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"Greedy Trial Lawyers" Save Lives.

4/7/2014

 
Some find it easy to blame complicated economic and societal problems on "greedy trial lawyers".  I admit, some product warning labels I have encountered seem pretty silly.  However, when I consider that many warning labels result from dead children and inconsolable parents, it doesn't seem as bad.  The fact is, many of the safety enhancements we rely upon to protect us from needless death or serious injury came about because of lawsuits filed by lawyers.  Without lawsuits, we may be left to rely upon manufacturers to do the right thing, or upon "the government" to uncover the problem and protect us.  I don't feel comfortable with either scenario.

Many of us remember the example of Ford Motor Company and their "exploding" Pintos.  Ford reportedly decided that there was an acceptable number of people who could burn to death in its vehicles.  Retrofitting a design
alteration would have prevented gasoline from saturating Ford's customers during rear-end collisions.    

Prior to a month ago, we were probably thinking such a thing could never happen in modern America.  Then we find that GM has over the last 9 years been hiding an ignition defect at the expense of its customers' lives.
 (Two weeks ago Toyota was ordered to pay the biggest fine ever levied for its "sudden acceleration" antics.)  What is not widely know or appreciated, however, is that a trial lawyer, one Lance Cooper of Georgia, is almost single-handedly responsible for uncovering GM's deception.  NHSTA, the governmental entity we rely upon to discover and protect us from such defects, never connected the dots.  It took a trial lawyer, presumably one trying to get money, to bring this atrocity to light.  Watch this video to learn more. 

I am not apologizing for all trial lawyers, and I have a GM in my parking stall.  However, when it comes to the role of trial lawyers in our society, I don't see things so nearly black and white.   Money is a great motivator, and if that helps save lives, so be it. 

CAN TEXTING A DRIVER GET YOU (OR YOUR KID) SUED?

9/20/2013

 
    My law office in Onalaska, Wisconsin, overlooks highway 35, which reportedly has over 20,000 vehicles passing by per day.  From time to  time, I will look at the road below as I am talking on the phone, sometimes while dealing with car accident injuries.  I frequently see driver's pecking away at their smart phones as they speed by at 15 miles over the speed limit.  I think to myself, "I would like to be the attorney who sues that driver after they cause an accident."  However, I never thought about suing the person texting with the driver, at least not until now:

    A seventeen-year-old New Jersey girl was sued for sending texts to a friend she knew was driving.  The evidence
    revealed that driver and the girl had exchanged "hundreds" of texts on the day that the driver crossed the center line and struck a motorcycle.  The texting friend was sued along with the driver.

    The  trial court granted the texting friend's motion for summary judgment (motion for dismissal).  The New
    Jersey Superior Court Appellate Division (Kubert v. Best, 2013 WL 4512313 (N.J. Super. App. Div. Aug. 27, 2013)) upheld the dismissal on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence to demonstrate the texting caused the collision in that case.  However, it left the door open for such claims in the future, ruling that liability may attach when a person sends a text he or she knows is driving a motor vehicle and will immediately read the text, if the driver then loses control of the vehicle and causes injury.  The central premise for the ruling is that a person texting a driver in such fashion essentially aids and abets their distracted/reckless driving.

    The lesson:  Don't "know" the person you are texting with is driving.

    Author

    Christopher W. Dyer, a Wisconsin and Minnesota Trial Lawyer, serving La Crosse and surrounding counties.

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