If you’re planning on filing a lawsuit, you probably have what you believe to be evidence that you were wronged in some regard. Understanding evidence, however, does take some real legal knowledge. In fact, you may find that, upon meeting with your attorney, they don’t really believe that the things you consider to be evidence […]
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Police Sued Over Privacy Violations
CNN reported that a police department in Washington is facing a lawsuit over violating the rights of inmates. The reporting details that 11 women and 1 man are suing a police department over alleged instances where the inmates—who were all arrested on suspicion of drunk driving—were recorded while they were undressing and using the toilet. […]
Frivolous Lawsuits Get too Much Publicity
The idea behind a lawsuit is to give a person who was wronged because of another person’s negligence away to get compensated. This can include suing manufacturers for putting dangerous products out on the market when they should’ve known better, suing motorists who are prone to driving dangerously and end up hurting or killing someone […]
Dog Bites and Liability
Unfortunately, many dog owners are not responsible with their animals. In fact, it’s quite reasonable to argue that the biggest cause of dog bites has nothing to do with dogs, but with the people who are in charge of taking care of those dogs. There are differences on a state-by-state basis as to how much […]
Daycare Worker Arrested for Raping Children
For parents with children in daycare, a nightmare scenario seems to be unfolding in Ohio. According to NewsOK, a daycare worker has been arrested on two counts of rape. The woman, according to the article, had engaged in sexual conduct with an infant and made a video of herself doing it. Police claim that they […]
Class Action Against LinkedIn Reveals Importance of TOS
If you’ve gotten emails that appear to be from a friend of yours but that were actually from LinkedIn giving a pitch for the website, you’re not alone. In fact, a lawsuit has been filed against the business social networking website alleging that the company breaks into email accounts, uses the contact list to send […]
Can You Sue a Company for Mishandling Your Information?
Today, it’s not uncommon for companies with whom people do very casual business – cellular phone companies, Internet service providers, etc. – to have some very sensitive information about their clients. For example, Social Security numbers are routinely used as forms of identification and many companies require that information in order to open an account. […]
Why Do Personal Injury Attorneys Turn Down Cases?
There are instances when a personal injury attorney may turn down your claim. This may leave you wondering if there is any hope for justice but, keep in mind the fact that civil lawsuits are not really about justice; they’re about compensation. If you’ve been turned down as a client by an attorney, some or […]
How Do You Sue on Behalf of a Child
Some of the largest jury awards are actually handed out to children. These occur in cases involving medical malpractice during birth, car accidents that permanently damage a child and in other cases. Obviously, a child cannot enter into a contract or take any other legal action of their own accord. Parents are the ones who […]
How Slip and Fall Injuries Are Investigated
Slip and fall injuries are among the most common and, unfortunately, quite devastating types of injuries that people sue over. These types of injuries can occur at private residences and commercial establishments. Lawsuits over these incidents are more frequently filed over injuries that occur in commercial spaces, though some residential property owners find themselves being sued over such injuries. If you have been injured in a slip and fall accident, you may want to talk to an attorney about it. They have resources that can help to get you compensation, in some cases.
What They Look For
What a personal injury attorney will be looking for if you want to bring in a slip and fall injury claim is an instance of negligence. This would mean unreasonably putting someone at risk by action or inaction. In a slip and fall accident, a common form of negligence is not placing signage on wet floors, causing people to unknowingly step on them and fall, potentially injuring or killing themselves.
If the slip and fall injury occurred in the workplace, the attorney may start looking for OSHA violations or other instances where the employer was negligent and where the employer essentially set up a situation where it was inevitable that one of their employees was going to get injured or worse. Attorneys can utilize experts to make determinations as to whether or not you were put at unreasonable risk.
For example, if you had taken a tumble down the stairway because the stair railing had broken loose, the attorney might hire a building inspector to see if it was ever up to code in the first place. They would likely also look into whether there had been complaints filed about it in the past as well as whether the property owner had ever taken action to remedy the situation. Attorneys are very good at investigating these matters, so you don’t have to worry about having your entire case mapped out in your head when you come into the attorney’s office for the first time.
Should You Sue?
The first thing you need to understand about slip and fall injuries is that they are sometimes extremely damaging. Lives are continuously lost in slip and fall injuries, particularly in cases where people end up taking a tumble from a height or when they fall on an extremely hard surface, such as the tile flooring used in retail establishments.
If you have been injured in a slip and fall injury and you believe that the property owner was negligent and that they put you at risk, talking to an attorney is a good idea. A Houston personal injury attorney will let you know whether your case is worth pursuing.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Doctor Gets Hit with $6 Million Jury Award
A doctor in Fayetteville will have to pay $6 million over a wrongful death lawsuit, according to SFGate.
