settlement verdict

Published on: August 16, 2010

Wrongful Death Lawsuit Settled by Georgia Department of Transportation

Georgia Department of Transportation Settles Wrongful Death Lawsuit

The Georgia Department of Transportation has agreed to pay $600,000 dollars to settle a wrongful death lawsuit, arising from a taxi accident that killed a 51-year-old woman.Patricia Heller was killed when her taxi went out of control and crashed into a tree.She suffered fatal injuries.

Her husband filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the taxi driver, the taxi company, a former city inspector and the Georgia Department of Transportation.The lawsuit alleged that the taxi had bald tires on the day of the accident, and had passed a city inspection just one day before the crash.The lawsuit also accused the Department Of Transportation of negligent design of that section of Interstate 85, alleging that a tree should not have been allowed to grow so close to the roadway.The lawsuit also alleged that the slope was too steep, and the drainage system was poor.

Published on: June 6, 2010

Yamaha Rhino Gets Product Liability Verdict for Plaintiff

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

A Georgia jury this week awarded a couple, damages of $317,000 in the first product liability lawsuit related to injuries from Yamaha Rhino All-Terrain Vehicles.

Roger McTaggart was injured in 2007 when his ATV flipped over, trapping his leg. He suffered crushing injuries in the accident. McTaggart filed a lawsuit against Yamaha, alleging defects in the Rhino ATV. According to his attorneys, the accident occurred on a flat piece of land on which it should have been safe to ride an ATV. McTaggart claimed in his lawsuit, that the Yamaha Rhino should’ve come with doors that would have contained the rider’s legs, thereby preventing crushing injuries in case of a rollover..

Not surprisingly, Yamaha insisted that the injuries were caused not because of any inherent stability defect in the Rhino, but simply because the driver operated the vehicle in a reckless manner. It’s highly likely that Yamaha will pursue this line of defense in most of the Rhino product liability lawsuits that are pending against it. Yamaha plans to appeal the verdict.

Published on: July 7, 2009

Georgia Home Depot Customer Awarded $1.5 Million in Premises Liability Lawsuit

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

A Home Depot customer, who sustained serious injuries in a Marietta store from a piece of wood falling off a folk lift, has been awarded $1.5 million in premises liability damages.

In 2005, Larry Reece was at a Home Depot in Marietta when a pallet of plywood fell about 24 feet on him. Reece suffered serious neck and spinal injuries that left him debilitated, and unable to continue his work as a residential contractor. According to his attorney, he settled with Home Depot over punitive damages, but the case had to go to jury trial over personal injury damages. He has now been awarded $1.5 million in damages, while his wife has been awarded $30,000 for loss of consortium as part of the damages.

Besides the debilitating injuries and the severe pain that he suffered, Reece also had to deal with the high expenses of hospitalization and other medical costs. Since the accident, Reece has racked up about $120,000 in medical expenses.He was required to have permanent hardware in his neck to resume his normal activities. Most traumatic of all, Reece who has been a construction worker all his life, was unable to return to his job. He lost his livelihood, along with the trauma and loss of income that that accompanies.

Published on: June 15, 2009

Mattel Settles CPSC Lead Paint Violation Allegations with $2.3 Million Fine

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Toymaker Mattel has agreed to pay $2.3 million to settle allegations that it imported and distributed toys that contained lead levels in paints that were in excess of federal standards.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission announced the penalties, the highest ever for importation and distribution regulation violations by the agency, on its website. Mattel and its subsidiary Fisher Price, have been charged with importing toy that contained lead levels that were higher than the .06 percent by weight, mandated by federal laws. Mattel was charged with importing 900,000 toys that were non compliant with the standard, while Fisher Price, according to CPSC allegations imported more than 1.1 million toys that did not comply with those safety standards. With the fines, Mattel has put those allegations to rest.

The lead toy recall crisis of 2007 has had several positive effects – Congress moved to equip the generally-regarded-as toothless CPSC with more powers to prevent such crises. This led to the implementation of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, which sets standards for lead in children’s products including toys, among other standards.

Published on: June 9, 2009

Bausch and Lomb Settles Hundreds of Eye Infection Lawsuits

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

After Bausch & Lomb Inc. went private in 2007, the contact lens maker conducted a quiet recall of its ReNu with MoistureLoc solutions, without much fuss and away from the public glare.

As it now turns out, the company also quietly settled nearly 600 product liability lawsuits brought against it by contact lens wearers across the country, who contracted a fungal eye infection called Fusarium Keritatis. These persons claimed that the infection, which left some of them with permanent eye damage, was the result of using the ReNu with MoistureLoc multi purpose solution. Fusarium Keratitis is an extremely rare infection which means that when these cases of infection began to show up in 2005, ophthalmologists were not able to diagnose the infection correctly and treat it properly. As the result, 60 people suffered enough eye damage to require a cornea transplant, and at least 7 people lost an eye.

Several of these injured users have had their lives impacted dramatically by the infection. One race car driver in Colorado had to give up his passion for racing after he suffered severe eye damage. A Broadway actress who suffered scarring in her eye was also one of those who filed a product liability lawsuit against the company.

