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Florida’s prison system and jails are coming under fire amid a host of inmate injuries and deaths that are alleged to have been caused by abuse and neglect. The Miami Herald reports there were nearly 350 inmates who died in Florida prisons last year. While not all of those are attributed to wrongdoing, it is a record high, despite the fact the number of inmates as a whole has remained largely unchanged.

One of those cases, involving a man who died after suffering severe burns after being locked by guards in a scalding hot shower, has resulted in a federal investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division. The 50-year-old inmate at the Dade Correctional Institution in Miami suffered from schizophrenia and was allegedly being punished for refusing to clean feces off the floor of his cell.

An investigation by the Miami Herald, which involved spending more than a year interviewing dozens of witnesses, pouring over hundreds of records and analyzing a number of claims, the paper found alleged abuses included:

  • Sexual assaults by officers against inmates;
  • Racially motivated beatings;
  • Withholding food from inmates in a mental health ward;
  • Refusing to secure medical treatment for inmates in dire need.

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A couple from Nebraska is suing a doctor in Colorado, seeking more than $75,000 in damages, after it is alleged he botched an abortion procedure and left his patient sterile.

The federal claim, Debuhr et al v. Hern et al, was was filed in Colorado District Court in Denver.

Plaintiff asserts the physician’s negligence forced her to undergo a subsequent procedure to have her entire uterus removed. The lawsuit alleges the physician and the clinic are responsible for negligence after the doctor left a piece of the fetus’ skull inside her body.

While the physician’s website promises patients the “safest possible abortion care and termination of pregnancies for fetal anomalies,” that is not what plaintiff alleges she was given. Continue reading →

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The holidays are fast-approaching, and baby gifts are especially popular for those who are expecting. Baby bedding – including cribs, sheets and crib lining – is a $50 million annual industry.

But concerns over crib safety have been mounting in recent years. It’s what led to the recall and eventual ban of drop-side cribs in 2011 after indications these products posed risk of serious injury and death to infants and toddlers. In more recent years, the focus has shifted to “crib bumpers,” the soft, pillow-like lining intended for use inside cribs that poses a risk of suffocation and strangulation for infants.

They are displayed prominently in stores in cute designs, intended to coordinate with the overall theme of the room. About 200,000 are sold annually. There have been several studies and recalls and lawsuits over the last four years, but still, they remain on sale. Continue reading →

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A cruise ship injury resulted in a$21.5 million verdict in favor of plaintiff after jurors in the federal lawsuit determined the cruise line was grossly negligent for failing to fix a faulty door, which was a known problem.

In Hausman v. Holland America Line-USA et al., tried in the Washington Western District Court in Seattle, plaintiff not only produced evidence of his own injury, but of similar injuries suffered by dozens of other passengers before him involving the same type of sliding glass doors that struck him. These other cases occurred across the company’s fleet, with the issue being faulty sensor settings.

Plaintiff alleged he suffered a minor brain injury when he was struck by the door as he exited behind several cruise members. Surveillance video of the incident, which occurred in open water, shows plaintiff approaching the doors and then being struck in the face and side of the head when the doors shut unexpectedly. Defense argued in trial plaintiff walked into the closing doors. Continue reading →

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The family of a 16-year-old aspiring model in Texas has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against adult property owners of a deer camp and a group of teens.

According to news reports, the girl was killed in late July after being ejected from a utility task vehicle (UTV) during a 3 a.m. ride on the property. Authorities said the teens were consuming alcohol throughout the day and playing drinking games. They had been out riding earlier, and someone suggested they go out again in the middle of the night.

The operator of the UTV in which decedent was riding made a sharp turn at a fork in the road. This caused the vehicle to slide and roll, smacking the edge of a dirt road and pitching right. Decedent was ejected 20 feet from the vehicle, striking her head and body on the ground. Continue reading →

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The principle of comparative fault is key in many Florida personal injury lawsuits. Comparative fault is the degree to which an injured plaintiff is responsible for his or her own injuries.

For example, a pedestrian is struck by a drunk driver. The driver may well be liable, but if the pedestrian was not using caution to cross safely in a designated crosswalk, he may be found to have committed contributory negligence. The way this affects a case varies greatly from state-to-state.

