Day on Torts

December 10, 2009

Debt Collector Blamed in Wrongful Death Lawsuit

Dianne McLeod says a debt collector killed her husband Stanley.

According to CNN, Ms. McLeod alleges that " her mortgage company, Green Tree Servicing, for the wrongful death of her husband. McLeod said she thinks he would be alive if not for the stress caused by Green Tree’s debt collectors. She said they sometimes called up to 10 times a day and also called the McLeods’ neighbors." Stanley , a heart patient died of heart failure.

The CNN story does not reveal the cause of action being employed in the Florida litigation. In Tennessee, the Supreme Court has ruled that debt collectors may be liable for damages caused if they engage in intentional infliction of emotional distress, as known as the tort of outrageous conduct. The case applying this tort to debt collectors is Moorhead v. J.C. Penny, Co. 555. S.W. 2d 713 (Tenn. 1977). Whether conduct is "outrageous" and whether the conduct caused an injury or death is very much dependent on the facts.

December 10, 2009

Medical Malpractice Insurance Rates

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

From the American Association for Justice:

State tort reforms have provided a boon to insurance companies, leading to record profits while physician and patient premiums continue to skyrocket.

An analysis of data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) and company annual statements shows malpractice insurer profits are 24 percent higher in states with caps. In these cap states, insurers took in 3.5 times more in premiums than they paid out in 2008. In contrast, insurers in states without caps took in just over twice what they paid in claims.

December 9, 2009

Alcohol Impaired Drivers Continue to Kill

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

According to NHTSA’s National Center for Statistics and Analysis there were 1035 people killed on Tennessee roads in 2008. Of those fatalities, 327 of them involved at least one driver who had a blood alcohol level of 0.8 or greater.

This is an alcohol-related death rate of .47 people per 100 Million Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT). The death rate per VMT is down 11.3% from a year earlier.

In 2008, Montana had the highest alcohol-impaired fatality rate in the Nation – 0.84 fatalities per 100 million VMT while Vermont had the lowest rate in the Nation – 0.16 per 100 million VMT.

December 8, 2009

Maine’s Senator Snowe Introduces Legislation To Require Malpractice Victims Go to Expense and Time Delay of Medical Screening Panels Before A Jury Trial

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

Maine requires that a medical screening panel hear a medical malpractice case before it can be heard by a jury. Tennessee had screening panels in the late 1970s and early 1980s, when they were abandoned because all agreed that they were ridiculous.

Now, Senator Snowe wants to require that states adopt screening panels as a condition of receiving Medicaid funding. Here is a copy of the proposed amendment: www.dayontorts.com/uploads/file/Snowe-2948.pdf

How are the panels working in Maine? Well, 37.61% of claims filed in 2005 have yet to be heard by a panel while 69% of claims filed in 2006 are still pending. Maine Chief Justice Saufley has called the two-trial system “a cumbersome process with unpredictable results that cost both the plaintiffs and the defendants money and time in a way that was not intended by the Legislature.”

December 8, 2009

Wal-Mart Wins Suicide Case in Illinois

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has affirmed the dismissal of a case against Wal-Mart for selling bullets to a person without requiring her to present an identification card as required by Illinois law. Candice Johnson later used the bullets to commit suicide. Her husband filed suit, alleging that his wife did not have an identification card in her possession and Wal-Mart’s violation of the Illinois statute requiring proof of identification was the proximate cause of her death. He also alleged that she should not have been sold a gun because she had been a mental patient within the previous five years and thus should not have been sold a weapon. The opinion does not say whether Wal-Mart knew of her prior status as a mental patient.

Wal-mart argued that the act of suicide was a superceding cause and thus it was not responsible for the death. It also argued that the violation of Illinois law was not the cause of Ms. Johnson’s death.

The appellate court accepted Wal-Mart’s arguments, saying that under Illinois law suicide is ordinarily an unforeseeable event and thus causation was not present as a matter of law.

December 7, 2009

When to Evaluate for a Hypercoagulable State

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

The Doctors Company is a medical malpractice insurer. Its website contains articles of interest to all Tennessee medical malpractice lawyers and, in fact, medical malpractice lawyers in every state.

