South Florida Personal Injury Lawyers

On Saturday, November 3 an oil tanker crashed a lighthouse off the coast of Staten Island. The tanker, Axel Spirit, slammed into the light house tower at around 2 a.m. The tanker damaged the tower’s legs, so the tower’s light is no longer rotating and is not considered reliable. The light is still working though.

No injuries were found aboard the tanker and no pollution of oil was reported. The incident occurred during the remains of Hurricane Noel which caused 5 foot waves and 25-knot winds.

The shipping lanes are still open, but the Coast Guard are asking ships to stay away from Ambrose Light until it is repaired. As of now the Coast Guard has set up temporary navigation until everything is fixed. There are other navigation aids in the area, “but it’s very important that all of the mariners out there know about this one so they don’t come too close to it,” said Coast Guard Petty Officer 3rd Class Annie Berlin.

Girl Scouts of Santiam Council, in Oregon, voluntarily recalled thousands of cashew cans after small, spiral metal pieces were reported found mixed in with the cashews.

The cashews were sold in Benton, Linn, Lincoln, Marion, Polk and Yamhill counties, according to the director of program services for the Girl Scouts of the Santiam Council.

The council has received six reports of opened cans of cashews containing metal fragments mixed in with the cashews. Metal pieces were also found in several unsold cans that were being stored at the council office.

The recalled cashews were produced by Ashdon Farms and have date codes of 7268A9 or 7268B9 on the second line printed on the can bottom. William Womack, director of quality assurance for Ashdon Farms, said 62,400 affected cashew cans were sent out to 12 Girl Scout councils through the United States.

Consumers that have any recalled cans of cashews should contact Ashdon Farms directly at 800-274-3666 for a replacement product.

A Jasper County woman has filed a federal lawsuit against Pfizer and Wyeth, claiming the hormone therapy drugs manufactured by the pharmaceutical companies caused her breast cancer.

Scharlotte Fitzgerald says she began taking hormone replacement drugs in 1994. In 2001 she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Fitzgerald and her husband Larry filed a personal injury suit against the drug companies in the Beaumont Division of the Eastern District of Texas on Nov. 2. They are seeking in excess of $75,000 in damages.

“This lawsuit asserts claims for negligence; strict product liability for failure to warn, strict product liability for design defect; and breach of implied warranty against the defendants responsible for the design, manufacture, production, testing, study, inspection, mixture, labeling, marketing, advertising, sales, promotion and/or distribution of those hormone therapy products that caused her breast cancer,” the plaintiffs’ original complaint states.

The plaintiffs’ claim that the defendants had an obligation to provide warnings about risks and side effects of their hormone therapy drugs as soon as it was aware of them. The suit alleges that the drug companies failed to disclose “an increased incidence and risk of strokes, blood clots, heart attacks, breast cancers and ovarian cancer from these drugs.”

Plaintiffs also assert that the defendants made claims regarding health benefits of the drugs and should have known “that these claims were false and misleading.”

The defendants also gave a false impression that adequate pre-marketing clinical testing and research and post-marketing surveillance had been done, the plaintiffs claim.

“Plaintiff would not have ingested the hormone therapy drugs … or would have discontinued their use, or would have used safer alternative methods, had defendants disclosed the true health consequences, risks, and adverse effects, including the increased incidence and risk of breast cancer and other illnesses, caused by their hormone drugs,” the complaint states.

In the first claim against defendants, the plaintiff alleges that the companies were negligent by failing to exercise reasonable care in designing, manufacturing, testing and distributing the hormone replacement drugs.

“Defendants knew or should have known that their hormone therapy drugs caused unreasonable harm and dangerous side effects that many users would be unable to remedy by any means,” the petition states. “Despite this, defendants continued to promote and market their hormone therapy drugs for use by consumers, including plaintiff, when safer and more effective methods of countering the negative health effects of menopause were available.”

The petition also includes claims for strict liability through failure to warn and design defect.

