The crash is over in seconds. The consequences for your child will play out across every year of their life, every school year, every job interview, every milestone you were supposed to watch them reach.
An insurance adjuster does not see those years. The adjuster sees an X-ray, a discharge summary, a hospital stay measured in days, and a settlement offer calibrated to close the file. What the adjuster will not factor in is the speech therapist your child needs at age seven, the learning accommodations at age ten, the career path that closes before it opens.
Children do not heal the way adults heal. Some injuries recover faster. Others reshape a life in ways that do not show up on scans. Both require legal representation built for a seventy-year time horizon, not a ninety-day claims cycle.
Cowen | Rodriguez | Peacock represents children and their families across Texas from our San Antonio headquarters. When the injury is to a child, our Texas child injury lawyers build the case around the full life ahead, negotiate through the procedures that protect minor settlements, and make sure the recovery actually reaches the child who earned it.
Call (210) 941-1301 for a free consultation today.
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Why Cowen | Rodriguez | Peacock Handle Texas Child Injury Cases
Representing an injured child is not the same as representing an adult. The medicine differs, the damage projection differs, and the procedural rules differ. Our firm has the infrastructure and trial preparation to handle every layer.
- Catastrophic injury is the core of our practice: Traumatic brain injury, spinal cord damage, severe burns, amputations, and wrongful death make up the majority of our active files, and many of those cases involve children.
- Results that reach what the future costs: Outcomes on our record include a $10.5 million judgment in a catastrophic injury case and a $4 million jury verdict in a commercial vehicle crash. Numbers at that level reflect what rigorous case development produces when insurers refuse to pay full value.
- Board certified trial attorneys: Michael Cowen is Board Certified in Personal Injury Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. Malorie Peacock holds Board Certification in Truck Accident Law from the National Board of Trial Advocacy.
- Pediatric expert witness relationships: Child injury cases require pediatric neurologists, developmental specialists, educational consultants, pediatric life care planners, and vocational economists trained on youth earnings projections. We choose these experts carefully because the wrong team can sink a child's case.
- Minor settlement procedure handled correctly: Texas law imposes specific requirements on any settlement involving a minor. We coordinate court approval, guardian ad litem proceedings, and structured settlement design so the money reaches the child in a way that protects them.
- Contingency representation with advanced expenses: Families facing medical bills for an injured child cannot also fund a lawsuit. Our firm works on contingency and advances all case expenses, including pediatric expert costs.
Preparing a child's case well is one of the most important things a Texas injury firm takes on.
How Texas Law Protects Children in Injury Cases
Texas creates specific legal protections for children that do not apply to adult claimants. Understanding these rules is essential to preserving your child's rights and maximizing their recovery.
| Legal Protection | Description |
|---|---|
| Statute of limitations tolling | The two-year filing deadline is paused while the injured person is a minor, generally giving the child until age 20 to file for their own claim. Parental claims for medical expenses are not tolled. |
| Filing by a "next friend" | Minors cannot sue in their own name; a parent or guardian must file the lawsuit as the child's "next friend" until the child reaches majority (Rule 44). |
| Court approval of minor settlements | Any minor settlement requires court approval by a judge, who reviews the terms and distribution to ensure it serves the child's interests. Unapproved settlements are not enforceable. |
| Guardian ad litem appointment | Courts usually appoint a guardian ad litem (an independent attorney) to evaluate if the proposed settlement is fair to the child and report to the judge. |
| Section 142 trusts and settlement preservation | A court can order settlement proceeds placed in a managed trust, annuity, or court registry under Texas Property Code Chapter 142 until the child reaches majority. |
| Structured settlement advantages for minors | Settlements that pay out over time (structured settlements/annuities) are routinely used to provide tax-free growth and guaranteed income through key life stages. |
These protections exist because courts recognize that children cannot advocate for themselves. Families without the right counsel often miss opportunities these rules create.
Types of Child Injury Cases We Handle in Texas
Our firm represents children injured across the full range of scenarios where adult negligence causes serious harm to a minor:
- Child passengers in car and truck crashes: Children injured while riding in a vehicle struck by a negligent driver or commercial vehicle.
- Pediatric pedestrian accidents: Children hit in crosswalks, near schools, in parking lots, or along residential streets.
- Rideshare and delivery vehicle crashes: Children injured as passengers in Uber or Lyft vehicles, or struck by rideshare and delivery drivers.
- School bus and commercial vehicle crashes: Crashes involving school transportation, daycare vans, or commercial vehicles on routes that place children at risk.
- Defective product injuries: Injuries caused by unsafe child car seats, cribs, toys, playground equipment, or consumer products that failed during ordinary use.
- Swimming pool and drowning incidents: Injuries and fatalities at apartment complexes, hotels, and commercial pools where proper fencing, supervision, or safety equipment was missing.
- Catastrophic injuries with lifetime impact: Traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord damage, severe burns, and amputations affecting children at any age.
- Fatal injury to a child: Wrongful death claims brought by parents under the Texas Wrongful Death Act when a child is killed through another party's negligence.
The legal mechanism of injury matters for proving fault. The child's age and developmental stage matter for calculating damages. We build cases that address both.
The Unique Challenges of Valuing a Child's Injuries
A child's injury claim is worth more than the same injury to an adult, not less, because the child has more years affected. Converting that truth into a recoverable damages figure requires specific analysis.
