Posts Tagged ‘personal injury’
Friday, December 21st, 2007
Attorneys from the Fort Worth personal injury law firm of Laird & Cummings, P.C., are reminding everyone who may be traveling on interstate highways to stay safe and smart this holiday season.
Families traveling north to celebrate the holidays with love ones this year should be particularly aware of weather-related dangers on the roads. Take precautions, and check the weather before you leave.
“The difference in road conditions can be very tricky for drivers who aren’t used to driving on icy roads or in severe weather,” says attorney John Cummings, partner in the Fort Worth personal injury law firm of Laird & Cummings, P.C. “When you combine bad driving conditions with the fact that tractor trailer drivers are trying to make it home for the holidays themselves, you can see the dangerous combination.”
Nearly 5,000 people were killed in crashes on U.S. roads involving large trucks in 2006, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
The National Transportation Safety Board and other respected highway safety research groups have found that nearly 40 percent of big truck crashes are due to fatigue. Studies show that extended periods without sleep can slow reaction times by as much as 50 percent, which is the same as having a .05 percent blood alcohol level.
Laird & Cummings, P.C., is a Fort Worth, Texas, personal injury law firm that represents individuals and families in cases involving personal injury, wrongful death, trucking accidents, medical malpractice, construction site accidents, products liability and business litigation.
Tags: accident, car wreck, fort worth, lawyers, personal injury, texas
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Friday, December 21st, 2007
Historically in Texas, there were no particular rules regarding the division of fees among lawyers or the payment of a referral fee from one lawyer to another for forwarding the case. In 2005, however, the Texas Supreme Court enacted new referral fee rules which do away with “pure” referral fees (those where the referring lawyer has no role in the case other than forwarding it to another lawyer). Now, referral fees in Texas must be based on either a “proportion of services” basis or a “joint responsibility” basis.
In a “proportion of services” situation, each lawyer performs substantial services on behalf of the client with respect to a particular legal matter. Each lawyer who participates in the division of the fee is required to perform services beyond simply being hired by the client and forwarding the case to another lawyer. There must be a “reasonable correlation” between services performed and the sharing of the fee between the referring lawyer and the handling lawyer.
In a “joint responsibility” situation, the referring lawyer assumes an ethical and perhaps financial responsibility for the representation. The referring lawyer must make a reasonable investigation into the client’s legal matter and refer the matter to a lawyer reasonably believed to be competent to handle it. The referring lawyer must monitor the matter throughout the representation, respond to client questions and keep the client informed of progress in the case, and assist the handling lawyer when necessary. “Joint responsibility” does not mean joint control, and the referring lawyer is not required to attend deposition or hearings or trial, or be copied on all pleadings and correspondence.
Importantly, attorneys must obtain the client’s written consent in advance regarding the basis for the referral and the division of fees. The complete rules pertaining to referral fees in Texas may be found in Rule 104 of the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct.
In our practice handling personal injury and wrongful death cases on a contingent-fee basis, we find that referrals on a joint responsibility basis are most common and most akin to the traditional referral fee arrangements our referring attorneys have enjoyed over the years.
Tags: Dallas, fort worth, lawyers, personal injury, texas, wrongful death
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Tuesday, December 18th, 2007
Remember this case from back in the summer?
A Kentucky judge will decide next week which company will perform testing on the broken cable from the ride at Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom that severed the feet of a 13-year-old Louisville girl in June. Kaitlyn Lasitter’s attorneys are asking that a local company test the cable, while Six Flags “wants to award the contract” to a laboratory in Chicago.
“Award the contract” for testing the cables that cut this poor girl’s feet off sounds so crass.
Tags: personal injury
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Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006
Rarely does a week pass without someone forwarding me an email complaining of “frivolous” lawsuits. You’ve probably seen them, too. They usually reference the so-called “Stella Awards,” in dubious honor of 79-year old Stella Liebeck. Stella was severely burned when scalding hot coffee spilled in her lap and she sued McDonald’s for $2.7 million. Most people hear only this and automatically assume it was a frivolous suit filed by a greedy plaintiff. Unfortunately, few seem to know the true facts about Stella’s case, such as:
- Stella was severely injured, suffering third degree burns to her legs and genitals which required hospitalization and multiple skin grafts;
- Her doctor testified that her injury was one of the worst scald burns he had ever seen;
- She asked McDonald’s to simply pay for her medical treatment, but they refused;
- McDonald’s kept its coffee at 180 to 190 degrees, a temperature which by its own admission made it unfit for consumption (hot beverages are typically served from 130 to 150 degrees);
- Spilled coffee at that temperature causes third degree burns in 2 to 7 seconds;
- McDonald’s had been aware of the risks of serving super-hot coffee for over 10 years;
- Over 700 people had been burned previously by its coffee; and
- The jury’s assessment of $2.7 million in punitive damages representing merely two days’ worth of McDonald’s coffee sales, and the trial judge reduced this amount to $480,000.
Sound frivolous? So the next time one of these emails pops up in your inbox, consider replying to the sender and giving them the real facts. After all, just like Stella Liebeck, that person may someday need a personal injury lawyer, too.
Tags: lawyer, personal injury
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