This lawsuit is similar to many others, though still tragic. The doctor in question, according to the lawsuit, left a surgical sponge in the deceased woman’s body after closing a surgery. The sponge remained there for 10 weeks. This led to the woman suffering from infections and other ailments.
The woman was receiving the surgery to remove cancer from her colon and her rectum. Because she became ill after the surgery, she was unable to go through other cancer treatments.
Botched Surgeries
Surgery is far more advanced today than it was even a decade ago. Some surgeries that were formerly life-threatening ordeals are now actually rather safe, relatively speaking. There is still the potential that a surgery can go catastrophically wrong, however, and sometimes it does because of physician negligence. The unfortunate woman whose death spurred the lawsuit described above is not the only person to have an instrument left in her body following a surgery.
Some surgeries are not botched in this manner, but are incorrect for the condition that’s being treated or are the wrong surgery entirely. These surgeries, even when they don’t end up taking someone’s life, cause all of the trauma, distress and financial hardships that go along with having any surgery, and sometimes cause those things to a much more significant degree.
Getting Help
If you find out that something was done incorrectly during a surgery and it requires a surgical correction to fix the problem itself, you’re obviously in a very bad situation and one that was not any of your own doing. You’ll be out wages from missed work, there will be pain and suffering involved and it may mean that an existing condition doesn’t’ get the treatment it needs or that it actually gets worse.
Consider contacting an attorney if you’ve been the victim of this type of malpractice. The attorney, if you have a good claim, can get started on filing your case and make sure you don’t end up missing your window of opportunity to sue. A good Houston medical malpractice lawyer will be able to go figure out who was responsible for the negligence that brought you to suffer and can help you figure out how much to seek in damages. Talk to an attorney today; the initial consultation is generally free of charge.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Hit and Run Driver Injures Woman
According to reports in KLTV, a Longview woman was struck by a hit-and-run driver who ended up causing her injuries that required a trip to the hospital. The report details that the woman was suffering from back and neck injuries.
The driver of the vehicle struck her from behind. He did get out of his vehicle and make certain that she was okay, according to reports, and then left the scene, claiming that he was going to find assistance. The man never came back and police are currently looking for the driver of the vehicle. Rear end collisions and hit and run accidents are both all too common in Texas and leave many people injured every year.
How to Handle a Crash
If you’re involved in an auto accident and are not severely injured, there are some things that you can do to prevent these types of situations from developing. First, make certain that you immediately ask for identification and insurance information. Take note of the driver’s license plate. Provided you have this information, police should be able to quickly track down anybody who tries to flee the scene of an accident.
Responsible drivers who want to handle things legally will usually want to exchange insurance information right away. After all, if they are a responsible driver who pays their car insurance, they want to make certain that they get any money the insurance company owes them for the car crash as soon as possible. If someone hesitates about getting insurance information or they try to distract you from asking for it by acting angry or claiming that they don’t have the insurance information on them, that is a warning sign. These are the cases where you want to make certain that you get a good description of their vehicle, their license plate number, if possible, and that you remember what they look like and what they were wearing. All of this information can make it easier for police to find them.
The one boundary you do not want to cross in the event of such an accident, however, is trying to detain the person on your own. Not only do you not have the legal authority to do so, it can be downright dangerous. You may be looking at an expensive repair bill due to the accident, but the person who hit you may well be looking at jail time or they may already have a criminal record that means that they’re going away for a very long time when the police arrive. Don’t take actions that will lead to you finding this out the hard way.
If you have been struck by a hit-and-run driver, talk to a Houston personal injury lawyer. They are experts at handling these types of cases.
Call us at for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Unsafe Lane Change Causes Wreck
A woman in Corpus Christi will be charged for making an unsafe lane change and for not having a driver’s license after she caused a wreck, according to KZTV10. The accident occurred in the evening. The woman attempted to make a lane change but, when she saw that there was another car in the lane that she was attempting to enter, she tried to correct. She ended up overcorrecting, according to the report, and causing a wreck that backed up traffic for some time.
Unsafe Lane Changes
Unsafe lane changes are very common on freeways, highways and smaller, city roads throughout Texas. They also frequently cause accidents. Drivers who do not check to make sure that the lane they’re trying to enter is clear before starting their change frequently end up causing accidents when they sideswipe other vehicles or when, as the case above shows, they have to go back into their lane quickly and end up causing a wreck because of overcorrecting. In some situations, this can be construed as negligence and the parties that they injure and whose property they destroy may be able to sue.