“These hormone therapy drugs were each dangerous to an extent beyond that which would be contemplated by the ordinary consumer who purchased them,” the suit says. “They were more dangerous than plaintiff contemplated. The risk of each of these hormone therapy drugs outweighs its utility.”

The companies also breached implied warranty, the suit said, because the sold the drugs as being of “merchantable quality and safe and fit for their intended use.”

Scharlette Fitzgerald is seeking damages to exceed $75,000, attorney fees, costs of suit and other relief that the court may deem just and proper.

Her husband, Larry Fitzgerald is also seeking monetary damages for his loss of spousal services, society and companionship.

Christopher Kirchmer of the Provost Umphrey Law Firm LLP in Beaumont is representing the plaintiffs.

The case has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Thad Heartfield.

Case No. 1:07-CV-832-TH

Reports of St. Jude’s Riata defibrillator leads puncturing holes in patients’ hearts are raising new concerns about the safety of medical heart devices. The reports come just weeks after Medtronic recalled certain models of its Sprint Fidelis leads over their potential to fracture.

PACE Publication

In the most recent issue of the journal of Pacing and Electrophysiology (PACE), four cases of heart perforations caused by St. Jude’s Riata leads are highlighted. One case involves a Riata lead that came within a quarter-inch of penetrating the patient’s skin.

FDA Reports

The Food and Drug Administration database of adverse events contains reports of 15 heart punctures and one death associated with Riata leads. However, cardiologist Stephen Vlay believes these types of incidents may be underreported.

When Leads Fail

A tiny wire component of implantable defibrillator devices, leads are responsible for delivering life-saving shocks when an abnormal heart rhythm is detected. Leads that malfunction or puncture a hole in the heart can have serious, sometimes fatal, effects in patients.

Dr. Vlay is encouraging healthcare professionals to report incidents potentially related to Riata leads, which he says may have “an inherent design flaw.”

There are few things more nerve-wracking, or more anxiety-producing for even the most law-abiding driver, than seeing the flashing red and blue lights of a police car in your rear-view mirror.

It doesn’t always have to be a harrowing experience, even if you know that you were driving well over the speed limit, or that your registration is expired, or heaven forbid, you’ve had a few too many cocktails and are behind the wheel anyway.

There are a few simple rules to follow to make sure the experience doesn’t have to be any more unpleasant than it already is — considering that it’s likely you will come away with a fat ticket.

We sought the advice of a former Virginia State Trooper, now retired and working happily at an intelligence analyst job for a federal agency in Washington, D.C. He asked that we not use his real name, “because I don’t want people to think I’m trying to draw attention to myself,” he said. He chose a colorful alias, asking that we just refer to him as Trooper Tom. Here are his six tips.

Pull Over in a Safe Area
First of all, the most important rule to follow is to pull over in a safe area, as soon as it is reasonable and safe to do so. “Don’t pull over in a place that is going to put you or the officer in danger,” says Police Officer Tom — like a narrow left-hand-lane shoulder on a highway. “If you do that, the officer is not going to get out and risk being hit — he’s going to get on the loudspeaker and tell you to move over to the right shoulder, and then you have to negotiate traffic to try to cross the highway. That can be aggravating, and you don’t want to lock yourself into a ticket by making the officer mad,” he says.

Don’t Coast
Secondly, don’t coast for several blocks before pulling over. “If you just keep coasting, the cop is going to think, ‘What is this guy doing?’ He may think you’re stalling because you’re trying to stash something,” warns the police officer. “If you pass a few safe places to pull over, the officer is definitely going to think you’re up to something, and that raises suspicion.”

Keep the Engine Running
Surprisingly, Police Officer Tom also advises you not to turn off your engine, especially if you’re driving an old beater that’s not reliable. “I generally didn’t like the citizen to turn off his engine, because if it’s an older car, it might not start again, and then you’re in a situation where you have to wait for the guy to call a buddy or call a wrecker, and he’s mad because you stopped him — I’d just as soon not have to negotiate all that,” says the police officer.

