personal injury lawyer

NASCAR Injury Lawsuit Settled With Fan

March 19, 2017 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

A spectator who was injured in a 2013 NASCAR crash at the Daytona International Speedway recently settled with the racing company, prior to the collection of depositions and other extensive discovery.

The terms of the agreement are confidential, which means we don’t know how much the spectator received from the company for its alleged negligence. What we do know is that the move was most likely strategic by NASCAR, given that settling at this juncture meant it was able to avoid enduring driver depositions, as well as making fencing and crash reports public.

According to ESPN.com, plaintiff sued International Speedway Corp., parent company of the Daytona International Speedway. The complaint detailed how plaintiff, a resident of Florida, was seated in the upper deck, watching a race, when he was suddenly and unexpectedly struck in the head with a heavy piece of debris. As a result of the incident, plaintiff suffered catastrophic traumatic brain injury. Continue reading ›

Parker v. Four Seasons – Hotel Shower Injury Plaintiff May Seek Punitive Damages

January 26, 2017 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

South Florida welcomes millions of visitors every year. Many of them rely on rental accommodations while they are here – whether that is a hotel or a resort or a private home or campground. Property owners who welcome patrons onto their site for the owner’s financial benefit owe the highest duty of care to ensure guests are not endangered by unreasonable hazards. When they fail, claims can be made under an area of law known as premises liability.

A hotel injury lawsuit was recently weighed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. In Parker v. Four Seasons, plaintiff was injured when, as she exited the shower by opening the shower door, the glass exploded. Shards of glass covered her naked body, causing her to sustain injuries. Her sister, who had been in an adjoining room, called for help and the hotel engineer responded right away. He looked at the overhead track and remarked that the “stopper moved again!” He went on to say that several of the newly-installed glass doors at the hotel had shattered because the track stoppers weren’t properly working, which meant the handles of the doors crashed into the walls, causing the glass to break. The engineer noted the room the plaintiff was staying in had been on the “do not sell” list for this reason, and urged the sister to make sure hers wasn’t on the same list. It was later shown plaintiff’s sister’s shower door had the same defect. Evidence was presented later that showed the door in plaintiff’s room had already been shattered and repaired, and further that there were numerous rooms where this same problem existed.

When plaintiff filed her injury lawsuit, she sought both compensatory and punitive damages. Compensatory damages are those paid for actual losses. Punitive damages are those paid to punish the defendant for egregious wrongdoing – and to prevent others from doing the same. The court must approve plaintiff’s quest for punitive damages, and here, the trial court did not, finding the evidence insufficient as a matter of law. On this point, the federal appeals court reversed. Continue reading ›

Cefaratti v. Aranow – Surgical Sponge Left in Patient Prompts Injury Lawsuit

June 10, 2016 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

In 2013, USA Today published a startling statistic: Twelve times every single day, surgeons sew up a patient with surgical sponges and other supplies mistakenly still inside. In some cases, patients become very ill as a result. Some do not survive.

But discovering the exact source of internal pain (usually abdominal) is often a process. Although in some cases, these “retained surgical items” include clamps, forceps or other hardware, they are most often the gauzy sponges doctors use during surgery. The incidents are referred to in the medical community as “never events,” as they are simply never supposed to happen.

And yet, it’s an ongoing problem. Consider the recent Connecticut Supreme Court case of Cefaratti v. Aranow. Central to this case was the question of the statute of limitations and whether the “continuing course of treatment” extended the timeline plaintiff had to file her claim. Continue reading ›