Published on: April 3, 2009

Fulton County Boy Awarded $2.3 Million for Botched Circumcision

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

There could be not a medical malpractice awardthatcould compensate this boy and his family for the unimaginable horror they have been made to suffer.While a Fulton County Jury has awarded them damages of $2.3 million for a circumcision procedure that went wrong, the boy and his family will need counseling for a very long time.

The award relates to the injury caused to the young boy during what should have been a fairly routine circumcision procedure performed soon after he was born. The procedure however ended with the doctor removing a small portion of the tip of the penis. There was bungling on the part of more than one doctor at the hospital, Tenet South Fulton Medical Center where the procedure was performed in 2004. The pediatrician who was informed by a nurse after the boy began to bleed heavily, failed to respond to the call. Due to the negligence and failures of both the doctors, the boy suffered a permanent injury.

In 2006, his mother filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against the doctor who performed the circumcision, as well as the pediatrician who failed to respond to an emergency. The jury was convinced that the doctor Haiba Sonyika snipped off a portion of the organ and that the pediatrician Cheryl J. Kendall could have reattached the cut off portion if she had responded to the emergency immediately.The boy has been awarded $1.8 million in damages, while his mother has been awarded an additional award of $500,000. The hospital where the procedure was performed was not found negligent.

Published on: January 16, 2009

Eli Lilly Agrees To $1.42 Billion Fine to Settle Zyprexa Litigation

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Eli Lilly & Co. has agreed to a settlement with federal regulators that will include a fine of $615 million to settle criminal lawsuits, and a further $800 million to resolve civil litigation related to injuries caused by its anti psychotic drug Zyprexa.That makes the total fine amount to close to $1.5 billion, said to be the largest criminal fine for an American company. The company will plead guilty to one misdemeanor charge, and will not plead guilty to wrongdoing in any civil case.

The punishment is for the company’s indulgence of off-label use of its Zyprexa medication. Off-label use is the promotion of a drug by a company for purposes other than that for which it has been approved.It’s not prohibited for doctors to prescribe drugs for purposes other than that for which it was specified, but pharmaceutical companies are expressly forbidden from promoting such off label use of the drug.

Zyprexa is an anti psychotic drug that is meant for use by patients who suffer from schizophrenia or bipolar mania, but that didn’t stop Eli Lily from promoting the product as a sleep medication for elderly dementia patients. Between 1999 and 2003, thousands of Eli Lilly representatives were urged to promote use of Zyprexa for use in dementia patients.Documents produced in court have shown that the company greedily pushed Zyprexa to treat a variety of disorders that it was never approved for, including aggression, dementia and dementia related to Alzheimer’s Disease.The company began promoting the medication in assisted living facilities and long term care nursing homes. Effects of the medication like weight gain were already becoming evident, but Eli Lilly’s representatives pooh poohed these, saying these were part of the benefits of taking the medication.Representatives were urged to market the drug for symptomatic treatment, even in cases where the drug had not been approved. Incidences of patients dying from heart attacks and infections after using the drug began to surface, and finally in 2006, the FDA ordered the company to have strong warning labels that cautioned patients of the drug’s risk for elderly patients. Since then, the company has paid out $1.2 billion in settlement of at least 32,000 injury claims that were brought against it.This new settlement is in addition to the previous one.

Published on: May 29, 2008

Multi-Million Med Mal Verdict Awarded in Gwinnett County

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Monday a jury in Gwinnett County awarded a plaintiff a five million dollar verdict against the Gwinnett Hospital System for a nursing malpractice.

Plaintiff, Wendy Wyckstandt, 34, returned to the hospital four days after giving birth due to medical complications of postpartum high blood pressure.She collapsed while taking a shower in her hospital room.When her mother entered her room, she found her near lifeless body in the running water. She died a day later; her death caused by drowning.

The nursing staff claimed to have checked on her during the day, but video surveillance proved otherwise.The plaintiff’s attorneys claimed the hospital staff altered records and kept evidence from the plaintiff’s attorneys.Eight years of legal wrangling has finally resulted in a huge verdict award for the plaintiff.The hospital has indicated it will appeal the verdict.

Published on: February 22, 2008

Million Dollar Personal Injury Settlement by Distracted Driver

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Cell phone liability is back in the news again. Last week the Fulton County Daily Report highlighted the recent International Paper personal injury settlement. International Paper ( "IP") paid out $5.2 million to settle a personal injury suit for an automobile collision that an IP employee caused by talking on a cell phone.

IP employee Vanessa McGrogan was talking on her company-supplied cell phone when she rear-ended a vehicle driven by Debra Ford. The collision pushed Ford into a ditch on the right side of the road. The car overturned and dragged the driver’s side across the roadway. Ford’s arm was caught between the door and the asphalt. Ford, a widowed mother of four, had to have her arm amputated at the shoulder.

McGrogan had her cruise control set at 77 mph. In addition to this, she was talking on her cell phone to the point of distraction. The plaintiff raised the issue of intentional negligence. The trial court in ruling on a motion for partial summary judgment allowed the plaintiff to seek punitive damages. The case was set for trial in March and settled this month.