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A personal injury lawsuit isn't fun, but it may be necessary to start your recovery. The effort and stress you may deal with are done with the more important goal of achieving financial and other forms of relief. This means that one key element is the prayer for relief. What is your lawsuit's prayer for relief? What does it include? And how does it affect you? Here's what every accident victim needs to know.
What Is the Prayer for Relief?
It may sound strange to find mention of prayer in a legal complaint. But it's really just a traditional name for the plaintiff's request for damages or other interventions. Some courts may refer to it as the demand for relief instead.
The prayer for relief outlines what you are asking the court to order if you win your case. Because the relief in personal injury cases is almost exclusively financial damages, their prayers for relief usually lay out the types and amounts sought by the plaintiff.
Think of the prayer for relief as a sort of summary of your goals for the case. It's brief and to the point, and it encapsulates your case's result.
What Can You Put in the Prayer for Relief?
As mentioned, the most common type of relief in civil cases is monetary damages. The prayer for relief may request different types of damages, including compensatory damages, punitive (punishing) damages, and nominal damages.
But you may also request other forms of relief, such as payment of attorney fees by the defendant. An injunction is a type of relief wherein the court orders the other party to do something (or stop doing something) specific.
Most prayers for relief end with a request for the court to provide other forms of relief as it deems appropriate. This statement, often called the general prayer for relief, allows a court to go beyond the specific details you requested — such as adding punitive damages even if you didn't request them.
You may or may not also include a request for a trial by jury in the prayer. This depends on the laws and standards of your particular jurisdiction.
Where Should You Start?
What you include in your prayer for relief is your end goal, so you must know what you need to start fully recovering. Calculating damages and deciding whether or not to include nonfinancial requests can be difficult. A good lace to begin is by consulting with a personal injury law office in your state.
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