Keep Your Hands on the Wheel
Keep your hands on the wheel as the trooper or officer approaches your vehicle. “That’s how people kill you — with their hands,” muses Police Officer Tom. “They can reach for a weapon or the gear shift, which can turn the car into a weapon. We always focus on the driver’s hands, and if they’re not on the wheel, we’re immediately more apprehensive, and that doesn’t help your situation if you’re the driver.”

Stay in the Car
You should always stay in the car. “I didn’t want anyone out of the car, ever,” says Police Officer Tom emphatically. “If they get out of the car, I’m thinking they have something to be afraid of, like they’re wanted, or intoxicated, and in either case, that’s a safety issue for the officer,” warns the police officer. “I don’t care if you’re the baddest officer there is, there’s always someone out there who’s badder than you, and if we can keep them inside the car, that’s the best way to keep from being injured. If they’re inside the car, they can’t fight you and maybe grapple for your gun and shoot you.”

Be Careful What You Say
Being polite to the officer isn’t necessarily a pre-requisite, concedes Tom. “I never demanded respect,” the police officer insists. “I only didn’t want dis-respect. If you want to be rude and yell and complain and say you’re going to file a complaint against me, that’s fine, I heard that all the time — just don’t get physical. And don’t use curse words in an aggressive way, because in Virginia, anyway, that can get you arrested for disorderly conduct.”

The police officer details some of his more exciting or amusing traffic stops — that is, when people did not take the advice he shared above, and paid the price. Once, he pulled a woman over on the highway for violating the High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) law. In Virginia, during morning and evening rush hours, vehicles traveling in the left-hand of some highways near Washington, D.C. are required to have more than one occupant. The ordinance is aimed at cutting down congestion by encouraging more drivers to car pool.

“She got out of the car and she was immediately extremely irritated,” recalls the police officer in his Tennessee-by-way-of-Virginia accent. “I guess she was en route to a job interview. Now, I can put up with a lot of static, so it takes a lot to get me excited over an HOV ticket, but she was is in my face immediately, and she starts cussing and complaining, and she’s actually making the process take longer because she won’t let me write the ticket. I asked her to get back in her car, and she did, but in 15 seconds, she came roaring out again.

“This happened several times, and her anger kept escalating, and she kept yelling and cussing,” continues Police Officer Tom with a wry laugh. “So finally, I had to roll my window up while she was yelling at me, just so I could finish writing the ticket. Well, I guess she didn’t like that because she yanked my door open and said, ‘Don’t you ignore me, you m——- f——!’ Well, that was it, she crossed the line there, so I cuffed her and arrested her for disorderly conduct and took her in.”

The bottom line is that the original HOV violation was just a $50 fine, but the disorderly conduct conviction would have given her a criminal record, explains the police officer. “And she had a job with the federal government, so a criminal conviction would have meant losing her security clearance, and therefore her job. So during negotiations between her attorney and the commonwealth prosecutor, she eventually paid a $2,500 fine in exchange for lowering the charge to a careless driving violation. So that turned out to be a pretty expensive outburst on her part.”

One serious but amusing tale involved a driver who was “power-braking” his pick up truck outside a raucous Springfield, VA bar at 3:00 a.m. He was extravagantly spinning and screeching his tires “and just filling the air with blue smoke and burning rubber,” recalls the police officer. “And he’s doing it right in front of me at a traffic light. So I pulled him over, and he was clearly intoxicated, but he wasn’t belligerent or anything — he was a nice guy, an ‘ol’ country boy. But he failed every field-sobriety test I gave him.” This included a breathalyzer test, which revealed that he had a .18 blood alcohol level, more than double the legal limit for driving.

But the guy kept insisting that he be allowed to perform “his own test” which he claimed would prove he was not drunk. So finally, just out of curiosity, the police officer acquiesced — with no guarantees. “So the guy takes off running, and all of a sudden he goes into this cartwheel/back flip, with his cowboy boots on, and his legs go counter-clockwise, and he lands it, perfectly, in his cowboy boots, like he was a gymnast at the Olympics or something.