Watch Out
There are some things that you can do to protect yourself from these types of drivers, but it’s impossible to be entirely safe. These drivers tend to use their mirrors to check lanes but do not make head checks before they switch over. This means that, if you’re in their blind spot, they’re not going to see you and they may come directly over into your lane.
The best way to avoid this is to make sure that you don’t linger in someone’s blind spot. On most vehicles, this is an area directly behind the driver’s side mirrors-or passenger’s side, it’s the same on both sides-where the mirrors do not show you and where the driver cannot see you by simply turning their head to the side. Blind-spot mirrors can help to eliminate this hazard on your own vehicle, but you still need to turn your head to check alongside you before you make a lane change.
It’s also a good idea to keep two seconds of distance between you and the car in front of you, unless you’re moving to pass. This way, if they do come over in your lane or cut you off otherwise, you’ll have enough time to change directions or to stop. To figure out the distance, wait for them to pass a landmark or a highway line and then count the amount of time it takes you to reach that same landmark. It should be at least two seconds.
If someone wrecks your vehicle or harms you because of making a negligent lane change, talk to a Houston personal injury attorney. They may be able to help you.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Suing the IRS and Identity Theft
The IRS is, without a doubt, one of the most intimidating government agencies of all. When most people think about the IRS, they logically think about paying their taxes and, in some cases, getting a refund. Some people have had their identity stolen and, among the financial damages done to them due to that identity theft has been having their tax refunds taken away. People who have attempted to reclaim these tax refunds from the IRS have had, according to a report in TBO.com, better luck getting that money through a lawsuit than have people who have attempted to go at it on their own.
Not Being Heard
One man profiled in the article was the victim of identity theft and, because of that, never received his 2010 refund. In the article, he claims that an IRS worker was assigned to handle his case but that he never got his phone calls returned and that his call – according to the agent’s voicemail – would be returned within 60 days. What follows is a typical story of bureaucratic sloth. Each time the man called he had to reiterate his entire story, as he was never able to get the same person.
After learning in a news article that another victim of such a situation had successfully sued the IRS and gotten his refund very quickly after having filed the lawsuit, he decided to do the same. The article does go on to say that the IRS has worked very hard to get these cases dismissed but also notes that people who have filed them have gotten their returns rather quickly after having done so.
Lawyers and Bureaucracy
Denied Social Security benefits, problems with the IRS and other bureaucratic nightmares are all reasons that some people end up hiring a lawyer. Sometimes, these lawyers end up successfully suing for money that’s owed and, in other cases, simply having a lawyer handle the matter speeds things along, for whatever reason. Don’t expect the agency that was holding back your money to admit that they were dragging their feet, but you can certainly take comfort in the fact that having a lawyer may help you to get the money at all.
One of the things that lawyers excel at is understanding bureaucracies, the rules that apply to them and how to use those rules against the bureaucracy itself. Most of the time, when you go up against a government bureaucracy, to use an analogy, you’re fighting an uphill battle against a taller and stronger opponent. You’re just not going to win on your own. If you’re having trouble with the government, an insurance company or any other bureaucracy that’s not giving you the money you’re owed, have a Houston attorney take a look at the situation and they may be able to help you.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Alcohol Implicated in Deadly Crash
A deadly crash in Temple has police getting ready to charge the surviving driver with intoxicated manslaughter. The crash occurred on Saturday night, during the last weekend of September and took the life of a 35-year-old woman. She was pronounced dead at the scene after having been involved in a head-on collision with an SUV driven by a 21-year-old man from Nixon, Texas.
The driver of the other SUV suffered non-life-threatening injuries and was brought to the hospital, according to a report in ABC News. Following treatment, police are planning on charging him with intoxicated manslaughter and taking him to the Bell County Jail. In the article, it’s stated that police believe that he was traveling at a high rate of speed.
Drunk Drivers
There are many hazards on the roadways, but hardly any of them are as characteristically deadly as are drunk drivers. They drive unpredictably, they drive too fast or too slow for the road that they’re on, they sometimes swerve into oncoming traffic and they all too often take people’s lives. Drunken driving, of course, is a criminal offense. When somebody ends up losing their life because of a drunk driver, charges such as the intoxicated manslaughter charge mentioned above may be pressed against the driver. The victims in these cases have other options, as well.
Suing
A wrongful death lawsuit is a type of lawsuit filed by the survivors of the victim against the party whose negligence cost that victim their life. Drunken driving is, in many cases, something that a skillful personal injury attorney can use to argue negligence. If you ended up losing a loved one due to a car crash with a driver who had too much to drink, you may want to consider contacting one of these attorneys about filing a lawsuit.
