but it answers the question every family asks, and the answer is yes. A personal injury attorney in Manchester who knows how these caps interact can make sure that the answer costs the responsible party what the law actually allows.
What Raises the Value of a Manchester Injury Case?
Documentation, consistency, and proof of permanence, because case value is built, not discovered. Two people with the same injury can see wildly different outcomes based on how their claims were developed.
Records that tie your injuries to the incident, treatment followed without gaps, and treating providers who can explain what this injury means in year five, not just week five, all move the number. So does credibility, which insurers test constantly through recorded statements and social media surveillance. A jury in Hillsborough County Superior Court's Northern District responds to a documented, honest claim, and insurers price settlements against exactly that possibility.
One warning worth its own paragraph: assume the insurer is watching. Defense firms hire investigators, pull social media, and clip a single afternoon of yard work into an argument that you are fine. Live honestly, post nothing about the case, and tell us about anything unusual, and their surveillance budget buys them nothing.
This is where our firm earns its keep. We do not send a demand letter and hope. We assemble the proof a courtroom would demand, then let the insurer decide whether they want to face it there.
The Numbers Behind Our Name
Talk is cheap in legal advertising, so here is the record instead:
- More than $1 billion recovered for injured clients
- Over 100,000 people represented against insurers and corporate defendants
- Referring lawyers in all 50 states, bringing national depth to New Hampshire cases
- Zero dollars charged to you unless we recover money in your case
Behind those numbers is one habit: preparing every file for trial. Settlements follow strength, and strength is visible in how a case is built from the first week.
Add your case to that record. Call (800) 229-7989, any hour, any day.
FAQs: Manchester Personal Injury Lawyer
New injury clients in Manchester tend to bring us the same practical worries, so here are honest answers to the most common ones.
The business where I worked asked me to fill out an incident report. Should I?
Report the fall, but keep it bare bones: date, time, location, and what happened, nothing about fault, and no guesses about your injuries. Incident reports are written on the company's form, for the company's insurer, and stray words in them resurface later. Get a copy before you leave, and let us handle every communication after that.
Can I bring a claim against my own apartment complex?
Yes, and being a tenant does not weaken it. Landlords owe residents reasonably safe common areas, including stairways, walkways, and parking lots, and that duty does not bend based on your lease status or rent history. These claims run against the property's liability insurance, and we handle any landlord pushback that follows.
My child was hurt at a daycare or a friend's house. Is the process different?
Somewhat, and mostly in ways that protect your child. Claims for minors involve added court oversight of settlements, and children generally receive extended filing deadlines that run past their 18th birthday. Do not let the extra time slow you down, though, since the evidence and witness memories your child's case needs will not wait a decade.
I signed a waiver at a gym or trampoline park. Is my case gone?
Not automatically. New Hampshire courts read liability waivers narrowly, and a waiver may not stretch to cover conduct beyond the risks it clearly describes, such as badly maintained equipment, or injuries to children. Bring the waiver with you and let us read what it actually says before you write off your claim, because businesses count on people never questioning that piece of paper.
Do I have to talk to the property owner's insurance company?
No, and you should not, because you are under no obligation to give the other side's insurer a statement. Their adjuster's friendliness is a technique, and their questions are designed by people who do this hundreds of times a year. Refer them to us, which is a two-sentence phone call that protects your entire claim.
How do I afford medical treatment while my case is pending?
Use your health insurance now and let the claim reimburse those costs at the end, which is how the process is designed to work. Where other coverage applies, we identify it, and we negotiate any liens, the repayment claims health insurers assert against your settlement, so more of the recovery stays with you. Skipping treatment to save money is the move that costs a claim the most.
The property owner says the fall was my own fault. Does that end my claim?
No, an accusation is not a verdict, and New Hampshire law under RSA 507:7-d lets you recover as long as your share of fault does not exceed the other side's. Expect the "watch where you're walking" defense in nearly every fall case, since shifting blame is cheaper than fixing stairs. The side claiming you were at fault has to prove it, and a Manchester personal injury lawyer who documents the hazard properly makes that a losing argument.
Make Them Take Your Injury Seriously
Right now, your file is a number in a claims system, tagged with a dollar amount you would find insulting. The way that changes is not politeness. It is evidence, deadlines with consequences, and a law firm the insurer knows will walk into a courtroom.
We have made that point more than 100,000 times. Call (800) 229-7989 for a free case review, or contact us online, and turn a bad chapter into a fight you can actually win.