For example, one interesting article is titled "When to Evaluate for a Hypercoagulable State." Here is an excerpt:

Hypercoagulability is any alteration in the coagulation pathway that predisposes to thrombosis; it can be divided into primary (genetic) and secondary (acquired) disorders.

December 7, 2009

Senate Defeats Effort To Limit Access to the Courthouse by Medical Malpractice Victims

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

Senator Ensign (R-Nevada) introduced an amendment to limit contingent fees in medical malpractice cases. The Senator attempted to attached the language to amendment SA 2786 to H.R. 3590, which is intended to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to modify the first-time homebuyers credit in the case of members of the Armed Forces and certain other Federal employees, and for other purposes.

Senator Ensign’s amendment was defeated by a vote of 32 – 66 (2 Senators did not vote). Both Tennessee senators voted in favor of the amendment to restrict fees.

The following Democrats voted to limit fees as set forth in the amendment: Senators Hagan, Warner, Lieberman, Lincoln, and Kohl. The following Republicans voted against the amendment to limit fees: Senators Bennett, Chambliss, Cochran, Collins, Crapo, Hatch, Johanns, LeMieux, Risch, and Shelby.

December 4, 2009

Court Erred in Ordering Release of Medical Records

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

The Ohio Court of Appeals has ruled that a trial judge committed error by ordering production of a personal injury plaintiff’s medical records without first doing an in camera review to determine if the records should have been turned over to the defendant.

The opinion is interesting to Tennessee lawyers and should be persuasive in Tennessee even though the physician-patient privilege is statutory in Ohio.

Under Ohio law, "the filing of any civil action waives the physician-patient privilege as to any communication (including a medical record) that relates causally or historically to the injuries at issue in the action. Natl. City Bank v. Rainer (Aug. 12, 1999), 10th Dist. No. 98AP-1170; Ward v. Johnson’s Indus. Caterers, Inc. (June 25, 1998), 10th Dist. No. 97APE11-1531."

December 2, 2009

A New Way of Looking at Duty and Causation

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

The Iowa Supreme Court has released an opinion in Thompson v. Kaczinski, 2009 WL 3786632 (Iowa 2009) and adopted the Restatement (Third) of Torts approach to both duty and causation. The case arose after "a motorist lost control of his car on a rural gravel road and crashed upon encountering a trampoline that had been displaced by the wind from an adjoining yard to the surface of the road. He and his spouse sued the owners of the trampoline." The lower court dismissed the case, holding that the defendants did not owe a duty to the plaintiffs and that causation did not exist as a matter of law.

“An actor ordinarily has a duty to exercise reasonable care when the actor’s conduct creates a risk of physical harm.” Restatement (Third) of Torts: Liab. for Physical Harm § 7(a), at 90 (Proposed Final Draft No. 1, 2005). As the Court explained, "

[I]n most cases involving physical harm, courts “need not concern themselves with the existence or content of this ordinary duty,” but instead may proceed directly to the elements of liability set forth in section 6. Id. § 6 cmt. f, at 81. The general duty of reasonable care will apply in most cases, and thus courts “can rely directly on § 6 and need not refer to duty on a case-by-case basis.” Id. § 7 cmt. a, at 90.

December 2, 2009

Does Ms. Tiger Woods Have A Tort Claim Against the Other Woman?

by The Law Offices of John Day, P.C.

More information continues to be leaked to the media about Tiger Woods’ alleged mistresses, and news reports indicate that at least one of them has confirmed a long-lasting affair.

What does the law of torts say about this? Alienation of affections, criminal conversation, and reckless infliction of emotional distress immediately come to mind as potential claims that Ms.Nordegren could assert any woman who had a sexual relationship with her husband.

What is alienation of affections? In Tennessee, alienation of affections "is the willful and malicious interference with the marriage relation by a third party, without justification or excuse." Donnell v. Donnell, 220 Tenn. 169, 415 S.W.2d 127, 132 (1967). The cause of action was abolished by statute in Tennessee in 1989.