2,682 product liability lawsuits were filed against Medtronic Inc. due to failures in their Marquis line of implanted cardiac defibrillators. The company has recently reached a $114.1 million settlement agreement in response to the legal cases.
Wrongful death charges are being brought against a school district by the parents of a 5th grader who committed suicide after enduring bullying at the school. The lawsuit claims that the school failed in its duty to care for students when teachers and administrators did not stop the bullying. The 12-year-old boy left signs of his unhappiness including a note discussing his plan and a picture he drew with a rope around his neck along with other signs clear to his classmates and teachers. The drawing, in fact, was found by another student and shown to a teacher. Cases like this are on the rise. A 13-year-old girl committed suicide recently after cruel messages were posted on her MySpace page. Whether the school is liable for the boy's suicide will be found in the results of the lawsuit.
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Truck accidents are one of the most deadly and dangerous types of automobile accidents because the two motor vehicles can vary greatly in size and power. Some accidents can be caused by weather or an outside force, but too many result from the negligence of the driver. In recent years, truck traffic has increased, as have complaints of excessive speed by truck drivers. A family of five was recently killed by a truck driver in an accident. The family's car was stopped at an intersection when a truck pummeled into car killing the occupants almost instantly. The truck driver is being charged with five counts of dangerous driving causing death. The driver refused to provide a breath sample at the scene, but police reports indicate that excessive speed and alcohol were contributors. A wrongful death lawsuit against the truck driver has yet to be filed.
Levin and Perconti has been honored in Chicago Magazine's 2008 Illinois Super Lawyers Edition. Both John Perconti and Steve Levin were named Super Lawyers as Plaintiff's Personal Injury Lawyers. The pair have been honored for the last four years as two of Chicago's best Injury Lawyers.
Personal injury attorneys recently filed a $110 million personal injury lawsuit on behalf of an Illinois farm worker injured by a meniscal transplant surgery. CryoLife Inc., a major corporation that supplies human tissue for transplants, is being accused of providing contaminated cadaver material for the operation. Upon his return to Illinois, the farm equipment operator will no longer be able to work and will need to regularly take medication for pain for the rest of his life. CryoLife recently settled a different lawsuit with a man that died three days after he was implanted with the company's tissue. The personal injury lawyers in this more recent suit allege that the two mens' infections resulted from the "same deadly organism." The company plans to fight the product liability accusations "vigorously" based on the inevitable safety problems when human tissue is used in surgeries.
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Four teens were injured and one killed when a train crashed into their vehicle in 2006. Since then, investigations of the train accident have led to lawsuits filed by and against many different personal injury attorneys. The teens and their families are suing the city in which the accident happened and the company that owned the train and the tracks under the allegations that the tracks were unsafe. The driver and the owners of the car are being sued based on claims of reckless driving. Reasons being cited as to how the town and train company failed to make the crossing safe and other allegations cited by attorneys include allowing a stop sign to be hidden behind brush, reducing motorists' visibility; that the train was speeding excessively, failed to sound a horn and was staffed by unskilled workers; that the failure to create barriers to prevent cars from crossing the tracks when dangerous was negligent; and that the driver of the automobile failed to maintain control of the car, allowing it to be stuck on the tracks, where she then failed to unlock the doors. In addition to the teen that was ejected from the vehicle and killed, other injuries include knee injuries, spleen lacerations and pelvic, rib, jaw, and tooth fractures.
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Slip and fall accidents kill over 16,000 Americans each year, 11,000 of which are elderly people 75-years and older. Falls involving elderly people are much more dangerous. There are many ways to minimize the risks of serious slips and falls. Individuals must consider the materials and textures of their shoe bottoms as well as pedestrian walking gait. Businesses and property owners, however, also have a responsibility to ensure safety against slips and falls. Premises liability is one of the major factors in many of these injuries and deaths. It is easy for businesses to control floor maintenance and condidtions, but most falls leading to injury are caused by slips on a wet area. In instances like these, it is the land owner's responsibility to ensure the safety of floor surfaces.
Accidents at construction sites are dangerous and can often be fatal. The Illinois Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OHSA) is designed to inspect construction sites in order to ensure safety for employees and reduce construction site injuries. In the Midwest, Illinois is the worst state in the region regarding efficiency and number of OHSA inspections. Because there are so many more construction sites that OSHA can inspect, it would take an estimated 121 years for OSHA to inspect all of Illinois's jobsites. All employees should be aware of their employer's workers' compensation insurance and should learn their rights in the case of a construction injury or accident.
In February 2007, an elderly couple from Brookfield, Illinois was struck by a drunk driver while crossing the street. The woman was killed at the time of the pedestrian accident and her husband died days later from injuries sustained in the crash. Through her Illinois personal injury attorney, the couple's daughter sued the driver in a civil wrongful death lawsuit which recently settled for $500,000. The criminal trial is still going on in Cook County. An off-duty Chicago police officer saw the accident and apprehended the driver, who intended to leave the scene. He was charged with reckless homicide and aggravated driving under the influence. The couple's daughter said that the settlement provided some degree of closure noting that with less to worry about she could have time to grieve the loss of her parents.
