The Injury Lawyer Blog

Five people died in an auto accident in Tennessee last Friday night. Four out of the five were cheerleaders at a local high school. The SUV carrying the girls crashed into an oncoming vehicle shortly after the girls left their school’s football game.

The fatal accident was caused by wet and foggy road conditions. The SUV hydroplaned, flipped on its side and crossed into the oncoming traffic lane. It burst into flames immediately upon hitting an oncoming car.

The girls in the SUV were not wearing their seat belts. All of them died in the accident. The driver of the other car and her 10-month-old child were injured and hospitalized. Another passenger in the car had a miscarriage from injuries sustained in the crash.

It is important to consult an experienced personal injury lawyer after being injured in an auto accident. You might be able to receive compensation for your injuries.

If you have been injured in an auto accident in the Chattanooga, Tennessee area, please contact the law offices of Herbert Thornbury, Esquire today to schedule an initial consultation.

The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld a $4 million verdict in a medical malpractice case against Hospice Ministries and Dr. William Causey, but they reversed the $500,000 award for punitive damages.

The lawsuit was related to an incident in 2001 when Ersel Alllen was misdiagnosed with pancreatic cancer and then given a lethal dose of painkillers. Allen’s autopsy revealed that she never in fact had cancer.

According to Allen’s attorneys, massive doses of the painkiller Dilaudid led to her death. The attorney representing Dr. Causey and the hospice claims that Allen’s death resulted from a number of factors, and would have occurred even if she hadn’t taken the painkillers.

Dr. Causey’s lawyers appealed the verdict mostly to prevent it from setting a personal injury law precedent. He claims hospice patients often build up a tolerance to their medications and therefore need more potent dosages.

If you have suffered injuries as a result of medical malpractice, it is important to consult an experienced personal injury lawyer who can help you receive fair and proper compensation for your damages.

If you have a medical malpractice claim in the Jackson, Mississippi area, please contact the law offices of Coxwell & Associates, PLLC today to schedule an initial consultation.

A wrongful death lawsuit has been filed against a River Falls Bar for an incident occurring in February 2007. Joseph Roscoe was escorted out of The Library bar by bouncers for being “obviously intoxicated.” He was eventually found unconscious in the alley behind the bar and died 10 days later.

The lawsuit is being filed by Roscoe’s mother and brother. They claim that the bouncers were negligent in the way they handled the situation by causing Roscoe to trip, stumble, and fall several times. He hit his head on the ground, causing serious injuries that ultimately led to his death.

Employees at the bar deny all negligent behavior. They claim that Roscoe was simply kicked out of the bar for being extremely drunk and causing a ruckus. No criminal charges were filed against the bar.

Roscoe suffered a blood clot in his brain which led to a stroke. He was comatose for awhile before dying in the hospital.

Roscoe’s family is seeking to recover damages for his medical expenses and funeral costs, which totaled over $250,000. They are also seeking damages for pain and suffering.

The lawsuit claims that the bar managers were negligent in their hiring and training practices, and in their supervision of their staff.

If you have a wrongful death claim in the Chicago, Illinois area, please contact the law offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. today to schedule an initial consultation.

Jesse Schaffer, a 7-year-old boy from Ft. Lupton, CO, was rushed to the hospital by helicopter last weekend after being attacked by a local dog.

Schaffer was playing football with his friends at the time of the incident. He ran behind a shed to retrieve the football and was bitten in the face by the dog. Schaffer needed emergency surgery on his face and head to heal the wounds from the dog bite.

The dog’s owners received citations for not having a dog license, not having rabies shots, and for having a dangerous animal. They have expressed concern for Schaffer and have fully cooperated with the investigation.

It is still uncertain what caused the dog to attack the young boy. Schaffer’s family has not indicated whether or not they will file a personal injury lawsuit against the dog’s owners for the incident.

It is important to consult with an experienced personal injury attorney if you have been attacked by a dog. You may be eligible to collect damages to compensate you for your injuries and emotional trauma.

If you have been the victim of a dog bite in the Denver, Colorado area, please contact the law offices of Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine, P.C. today to schedule an initial consultation.

While you may feel safe knowing that the smoke detectors in your home will alert you of impending fires, you can’t always bank on them. Smoke detectors fail to perform all the time, and the results are frequently catastrophic for the family involved.

There are very few defective products that are more dangerous to our lives than a faulty smoke detector. The stakes are just too high. When your smoke detector fails to function properly, you are looking at thousands of dollars of property damage, and potentially serious injuries or even death for one or more family members.

Kidde has been marketing an ionization smoke detector which has malfunctioned on several occasions, leading to numerous injuries and deaths that could have been prevented had the smoke detector worked properly.

Calling this device a “smoke detector” is actually a misnomer. Ionization smoke detectors respond to heat, not smoke. Ionization technology is meant to pick up fast flaming fires that don’t give off very much smoke. Frequently, it will not detect slow smoldering, smoky fires. Unfortunately, these are the most common types of fires that start up in your home. Among them are kitchen fires, grease fires, and electrical fires.

To detect these fires, you really need a photoelectric smoke detector. Unfortunately, while Kidde is marketing their ionization smoke detector as a device that will more effectively warn you of fires in your home, the product is not delivering on this promise. The results have been dire in certain situations, leading several families to file defective product lawsuits against Kidde.

If you or a family member has been injured as a result of a defective product, you should contact an experienced personal injury lawyer, preferably one who specializes in defective products claims. Hiring the right attorney will help you receive fair compensation for your losses.

If you have been injured by a defective Kidde ionization smoke detector in the Mobile, Alabama area, please contact the law offices of Long & Waite today to schedule an initial consultation.

A woman has filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against the hospital where she had her tubes tied, claiming they didn’t perform the operation correctly.