There is nothing callous or opportunistic about filing such a lawsuit. When families lose someone, they may be faced with horrible financial hardships, there is the obvious emotional devastation of having someone taken from you in such an avoidable and pointless way, and the driver who caused all this hardship is liable, in many cases, for criminal charges as well as for the damages they caused in the financial sense.
Settlements
There are some families who find themselves losing a family member or suffering horrific physical or financial damages due to a drunk driver who are offered a settlement, sometimes because the drunk driver or their family happens to be wealthy. Never take such a settlement without consulting a lawyer first. Unless your attorney has helped you to negotiate a suitable, useful and respectful settlement, you should always consider such money to be go-away money. Talk to a Houston personal injury attorney so you know your rights as well as what you should do about the situation.
Call us for a FREE consultation 713-771-5453
Yaz Lawsuits Still Piling Up
Yaz is a hormonal contraceptive that has been the subject of many lawsuits, including an ongoing class action lawsuit. New lawsuits are being filed over this drug regularly, including one that was recently filed in Illinois and that will be added to the class action lawsuit. This lawsuit is all too familiar in its allegations. The woman suing is alleging that she was brought to real and permanent harm by using the drug and is seeking compensation. These lawsuits also allege that the defendants should have known how dangerous the drug was and that they were negligent in not taking action.
Dangerous Drugs
Lawsuits over dangerous drugs fall under the category of product liability lawsuits. These lawsuits, however, are oftentimes much more distressing in their circumstances than are most product liability suits. Bad drug lawsuits involve cases where people have suffered blood clots, strokes and heart attacks, in the case of hormonal contraceptives. Lawsuits over SSRI anti-depressants involve homicide, suicide, birth defects and more. These lawsuits are oftentimes chilling in what they imply: Sometimes drugs are known to be dangerous and drug makers just keep pumping them out onto the market in a quest for profits.
What if You’re Injured?
These claims can be very complex. In some cases, your injuries may be so similar to the injuries that the claimants in the class action suits are alleging that your case can be added to that class action. In other cases, you may have suffered entirely other injuries due to using the drug and, therefore, you’ll end up filing your own claim. Your attorney will have to have access to experts and all the relevant information about past cases and your own case to argue one of these claims successfully. If you have a good attorney, however, you may end up winning a jury award or a settlement that could help pay for your recovery costs.
Don’t Take It
Pharmaceutical companies are some of the largest and most powerful companies in the world. Some of them rake in literally billions of dollars in profit every year on just one of their drugs. This makes it intimidating to go after them. If they’re intimidating you or, if you’re so convinced that you don’t stand a chance against them that you’re dissuaded from taking any action at all, talk to an attorney.
How Attorneys Help
First, attorneys are not intimidated by drug companies. The law doesn’t care how much money you have or how powerful you are. Everyone is equal under the law. If someone wronged you by selling you a dangerous drug and injured you because of doing so, an attorney will be able to look at your claim objectively and, if it’s good, they may take you on as a client so you can get compensated for being wronged.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Three Car Crash Takes Life
YourHoustonNews.com reports that a car wreck on 105 W. left one person dead. The crash took place at approximately 7:30 AM the week of October 1 and involved a pickup truck and two passenger vehicles. At the time of the report, there was no hard and fast explanation for the accident – which apparently involved a head-on collision – but visibility conditions and road conditions were suspected to have played a part in the deadly collision. Firefighters at the scene had to remove the passenger door of one of the vehicles involved and part of the front of the vehicle to get the driver free.
Bad Conditions, Bad Wrecks
Even in a city with a relatively moderate climate such as Houston, the weather can get foul enough to make roads very dangerous at times. In the vast majority of cases, drivers are very sensible about this and slow down, turn on their headlights when necessary and give themselves a little bit of extra space between their vehicle and the vehicles in front of them. There are those drivers, however, we do not act responsibly in these situations and who end up causing crashes.
Watch Out
When the roads are wet, the braking distance for any vehicle increases. This is simply a part of physics and there is nothing your braking system can do about it. You have less traction on a wet road and, therefore, need more time and space to stop effectively. Additionally, wet conditions usually mean less lighting and, even during the daylight hours, that sometimes means that you have to turn on your headlights to remain appropriately visible. Be sure you follow this basic rule: if your windshield wipers are on your headlights should be on, as well.
One of the real hazards of wet conditions is the fact that they can make headlights and streetlights reflect off the road surface, making driving confusing for some people. If you’re having a hard time seeing in any regard, make certain that you slow down. If necessary, pull off to the side of the road and wait for the weather to pass. If you have difficulty with halos showing up around headlights and streetlights or if your windshield wipers are not functioning correctly, don’t chance it and try to make it home or to wherever you’re going. Pull over.
