Fifty months ago "Steven" and I had an ongoing debate about a post I wrote about the John Ritter case. I have repeated it below:
Steven and I have been having a discussion – it started here. Here is his latest missive:
"My mistake, I did not mean to state that this particular lawyer(s) was sleazy, but that the trial bar in general is sleazy. I will admit that there must be some decent trial attorneys just as there are bad doctors, cops, judges, etc.
You won’t read about this anywhere else.
State Volunteer Mutual Insurance Company, the doctor-owned medical malpractice insurer that insures the vast majority of non-university based physicians in Tennessee, has slashed medical malpractice insurance rates.
The average rate decrease, effective for renewals on or after May 15, 2010, is $23.1% at $1M / $3M insurance policy limits. There are different rates of decreases depending on specialty, dividend status, limits, years in practice, and other factors.
"Pressure Ulcers in the Surgical Patient" is a 38-page study guide prepared for health care providers prepared on behalf of Kimberly-Clark Health Care Education. Although the article focuses on pressure sores and burns that arise in the care of treatment of surgical patients, the information will be helpful to anyone who is handling a pressure ulcer case.
I file lawsuits for a living. Thus, I understand that reasonable minds often differ about whether there is liability in a given situation, often because there is a dispute about the facts. I also understand the idea of pushing the legal envelope – of attempting to expand the law to create a cause of action that will advance the overall cause of justice.
But a recent lawsuit threw me for a loop. David Carradine’s widow has apparently sued the French production company that was handling the actor’s last film, alleging that Mr. Carradine would still be alive if he had not been left in the hotel alone the night of his death.
Mr. Carradine was was found dead on June 4, 2009 in his Bangkok hotel room — a likely victim of auto-erotic asphyxia. Allegedly, there is a photo of Carradine (published by a Thai tabloid) which shows a body suspended from a bar in a closet, with his hands bound together above his head. Carradine’s genitals were also tied. It is reported that the family hired a doctor to do a private autopsy and determined that the cause of death was accidental asphyxiation.
Ok, so this post is not about tort law. But it is information that tort lawyers (or their assistants) can use.
Sometimes it is handy to create a demand letter or another document and use hyperlinks to allow the reader to quickly and easily view other documents that will be of assistance to the reader.
This blog post from Acrobat for Legal Professionals explains how to do it.
Starting next week I will begin to write about the bills that passed the 2010 General Assembly that are of interest to tort lawyers. There are fewer tort law-related bills in 2010 than there were in 2009, but the changes that have been made are changes you should know about.
The United States Supreme Court has agreed to consider whether the family of a woman killed in a car accident should be permitted to bring suit against Mazda Motor Corp. alleging that the death was caused by the failure of Mazda to install three-point seatbelts in its 1993 MPV minivan.
Here are the questions presented in the case:
1. Where Congress has provided that compliance with a federal motor vehicle safety standard “does not exempt a person from liability at common law,” 49 U.S.C. § 30103(e), does a federal minimum safety standard allowing vehicle manufacturers to install either lap-only or lap/shoulder seatbelts in certain seating positions preempt a state common-law claim alleging that the manufacturer should have installed a lap/shoulder belt in one of those seating positions?
The University of Tennessee Institute for Public Service, Municipal Technical Advisory Service, has a collection of municipal codes and charters of most of the cities in Tennessee.
The Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ordered a district judge to re-consider the fee to be awarded to plaintiff’s counsel in a personal injury case that resulted in a $18M dollar settlement. The district court had cut the fee from $6M to $600,000.
The appellate court concluded that the district court had disregarded the nature of contingent fee contracts in cutting the award.
The case is Pellegren v. National Union Fire Company, No. 09-1285 (4th Cir. May 18, 2010).
Max Kennerly has this interesting post that sprung from a post on Kevin, M.D. about a doctor who was a victim of poor medical care. The doctor went to a lawyer, not because she wanted money (she said) but because she wanted an apology. The lawyer couldn’t take her case because it was not economically viable. The doctor never got the apology she said she wanted.
I have represented patients in medical malpractice cases for 29 years. I have been contacted many times over the years by health care professionals to represent them in medical malpractice cases, and I am surprised to learn how little they know about the complexities of actually bringing the case. My assumption is that they have been taught that medical malpractice cases are routinely filed and won, and that cases are resolved based on sympathy and emotion, not laws and medicine. Anyone with any knowledge of the system knows that is simply not true and, for every plaintiff that wins a brain damaged baby case on the basis of "sympathy" there are five cases in which plaintiffs with valid cases lose because "Dr. Smith may have dropped the ball on this one but he is such a nice guy and volunteers as the team doctor for the high school football team."
Likewise, I am constantly amazed at how angry these health care professionals get when I do not automatically accept their view of the case or decline a case because it is not economically viable. Let me recount a recent example. Note: to avoid any risk of someone recognizing this event or the people involved, the gender of those involved may or may not be correct and the facts of the underlying event may or may not have been altered. Those portions of the post that go over the discussion with the prospective client are accurate.