As the busy Thanksgiving travel week began, two small private planes veered dangerously close to each other because of air traffic control errors, marking the second near miss in the area in less than a week.The planes traveling over central Wisconsin came within 2.8 horizontal miles and 500 vertical feet from each other Saturday. Federal regulations require at least 5 miles of horizontal separation and at least 1,000 feet of vertical separation.

“We were not talking to either airplane,” said Jeffrey Richards, president of the controllers’ union at the Federal Aviation Administration’s Chicago Center in suburban Aurora. “This was really a bad situation.”

One of the planes, a Cessna Caravan 208 turboprop, had taken off from Chicago’s Midway Airport and was traveling to Leeward Farm, a private airport in Soldiers Grove, Wis. The second plane, a Cirrus SR-22, had just departed from the Tri-County Regional Airport near Lone Rock, Wis., when the near miss occurred at about 3,800 feet.

Controllers’ union officials blamed years of short staffing and fatigue for last week’s errors but said Saturday’s mistake occurred after a misunderstanding between controllers at the Aurora center and counterparts in Madison, Wis., about how much air space needed to be blocked off for the Cirrus as it took off.

At the same time, controllers in Aurora switched the landing Cessna to an advisory channel and were unable to communicate with the pilot.

On Nov. 13, an air traffic controller in Aurora mistakenly directed a passenger plane to descend in the path of a jet heading to O’Hare International Airport. The planes came within seconds of a collision over Indiana during a shift change for controllers, officials said.

A collision was averted when a cockpit safety device in one of the planes alerted pilots, who began an emergency climb to get out of the way.

FAA spokesman Tony Molinaro downplayed a connection between the two near misses and noted in a Monday news release that overall errors at the Aurora facility have been decreasing since 2003.

“Two errors in a week at a center does not define a problem. We need to look at it from the proper perspective,” he said. “At Chicago Center, they handle about 3 million flights each year, so one or two controller errors in a week does occur.”

Control towers are adequately staffed, and Molinaro said federal officials were investigating Saturday’s error.

An Allegheny County jury has awarded $3.2 million to the estate of a woman who died when she fell through a broken window at a former Pittsburgh nightclub.

Twenty-four-year-old Debra Creese, of Marion Township, Beaver County, fell Dec. 23, 2005, while walking up steps at the Upstage Lounge in Oakland, near the University of Pittsburgh. She died several days later after falling nearly 20 feet to the pavement.

The window she fell against had Styrofoam over it because it had been broken previously.

Attorney James Ross said yesterday that the owners failed to warn Ms. Creese and others of the dangerous condition of the broken window.

A sport utility vehicle ran off a Central California road and landed upside down in a canal, killing seven people inside, including four children and a baby, authorities said Sunday.The SUV was going more than 55 mph Saturday night near Kettleman City, about 50 miles south of Fresno, when the driver, Sergia Olvera, 31, lost control, said Officer Joseph Miller of the California Highway Patrol.

The vehicle ran up a dirt embankment, rolled and landed upside down in the canal with 5 feet of water, Miller said.

“There were no child seats in the vehicle, and there was no evidence that any seat belts were used,” Miller said.

Survivor Dalia Olvera, 23, had moderate injuries, and 10-year-old Esmerelda Pompa was not injured, Miller said.

All of the victims were from Earlimart, about 50 miles from the site of the accident.

On July 7, 2005, plaintiff Philip Cote Jr., 27, a production worker, was motorcycling on the eastbound side of Sherman Avenue, near its intersection at Larose Street, in Glens Falls. As he proceeded through the intersection, he collided with a 26-foot-long westbound truck that was being driven by Terri Mae Murphy, who was executing a left turn onto the southbound side of Larose Street. Cote sustained a catastrophic injury of one arm and injuries of a knee and a leg.Cote sued Murphy and Murphy’s employer, United Parcel Service Inc. Cote alleged that Murphy was negligent in the operation of her truck and that United Parcel Service was liable because the crash occurred within the scope of Murphy’s work functions.

Cote claimed that Murphy executed a sudden left turn that crossed his immediate path. He also contended that other vehicles occupied the adjacent westbound lane, blocking a potential area in which he could have moved to avoid the collision.

