Meet Mike: Another Hensley Success Story

June 9, 2026

In October 2023, Mike, a 35-year-old EMT and fulltime college student, finished an evening class at IU’s downtown campus and was heading home on southbound I-65 when traffic suddenly came to a complete stop near the Meridian St. exit.

Although Mike stepped on his brakes, apparently not everyone around him noticed because the “Next thing I know, I looked up in my rearview mirror just in time to see the guy’s face in the van behind me.”

“55 to 60 Miles an Hour”

A split second later, the van’s driver, who “told the trooper he was doing 55 to 60 miles an hour,” violently collided with Mike’s Dodge Ram pickup.

Mike was left with various serious injuries as a result of the crash, including disc herniation in the lumbar spine, sciatic nerve impingement, and “a lot of pain.” He was in so much pain, in fact, that he consulted with a neurologist, who opted for a conservative course of treatment centered on physical therapy, ice, and care.

While this approach proved to be effective, it also led to “a slower recovery, so it’s kind of a tradeoff. Like, you avoid surgery, you avoid anything drastic, but it did take longer, which affected life for a longer period of time.”

“Haha, We’re Not Doing This Today”

The two aspects of Mike’s life that were most affected were work and school, especially in the period immediately following the van accident, when his pain was so severe that “simply standing up, your body’s like ‘Haha, we’re not doing this today.’”

In addition to being “off work for about two and a half to three weeks total,” there was “one particular class where just the way that the chairs were set up – they’re supposed to be ergonomically correct – but sitting in them for, like, a three-hour lecture just wasn’t happening.

“I tried to talk to my professor about it,” Mike continued, “and he said ‘Look, you can’t miss the class,’ so they ended up dropping me from the class, which stunk because I had already paid for it, and now I have to pay for it a second time and take it all over again.”

“The One Thing I Come Back To”

Mike’s recovery might have been a “slow, painful process,” but he was pleased when his condition finally began to turn around, and he doesn’t believe it was only because of what his medical team was doing either: “The one thing I come back to was the team I had there at Hensley.”

According to Mike, he hadn’t originally planned on retaining legal representation since he “was always taught growing up, if you’re ever in an accident, you get insurance started right away.

“But as I was going to doctors’ appointments and trying to go through the process of getting the healing started, I was talking to a coworker who said ‘It sounds like this is really slowing you down. Have you ever thought about maybe hiring an attorney?’”

After doing some online research, he reached out to Hensley Legal Group, PC, and the firm was “very reassuring about being able to help. There was no pressure. It was more, ‘Let us walk you through the process and explain to you how it’s going to work.’ I remember them telling me, ‘If you need to sleep on it for a few days, decide if this is what you want to do, that’s okay.’ So that was very helpful.”

“I Can Sleep Peacefully Tonight”

Mike had similar praise for HLG lawyer Briceida Ortega, case manager Carisa Murphy, and legal assistant Mariah Prosser, who were “really, truly willing to do whatever they needed to to help me out, while at the same time not making me feel like I was just a number. That was honestly a godsend.”

Mike was incredibly satisfied on a monetary level with the settlement the firm obtained for him, but more than that he was overcome with “a sense of relief.

“Because it seems like you go through situations like this otherwise, and sometimes it feels like you’re all alone, and Hensley made you feel like you weren’t alone through this process. And finding out that there was going to be a settlement, it was just like ‘I can sleep peacefully tonight.’”

Get in Touch with Hensley’s Indianapolis Car Accident Lawyers

Hensley Legal Group, PC is a dedicated Indiana personal injury law firm whose experienced attorneys have been fighting on behalf of the wrongfully injured since 1998. If you’ve been badly injured by a van or some other vehicle in the Indianapolis area, get in touch with Hensley’s Indianapolis car accident lawyers to explore your legal options.

You can call us at (317) 472-3333, chat with us online, or fill out our contact form for a free consultation with a knowledgeable Indianapolis car accident attorney at our firm.