The woman became pregnant five years after undergoing the procedure. The surgeon who delivered her baby discovered that one of the clips used in the operation had been placed on a ligament instead of the right fallopian tube. The woman also claims that the hospital never performed a necessary servicing of an applicator used in the procedure.

She suffered abdominal scarring as a result of the caesarean birth process. She claims that she has suffered physical and psychological damage as a result of the hospital’s negligent actions. She is asking for compensation for costs of raising an unwanted child and loss of wages, as well as for the physical and psychological trauma she has endured.

If you have been the victim of medical malpractice, it is important to consult an experienced personal injury attorney who can help you receive the maximum compensation you are entitled as a result of your damages.

If you have a medical malpractice case in the New York City area, please contact the law offices of Silberstein, Awad & Miklos, P.C. today to schedule and initial consultation.

On October 17, a Florida jury ordered the Citizens Property Insurance Corp. to pay close to $1 million in damages to the Sunglow Condominium Resorts for failure to provide proper coverage after hurricanes Charley and Frances in 2004.

The jury found that the $370,000 Citizens paid out to the condo complex did not nearly come close to fulfilling their financial obligations to cover damage created from the hurricanes. Currently, there are about 2,000 other unresolved claims against Citizens stemming from the 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons. In most of these cases, the plaintiffs have argued that Citizens is guilty of lowballing their clients’ damage estimates.

After their successful verdict last week, Sunglow plans to file another lawsuit against Citizens for bad faith practices. Since Citizens is a government insurer, they fall in a gray area regarding bad faith claims. At the moment, it is uncertain whether the court will find that they are immune from bad faith claims due to their government insurer status.

While the $950,000 verdict was clearly a victory for the condominium association, it was much less than the $5 million they were asking for. However, this victory should pave the way for similar judgments against Citizens in many of their other pending claims.

The damage and destruction caused by hurricanes result in millions of dollars in property damage across the southeast and Gulf regions each year. Many insurance companies frequently try to minimize their liability by offering clients unfairly low settlements or denying their claim outright due to a technicality. If you feel that your insurance company hasn’t dealt fairly with you, it is important to consult an experienced bad faith insurance attorney who can help you receive what is rightfully yours.

If you have a bad faith insurance claim in the Orlando, Florida area, please contact the law offices of Colling Gilbert Wright & Carter today to schedule an initial consultation.

The Philadelphia VA Medical Center has recently come under investigation after errors were discovered in the treatment plans administered to cancer patients.

The hospital has been running a treatment program for veterans suffering from prostate cancer since 2002. To date, 114 patients have been treated under this program, which was suspended last spring when an error in treatment procedures was detected.

The men in the program were undergoing brachytherapy, a process where iodine pellets are implanted in the prostate to destroy the cancer cells. This treatment is generally reserved for low-risk cases of prostate cancer.

Last spring, officials discovered that one patient had received a radiation dosage that was considerably lower than what was prescribed. This sparked an investigation into the hospital’s practices, which found that 55 of the 114 cancer patients received a dosage that was less than 80% of what was recommended.

The 55 men who received substandard treatment have been informed of the medical error. Currently, VA doctors are reviewing their medical histories to see if any additional measures need to be taken to mitigate possible damage caused by the treatment error.

To date, two men in the program have died. However, a hospital spokesman has stated that both deaths were not caused by their prostate cancer or by their treatment. Currently, there have not been any medical malpractice lawsuits filed by any of the veterans or their families.

If you have a medical malpractice claim in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area, please contact the law firm of Pomerantz Perlberger & Lewis LLP today for an initial consultation.

A wrongful death lawsuit has been filed against former Louisiana police officer Scott Nugent, Louisiana city officials, and Taser International in relation to a police brutality incident last January.

Baron Pikes, a 21-year-old from Winnfield, LA, died of cardiac arrest brought on by multiple taser shots. Pike was tasered nine times by police officer Scott Nugent before his heart gave out. Each taser blast pumped 50,000 volts of electricity into Pikes, who was in handcuffs before ever receiving the first shot.

Nugent was arresting Pikes on a drug possession charge. Winn Parish District Attorney Chris Nevils has charged Nugent with manslaughter, claiming that he used unnecessary force on Pikes by continuously administering taser shots after he had subdued his suspect. Nugent also failed to secure medical attention for Pikes after he collapsed. He was dismissed from the police force after the incident.

This is not the first time that police officers around the country have faced criticism for excessive use of tasers. While they were provided to police officers as a method of protection against hostile and potentially armed suspects, there have been many allegations of police abuse in conjunction with these weapons.

The wrongful death lawsuit was filed by Pikes’ wife. He had a four-year-old child who will now grow up fatherless.

If you know someone who has been the victim of a wrongful death case in the Houston, Texas area, please contact the law offices of Kennedy Hodges, L.L.P. today for an initial consultation.

The Hueneme school district in Ventura County, California has been sued in relation to a shooting at one of its middle schools last February.

Larry King, a 15-year-old eighth-grader at E.O. Green Junior High School, was shot and killed by a classmate, Brandon McInerney last winter. McInerny was charged as an adult for murder and committing a hate crime. He pleaded not guilty to the charges last week.

King’s parents and brother have filed a personal injury claim against the school district for failing to enforce the dress code. The school allowed King, a gay teenager, to wear makeup and feminine clothing at school. King’s family insists that their son’s attire brought needless attention to his sexual orientation and contributed to the events leading to his murder.

King’s parents have argued that teachers and administrators knew that Larry received abuse from other students as a result of his sexual orientation. They are claiming that the school didn’t take the proper steps to prevent this abuse. Their negligence in part led to the violent incident that ended in Larry’s wrongful death last February.

If you have a wrongful death case in the Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact the law offices of Snyder & Wenner, P.C. today for an initial consultation.