When Your Child Is Hurt, Everything Changes
You may be trying to keep your child calm while arranging appointments, missing work, and wondering whether you overlooked something. Start with what changed. Miller & Jacobs can help trace what happened, who had the duty to prevent it, and what your child may need as they grow.
Free and confidential consultation. No attorney fee unless compensation is recovered for your family.
Start With What Your Child Needs Now
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Your child is still in pain, frightened, or not acting like themselves.
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School, sleep, movement, or ordinary routines have changed.
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The explanation from a driver, school, property owner, or insurer does not add up.
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You are worried about therapy, future care, or what this may mean as your child grows.
Bring what you have. The record can be built from there.
Pompano Beach
Firm Headquarters
Local access on South Federal Highway.
50+ Years
Combined Experience
Representing injured people and families.
230+
Combined Jury Trials
Courtroom experience when facts or losses are disputed.
Former Prosecutors
Evidence-Focused Background
Experience testing competing explanations against the record.
The First Priority Is Your Child
Get the care your child needs and make home feel as normal as you can. A legal review can begin without pressuring a child to repeat the story, blaming anyone before the facts are known, or turning every family conversation into evidence.
Report pain, sleep changes, fear, headaches, balance problems, behavior changes, or anything that feels different. Ask what symptoms require urgent follow-up.
Record what your child said in their own words, when symptoms appeared, and how the injury affects school, play, movement, sleep, and family routines.
Incident reports, attendance logs, video, supervision schedules, maintenance records, and insurer communications may be stored in different systems.
You do not need every record before calling. Start with the part you know and the questions you cannot resolve.
The Human Part of Recovery
Bedtime may take longer. School mornings may become medical appointments. A sibling may not understand why plans keep changing. You may be trying to stay calm for your child while worrying about work, bills, and whether the injury will follow them into the next grade or the next stage of life.
Parents often replay the moment and wonder what they should have seen. A careful review is not about blaming yourself. It is about finding out what should have protected your child and what the recovery may require.
Talk Through What Changed →Where Did It Happen?
The same diagnosis can lead to a very different investigation depending on who was responsible for the child, the property, the vehicle, the product, or the medical decision.
Vehicle data, camera footage, witness names, restraint use, roadway conditions, and insurance coverage can matter.
Supervision ratios, staff schedules, incident reports, training, communications, and prior complaints may be relevant.
Barriers, gates, maintenance, inspections, warnings, access, lighting, and control of the property can shape the claim.
Ownership, control, warning signs, witnesses, photographs, animal-control records, and available insurance may be important.
Preserve the item, packaging, warnings, receipts, model information, photographs, and any recall or repair communication.
Provider records and a qualified review may create a separate pathway. Explore medical malpractice review →
The Two Questions That Control the Claim
A child claim must connect the preventable failure to the harm. It must also measure an injury that may change as the child grows, returns to school, reaches new developmental milestones, or discovers limits that were not visible in the emergency room.
Responsibility
The answer may involve a driver, school, daycare, property owner, dog owner, manufacturer, medical provider, public entity, or several parties with different records and insurance.
The Child’s Future
The review should connect treatment, development, school, activities, emotional health, independence, family care, and future earning capacity to the supported injury.
Age changes the evidence. A toddler, a middle-school student, and a teenager may experience the same diagnosis in very different ways.
What to Do Now
Do what is safe and possible. A parent, relative, or trusted adult can help organize records while the child focuses on treatment and ordinary routines.
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Follow appropriate medical guidance, report every meaningful change, and seek follow-up when symptoms continue or worsen.
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Ask for the written report, involved staff or witnesses, and the contact information for the insurer or organization handling the event.
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School, daycare, property, vehicle, access, and surveillance data can be overwritten or handled under routine retention practices.
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Keep school notes, therapy recommendations, expenses, missed-work records, transportation costs, and a simple account of changed activities.
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A broad authorization, waiver, release, or settlement may affect the child’s rights. Get advice about the document rather than guessing at its effect.
You Do Not Have to Sort This Out Alone
Tell Miller & Jacobs what happened, what changed afterward, and what your family is carrying now. The first conversation can focus on what should not wait.
What the Injury May Change
The first bill shows only part of the loss. A supported claim may need to account for how the injury affects health, development, education, family roles, and future independence.