The defense’s expert engineer opined that Cote was traveling about 50 mph when the crash occurred. In response, Cote claimed that he was maintaining a speed of about 25 mph to 30 mph. The area was governed by a 30-mph speed limit, but the limit was reduced to 15 mph during school days. Cote was issued a ticket for exceeding the 15-mph limit, but the ticket was ultimately dismissed because school activity was not being conducted at the time of the crash.

Cote’s right, dominant right arm became caught in the truck’s rear bumper. The arm was twisted and torn from his body. He also sustained four fractures of one leg.

Cote was placed in an ambulance and transported to Albany [N.Y.] Medical Center. Despite doctors’ efforts, his amputated right arm could not be reattached. The force of impact was so severe that it ripped the nerves from the brachial plexus, resulting in the loss of use of his shoulder muscles. Cote underwent fusion to stabilize his right shoulder, and his leg fractures were treated via the internal fixation of rods and other hardware. He was also given a myoelectric prosthetic arm. His hospitalization lasted 21 days, and he subsequently underwent about three weeks of inpatient rehabilitation. He also underwent occupational therapy, physical therapy for his leg and prosthesis training, but his prosthesis has merely limited movement, and Cote cannot move the upper portion of his right arm.

Cote claimed that he suffers phantom pain that seems to emanate from his missing right arm. He also claimed that he suffers residual arthritis of one knee. He contended that he will require lifelong use of painkillers and that his prosthesis will have to be changed every five years at a cost of $100,000 each time.

Cote has not been able to return to his job. He briefly worked as a ticket-taker at an amusement park in the summer of 2007, but he claimed that he had to quit because his pain was so severe.

Cote sought recovery of a total of $9.75 million for his past and future medical expenses, his past and future lost earnings and benefits, his past and future lost household services, and damages for his past and future pain and suffering. His wife, with whom he split about a year after the accident, sought recovery of damages for her loss of services.

The defense’s vocational-rehabilitation expert opined that there were at least 35 jobs available in the Albany area in which Cote would be able to work. However, Cote argued that he would not be able to make the commute and that his severe pain has rendered him unable to work.

The jury found that the defendants were liable for the crash. It determined that the Cotes’ damages totaled $11,160,308.80.

Philip P. Cote

$276,741 Personal Injury: Past Medical Cost

$2,361,082 Personal Injury: Future Medical Cost

$93,813 Personal Injury: Past Lost Earnings Capability

$2,789,713 Personal Injury: FutureLostEarningsCapability

$1,000,000 Personal Injury: Past Pain And Suffering

$4,000,000 Personal Injury: Future Pain And Suffering

$509,570 Personal Injury: future lost fringe benefits

$120,390 Personal Injury: loss of household services

Roxanne R. Cote

$10,000 Personal Injury: Past Loss Of Services

On Aug. 11, 2006, plaintiff Sandra Marante, 19, was singing opera at Ristorante Bova, a popular upscale Italian restaurant located in Boca Raton, in which the owners spend upwards of $5 million to create. Marante went outside after her set to have a beverage. She sat on an ottoman, and her dress touched a candle on the floor. She then immediately went up in flames, resulting in third-degree burns.Marante sued Ristorante Bova on a premises liability theory.

Plaintiff’s counsel argued that Bova was negligent in leaving candles on the floor, where a patron could not see or avoid the hazard.

Defense counsel argued that Marante had been at the restaurant numerous times, and should have been familiar with the layout, and thus should have avoided the hazard.

Marante sustained third-degree burns over 30 percent of her body, particularly on her back and arm. She was in the hospital for a month, where she underwent several skin grafts. The burns were also the proximate cause of her gall bladder be removed.

Marante has returned to singing opera, although she claimed that she suffers from stamina problems. Marante also stated that she will have permanent scarring. According to plaintiff’s counsel, Marante suffers from an increased risk of skin cancer in the affected areas.

The parties reached a settlement for $3 million. This sum represented the defendant’s insurance policy limits.