- Developmental impact projection: A cognitive or neurological injury in a four-year-old plays out differently than the same injury in a forty-year-old. Pediatric neurologists and developmental specialists project how the injury affects milestones, academic achievement, and social function.
- Educational and vocational consequences: Learning accommodations, special education services, tutoring, and adaptive technology costs extend across years of schooling. Reduced educational attainment also affects lifetime earning capacity, which economists quantify using youth-earning data rather than adult-earning data.
- Lifetime medical care projected from childhood: A pediatric life care plan accounts for decades of treatment, equipment replacement across growth stages, and transitions from pediatric to adult specialty care. The cost curves are longer than any adult case.
- Loss of enjoyment across developmental stages: A child's experience of injury includes activities lost at every life stage, from childhood play to teenage social life to adult independence. Noneconomic damages must capture that arc.
- Pain and suffering evaluated across a lifetime: Chronic pain and psychological impact that begin in childhood compound across decades. Pediatric psychologists and treating physicians document the trajectory, not just the present.
- Parental losses as separate claims: Parents may recover their own damages including medical expenses paid on the child's behalf, lost wages from time spent caring for the child, and in some cases loss of services and consortium.
Doing this analysis correctly shifts case valuations by millions of dollars. Skipping it leaves families with settlements that run out long before the child does.
Compensation in a Texas Child Injury Case
Recovery in a child injury case spans economic damages, noneconomic damages, and where applicable, exemplary damages. The categories look similar to an adult case on paper but differ in how they are calculated and proven.
Economic Damages
Economic damages are quantifiable, and can be proved by bills, receipts, and pay stubs. They include:
- Past and future medical care scaled across decades of growth and development.
- Pediatric rehabilitation including physical, occupational, speech-language, and cognitive therapies.
- Educational support, tutoring, and special education costs across the full school career.
- Adaptive equipment, assistive technology, and home modifications that will be replaced as the child grows.
- Future lost earning capacity based on the career paths the injury forecloses.
- Transportation costs including specialized transport if mobility is affected.
Parents often recover separately, with damages for medical expenses they paid, lost wages from caregiving, and loss of the services a child would have provided.
| Category | Description |
|---|---|
| Medical Care | Past and future medical care across decades of growth and development. |
| Rehabilitation | Pediatric physical, occupational, speech, and cognitive therapies. |
| Educational Support | Tutoring and special education costs across the full school career. |
| Adaptive Needs | Adaptive equipment, assistive technology, and home modifications replaced as the child grows. |
| Lost Earning Capacity | Future lost earning capacity based on foreclosed career paths. |
| Transportation/Home Modifications | Specialized costs to adapt living spaces and transportation if mobility is affected. |
Non-Economic Damages
Non-economic damages are harder to quantify, but our child injury attorneys can help. They can include:
- physical pain and suffering
- mental anguish
- disfigurement
- loss of enjoyment of life
- loss of parental consortium
- loss of future earnings
These damages carry particular force in child cases because the losses extend across a full life.
Exemplary damages are available under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Chapter 41 when the conduct that injured the child was grossly negligent, including drunk driving, commercial driver hours-of-service violations, or deliberate disregard for known product defects.
Call us at (210) 941-1306 for a free consultation or contact us below. No cost to you unless we win.
FAQs About Texas Child Injury Claims
How long does my child have to file an injury lawsuit in Texas?
For the child's own claim, the two-year statute of limitations is tolled during minority under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code Section 16.001, so the child generally has until age twenty to file.
Claims that belong to parents, including medical expense reimbursement, are not tolled and must be filed within two years of the injury. Waiting until a child turns eighteen almost always results in lost parental claims and degraded evidence.
Who files the lawsuit when the injured person is a child?
A parent or legal guardian files on the child's behalf as the child's "next friend" under Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 44. The filing adult does not have to be the biological parent but must have legal standing to act for the child. Once the child turns eighteen, they can take over the litigation in their own name if the case is still active.
How do child injury settlements work in Texas?
Any settlement for a minor requires court approval. The court reviews the proposed terms, typically appoints a guardian ad litem to independently evaluate fairness, and confirms the resolution protects the child. Settlement funds are generally placed into a structured settlement annuity, a trust under Property Code Chapter 142, or the registry of the court until the child reaches majority.
Can I receive payment now for medical bills I paid for my child?
Yes. Parents have a separate and independent claim for medical expenses paid on behalf of an injured child. These damages are recovered directly by the parents, not placed in a minor's trust. This is one reason parents should file early, because those claims do not receive the minor's tolling benefit.
Put a Texas Child Injury Lawyer on Your Child's Case
A child's injury affects the parent as much as the child, and the case you bring now will shape what your family can afford decades from now. Insurance companies are not built to think that far ahead. They are built to close files and move on. The protection your child needs has to come from somewhere else.
Cowen | Rodriguez | Peacock treat child injury cases with the seriousness the time horizon demands. We build medical pictures that include the full arc of development, engage pediatric experts, handle the court approval and trust structures that protect minor settlements, and prepare every case for a Texas jury when insurers refuse to recognize what the injury cost.
Call (210) 941-1301 for a free consultation with a Texas child injury lawyer. No cost unless we recover for your family. Phones are answered around the clock, and Spanish-language support is on staff.
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Cowen Law - Texas Office
Address: 6243 I-10 #801, San Antonio, TX 78201
Contact No: (210) 941-1306