injury lawsuit

Award of Attorney Fees After Rejected Settlement in Injury Lawsuit

September 24, 2017 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

Your personal injury attorney must carefully consider any offer of pre-trial settlement by the defense in a civil case to better your chances you won’t run afoul of F.S. 768.79 at the conclusion of trial. The very first section of this statute stipulates that if a defendant files an offer of settlement that is not accepted by plaintiff within 30 days, defendant is entitled to “reasonable costs and attorney’s fees” incurred if the final judgment is that defendant was not liable OR the judgment obtained is at least 25 percent less than the original pre-trial settlement offer.

Obviously, there is no way to know for sure how a case is going to be decided or how much a plaintiff may be awarded in a successful case. That makes turning down settlement offers a risk. This is why having a personal injury lawyer with extensive local pre-trial negotiation and trial experience is invaluable. Knowing how such cases have gone in this same jurisdiction or in front of this same judge in the past is important to your case.

An example of this was recently weighed by the Alaska Supreme Court in Whittenton v. Peter Pan Seafoods, Inc. This was a truck accident case alleging vicarious liability of the negligent truck driver’s employer. The question was whether defendant’s offer of settlement prior to trial entitled defendant to collect attorney’s fees – even though plaintiff had won. Continue reading ›

Entila v. Cook – Workers’ Compensation and Claim Against Co-Worker

January 27, 2017 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

Typically when someone is injured at work, the exclusive remedy they will have from their employer is workers’ compensation. This is true even if it was the wrongdoing of the company or the co-worker who caused the accident that resulted in serious injury.

There are some very narrow exceptions in which the law will allow workers to go outside these bounds and seek additional compensation from these parties. One of those involves some type of intentional harm or actions that the company knew would likely cause the worker to be injured. This is often very difficult to prove. However, a case out of Washington State recently carves out another interesting exception. It won’t apply to every case in which a co-worker is negligent in causing a work-related injury, but it may be worth considering when weighing whether to take legal action.

The case is Entila v. Cook, and it was decided recently by the Washington Supreme Court. This was a case where plaintiff was on his way in to work, crossing an access road on company property, when he was struck by a car driven by a co-worker and seriously injured. The injured worker was able to obtain workers’ compensation benefits. Normally, this would mean his co-worker would be immune from any liability. However, plaintiff alleged his co-worker was not immune from a third-party liability claim because the co-worker was not acting in the course and scope of employment at the time of the crash. Continue reading ›

Six Concussion Lawsuits Against Colleges, NCAA

June 22, 2016 | Associates and Bruce L. Scheiner

Half a dozen concussion lawsuits have been filed against colleges and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), claiming negligence for the handling of their sports-related head injuries.

According to The New York Times, this marks the latest effort by former college athletes who are seeking financial compensation for what they say are the lasting effects they suffered as a result of undiagnosed and improperly treated concussions. The lawsuits name Penn State, Vanderbilt, Auburn, Georgia, Oregon and Utah, as well as three major football conferences: the Southeastern Conference, the Big Ten and Pacific-12.

These lawsuits follow a proposed federal class action settlement covering all collegiate athletes who suffered concussion-related head injuries and the NCAA. However, that settlement, later approved by a federal judge, only included updated safety protocols – no actual payments made to former players. It did include setting aside $70 million for medical screenings of former college athletes. Continue reading ›