Negligence
Driving too fast in these conditions is sometimes a form of negligence over which juries will offer compensation. If you were injured or your property has been destroyed because a driver was negligent in not slowing down as much as they should have given the conditions, contact a Houston personal injury attorney. The accident may have been unavoidable but, in some cases, a little bit of caution could’ve gone a long way and you should never have suffered the injuries or property damages you did.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Making Sense of Medical Malpractice
Here in Texas, there is a constant stream of news regarding medical malpractice. The fact is that medical malpractice is a real thing and, unfortunately, it’s also a fact that there is a lot of information out there that is designed to make you feel guilty or like you’re running a scam if you sue a doctor for malpractice. The following information may help you to sort through it all and to understand your rights if a doctor breeches their duty to you.
The News
Texas has caps on medical malpractice. This is a very political issue and, outside of the dichotomy that the media likes to hammer on, there are many interests involved in this law. Take a look at the news and you’ll see conflicting information being pumped out all over. Some stories say the caps have done nothing and other stories say it has made Texas safe for doctors again.
Make sure you keep in mind that suing a doctor for malpractice is sometimes the only way that the victims of the doctors and their families are ever going to get enough money to pay for the fallout. There are a lot of stories about people abusing the system. There are also many cases, both in the past an ongoing, where people were given the wrong operation, the wrong medication, where a deadly condition was missed because of negligent diagnoses and where patients were otherwise wronged.
If you were the victim of malpractice, you need to talk to a lawyer, not to political operatives, media pundits or advocates for any type of law. You need someone to represent your interests, not someone who represents insurance companies or doctors who would rather that they have the safety of knowing that even the most egregious acts of malpractice aren’t going to get them in enough trouble for them to really worry about it.
Why Attorneys Matter
When you’re the victim of malpractice, you’re going to be at a disadvantage. You may be dismissed outright by the doctor or medical facility responsible or you might be offered a settlement, which amounts to money that’s basically given so that you’ll be quiet and go away. The attorneys for the healthcare provider’s insurance company can make you feel like you’ll never get any more money than they’re offering; it’s their job.
A Houston medical malpractice attorney will represent you and only you. If you’ve been the victim of medical malpractice, don’t go it alone, don’t take a settlement without consulting an attorney and don’t feel guilty. The only ones who should feel guilty are the doctor or healthcare facility who wronged you.
Call us for a FREE consultation at 713-771-5453
Avoiding Drunk Driver Wrecks
College is back in session, the nights are longer and you’ll find that the roads on weekend nights are oftentimes full of people who have had a few too many to be behind the wheel. It’s easy to rage against the dangers of drunk driving and the people who drive drunk themselves, but it’s more important that you have the types of driving survival skills that will help you to avoid being injured or worse by these drivers. For personal injury attorneys, far too many of their drunken driving claims involve a wrongful death. Here are some survival tips.
Don’t Get In
If you have a friend or someone else you’re with who is too drunk to be driving, do not get into the car with them. There are all kinds of videos that show people dissuading their friends from drunk driving-even some showing them punching the driver out, which is assault, no matter how noble the intentions-but, sometimes, the only thing you can do is not get into the car. There’s always an uncomfortable choice that someone has to make when their friend gets behind the wheel drunk. It does feel awful to call a friend in but, remember, your friend may well kill someone if they’re out there driving while intoxicated.
Watch for the Signs
Drunk drivers tend to make some very characteristic mistakes when they’re on the road. Their driving also tends to be sloppy in a very distinctive way. Be wary if you see a car doing any of the following:
· Swerving across lanes
· Making jerky, high-speed turns
· Braking or slowing in the road for no apparent reason
· Running stoplights or lingering at green lights
· Making sudden stops and suddenly taking off
· Driving out of a drinking establishment parking lot sloppily
These are the types of things that make patrol officers turn on their lights and pull a car over. Watch out for them and stay well clear of drivers who are showing these signs of intoxication. You cannot predict what they’re going to do, so it’s best to treat them as threats right from the start. You’ll also want to be careful around taverns and other drinking establishments that have parking lots that exit onto busy streets. Drunk drivers do not estimate speed, distance or judge whether they have enough time to get out into traffic very well.
If you’re injured by a drunk driver or if you lose a loved one due to their negligence, contact an attorney. They may be able to help you by filing a lawsuit against that driver and winning you compensation. That compensation may be enough to cover your medical and property loss expenses and consulting with an attorney is usually free.