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Specialists, follow-up care, surgery, therapy, medication, or equipment
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Growth-plate, neurological, mobility, scarring, or pain concerns
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Future needs that may become clearer as the child grows
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Emotional care after fear, trauma, or loss of confidence
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Missed classes, tutoring, accommodations, and learning support
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Limits on sports, play, transportation, sleep, or ordinary activities
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Parent work loss, transportation, childcare, and household changes
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Long-term effect on education, independence, and earning capacity
Florida’s Safeguards for a Minor’s Claim
Florida law places safeguards around many minor settlements. The process may involve court review, appointment of a guardian for the child’s property, and protected handling of funds depending on the amount and whether a lawsuit has already been filed.
Full Record
Document the injury, treatment, development, school impact, family care, and the needs that may continue.
Valuation
Separate immediate costs from supported future care, educational, functional, and non-economic losses.
Review
When court approval is required, the settlement must be presented for review under the applicable rules.
Protection
A legal guardianship or other protected arrangement may be required depending on the net recovery and case posture.
Full Record
Document the injury, treatment, development, school impact, family care, and the needs that may continue.
Valuation
Separate immediate costs from supported future care, educational, functional, and non-economic losses.
Review
When court approval is required, the settlement must be presented for review under the applicable rules.
Protection
A legal guardianship or other protected arrangement may be required depending on the net recovery and case posture.
Full Record
Document the injury, treatment, development, school impact, family care, and the needs that may continue.
Valuation
Separate immediate costs from supported future care, educational, functional, and non-economic losses.
Review
When court approval is required, the settlement must be presented for review under the applicable rules.
Protection
A legal guardianship or other protected arrangement may be required depending on the net recovery and case posture.
Deadlines require a claim-specific review. Florida generally applies a two-year period to negligence actions, but public-entity notice rules, medical malpractice, abuse claims, and limited tolling circumstances can change the analysis. Prompt review is safer than assuming childhood automatically pauses every deadline.
Pompano Beach and Broward County
Pompano Beach children move through busy roads, school zones, playgrounds, pools, apartment communities, youth programs, medical offices, and family activities throughout Broward County. The review should follow the child across those systems rather than accepting one report as the whole story.
Mentioning a school, facility, business, or medical provider does not imply wrongdoing. It reflects how responsibility and records can be divided among different people and organizations.
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Preserve incident, school, daycare, camp, and activity records.
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Identify video, access, inspection, maintenance, and supervision records.
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Connect pediatric, therapy, school, and developmental records over time.
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Document parent work, transportation, childcare, and household effects.
Pompano Beach Office
Pompano Beach, Florida 33062
The Attorneys Behind the Firm
Child injury claims may involve competing accounts, multiple insurance paths, medical and school records, and losses that develop over time. The legal work should make the child’s story clear without overstating what the evidence can prove.
Former Prosecutor · Trial Attorney
Mark Miller has been a member of The Florida Bar since 1995. His background includes criminal prosecution, insurance defense, and more than 70 reported jury trials.
Read Mark Miller’s Bio → Former Prosecutor · Trial Attorney
Rick Jacobs has been a member of The Florida Bar since 1995. His background includes criminal prosecution and more than 160 reported jury trials.
Read Rick Jacobs’s Bio →Mark J. Miller and Rick S. Jacobs bring the firm’s evidence-focused litigation background to the medical, developmental, educational, and family details of each child injury review.
Clear Answers Before You Call
These answers are general information. The child’s age, injury, location, responsible party, medical care, public-entity involvement, and other facts can change the analysis.
No. Children can be hurt even when adults and businesses act reasonably. A claim requires evidence that someone had a duty to protect the child, failed to meet it, and caused the injury or additional harm.
That is common, especially with younger children, fear, pain, or head injuries. Avoid coaching or repeatedly questioning the child. Incident reports, witnesses, video, medical findings, behavior changes, and the child’s own spontaneous words can help build the record.
Potentially. The review may examine supervision, staffing, access, maintenance, training, prior notice, safety policies, and whether a foreseeable danger was left uncorrected. Public entities may also involve special notice requirements and defenses.
The original accident and the later medical care may require separate legal analysis. A delayed diagnosis, medication error, surgical issue, or failure to monitor can involve specialized records, qualified medical review, presuit procedures, and different deadlines. Explore medical malpractice review →
A parent, natural guardian, or legally appointed guardian may act for the minor depending on the circumstances. The correct person and procedure can depend on custody, the type and amount of claim, and whether the interests of the adult and child are aligned.
Florida requires court approval after an action has been filed on behalf of a minor, and a legal guardianship is required when the child’s net settlement exceeds $15,000. Other safeguards can apply before suit as well. The process is designed to protect the child’s interests and funds.
The consultation is free and confidential. There is no attorney fee unless compensation is recovered. The written agreement explains the fee arrangement and responsibility for case costs before representation begins.
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