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A woman from Fairview Heights, Illinois collided with a Madison County ambulance in a 2005 automobile accident during which her one-month-old son sustained permanent head injuries. The woman has filed an Illinois personal injury lawsuit in which she is listed as a plaintiff acting on behalf of her infant son as well as an individual plaintiff. She, along with the Mission Care of Illinois ambulance driver, is also listed as a defendant. Her lawyer alleges that she failed to avoid an accident with the ambulance by not slowing down, stopping, or swerving. The attorney also claims that the ambulance driver was also careless and negligent.
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The family of a man killed in a bus accident involving a collision with a pickup truck is suing the driver of the bus, along with the operator and owner. The personal injury attorney filed a lawsuit alleging that the three defendants were negligent. The incident was blamed on driver fatigue; the bus veered off the road, colliding with the truck. Several other passengers were injured. The family is also asking that the bus company be shut down based on its failure to properly assess drivers' qualifications and history.
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The Home Shopping Network (HSN) ignored allegations of product liability when burn injuries resulted from the sale of pressure cookers on the channel. The cable shopping network, received at least 25 reports of a malfunctioning pressure cooker sold on the channel beginning in 2001. The network, however, failed to report the injuries to the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) thus breaking a US Federal law requiring manufacturers, distributors and retailers to report claims of dangerous products. HSN eventually reported the incidents and claims in 2005, four years after the first complaints. The lids on the Welbilt pressure cookers opened prematurely, inflicting burn injuries on at least 37 customers. HSN has been fined $875,000 and has issued a recall of the product.
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Recently, news regarding anemia drugs such as Aranesp, Epogen and Procrit has caused concern among patients and their families. Patients have learned that the drugs could increase the risk of heart attacks and strokes as well as increasing the progression rate of tumors in certain cancers. With the emergence of this news, family members have been left wondering whether the death of their loved ones came too soon. The FDA's safety warnings of the anemia drugs have been recently strengthened, cautioning that heart attack, death, and cancer progression could be side effects. A newer study has also linked the anemia drugs to an increased risk for patients with myelofibrosis of developing leukemia. Doctors have been warned to use the lowest doses possible of these drugs.
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The Illinois wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family of a 15-year-old in Southern Illinois has resulted in a $10 million ruling in Saline County Circuit Court. The teen was killed in an automobile accident after the car he was in was struck by a farm truck. The defendants admitted negligence; the truck failed to stop at an intersection, striking the victim's car and ejecting him and another passenger from the vehicle. The injuries sustained by the teen resulted in his death. Such a high award is uncommon in Southern Illinois, but in this case the court found that the survivors of the teen had incurred a significant loss of society and that the wrongful death warranted the compensation of $10 million.
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The American Tort Reform Association (ATRA) puts out an annual report. In 2007, the American Tort Reform Association's (ATRA) report called "Judicial Hellholes" cost $1.5 million to produce and distribute. However, no more than 10 newspapers referenced the report and those that did pointed out the report's flaws. The report was intended to expose a lawsuit crisis in the United States but in reality, it was just a message paid for by corporations that would benefit from restricting the civil justice process. The New York Times responded by stating:
The question is whether the report's arguments make sense, are supported by evidence and are applied evenhandedly. Here the report often falls short. It is, for starters, a collection of anecdotes based largely on newspaper accounts. It has no apparent methodology.Other research ventures also identified factual errors in the report. Here stands another example of the influence corporations have on the issue of tort reform because the real, fact-based information supports the maintenance of the civil justice system.
Recently a colleague referred a case to me involving blatant medical negligence. The referring attorney explained the series of events involving a misdiagnosis, a failure to diagnose, and a relatively simple procedure essentially done backwards causing material to be pumped out of the patient’s stomach of pumped into the patient’s stomach. As he explained the situation to me, it was clear that the doctor had made mistakes and caused the patient severe pain and permanent injury. It was no surprise to me that the patient had decided to pursue legal action. Apparently, however, the patient was reluctant to file a personal injury claim based on the medical malpractice of the doctor. The patient was reluctant to file a personal injury lawsuit , that is, until the doctor behaved arrogantly and refused to admit any wrongdoing. The old rule in medicine was to never apologize and never admit mistakes, but the old rule may not be the smart rule. In a recent New York Times article, a doctor explains a mistake he made and how his apology diffused the situation and even won over the patient. As an personal injury attorney I have seen that, unfortunately, mistakes are more commonplace in medicine than anyone would like to admit. Even more unfortunately, apologies are nearly non-existent.
For the complete New York Times article, click here.