Florida, thankfully, has one of the more plaintiff-friendly interpretations. Our courts use a model called “pure comparative fault.” What that means, per F.S. 768.81(2) is that if a plaintiff is at-fault, that percentage is going to diminish proportionately the amount to which plaintiff is entitled to recovery. However, unlike many states, plaintiffs can recover damages so long as their own fault is less than 100 percent. So a person who is 99 percent at-fault for their own injuries can still recover 1 percent of the damages from the other liable party. Continue reading →

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Proving liability in a Florida slip-and-fall case can sometimes be an uphill battle. That has largely to do with F.S. 768.0755, which requires plaintiffs who fell on transitory foreign substances to show defendant had actual or constructive knowledge of that the substance was there.

Absent a written memo or audio recording referencing that specific spill or video of a staffer walking by the spill, proving actual knowledge is very tough. The good news for plaintiffs is that constructive knowledge can be established by showing defendant should have known about the danger. This can be established by showing either that:

  • Condition existed for such a time that business establishment should have discovered it;
  • The condition occurred with regularity and was therefore foreseeable (due to the business’s “Mode of Operation”).

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When a patient undergoes surgery – either under emergency circumstances or in the course of a long-anticipated treatment plan – there is an expectation that the doctors, nurses and anesthesiologists involved are going to use the utmost care and caution.

We all know there are many potential risks associated with surgery, but we do expect our health care providers to minimize those risks to whatever extent possible. But now, a new study published in the journal Anesthesiology reveals that medication errors are happening in about 50 percent of all surgical procedures. This figure, based on results at one prestigious hospital in Massachusetts, is significantly higher than previous estimates.

The American Association of Anesthesiologists, upon recently being presented this information, told the study authors that this significant issue is by no means unique to this location. The lead author recounted to The Washington Post that there was “not a lot of surprise” because it was widely-accepted that the self-reported numbers of medication errors during surgery were far too low. However, there was some dismay at the fact that the figure was so high, even as industry experts conceded it’s likely at least as high if not more excessive in other hospitals. Continue reading →

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Plaintiff in the medical malpractice case of Tillson v. Lane will have the opportunity to take his case to trial, following the Vermont Supreme Court’s reversal of an earlier trial court ruling that granted summary judgment to defendant on the “Loss of Chance” doctrine.

The “Loss of Chance” doctrine, while permitted in several jurisdictions, is not recognized in Florida, and neither is it recognized in Vermont, where this case originated. Under the “loss of chance” doctrine, plaintiffs are compensated for the extent to which a defendant’s negligence reduced victim’s likelihood of achieving a better outcome, assuming that likelihood was reduced by less than 51 percent.

The idea is that rather than treating a medical malpractice case as an all-or-nothing issue, claimants should be able to pursue action against health care providers whose actions or inaction resulted in loss of chance of a better outcome or of avoiding adverse consequences. But again, Florida has expressly rejected this doctrine, and so has Vermont, by essentially finding that health care providers should only be accountable for the damages proximately caused by negligent acts or omissions. So it was in this context that the Tillson case arose. Continue reading →

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Fort Lauderdale’s city manager has proposed shelling out $2.1 million in risk insurance funds to cover the cost of sidewalk repairs, following a new report indicating more than 100 miles of it in the city are unsafe.

That will only begin to cover the costs of fixing the walkways, though. The consultant’s study that opined a quarter of the city’s 425 miles of sidewalks are badly damaged (cracked, uneven or pocked), and the cost to fully repair those areas is going to be $16 million. But even paying that much won’t give the city the safe walkability label for which it’s striving. Even if the city doubled the number of sidewalks that currently exist, that wouldn’t be enough to place sidewalks on all the roads in the city that lack them. By some estimates, that cost could swell to $100 million.

But it’s a major concern when you consider two things:

  • Florida has the highest rate of pedestrian accidents, fatalities and injuries in the nation.
  • The city has spent $1.3 million in five years to settle trip-and-fall claims related to sidewalk falls, but it’s only spent about $750,000 in repairs during that time – with about $94,000 of that reimbursed by homeowners who live adjacent to those sidewalks.

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