A Coral Springs police dog is dead after being left in a hot car, allegedly by its own handler.
Hieke, an 8 year old terrier and labrador mix, was left inside an unmarked police car for about two hours on wednesday.
The dog’s handler’s name is not being released because he works undercover.
An internal investigation is under way.
The federal judge overseeing much of the massive litigation over withdrawn painkiller Vioxx on Wednesday capped fees for plaintiffs attorneys at a relatively low 32 percent of the $4.85 billion settlement, saying he had to ensure fees were reasonable.
U.S. District Judge Elden Fallon wrote in an order that while the limit is below the usual 33.3 percent to 40 percent that lawyers collect when they take cases on a contingency, it won’t result in “a paltry award” for the lawyers.
“Limiting attorneys’ fees to 32 percent of the net recovery means that the attorneys in this case will receive more than $1.55 billion,” Fallon wrote in a 21-page order.
The judge gave several reasons for the limit, noting the global settlement reached last November streamlined the work of the participating attorneys. He wrote that he had an increased responsibility to keep fees reasonable because most of the claimants are elderly and frail after having “suffered life-threatening injuries”, or they are survivors of people who died of a heart attack or stroke, so they may not have been able to negotiate the most favorable contracts with attorneys.
Fallon, whose court is in New Orleans, also ruled the hundreds of attorneys representing about 50,000 Vioxx claimants participating in the settlement can recover reasonable costs.
Altogether, 871 law firms are involved in the litigation, which began about the time Merck & Co., the maker of Vioxx, pulled the painkiller from the market in September 2004 after its own research showed it doubled risk of heart attack and stroke.
A much smaller group of law firms that pulled together thousands of documents under a pretrial discovery process that Fallon coordinated will receive additional fees above the 32 percent. But the judge stressed that those extra amounts, still to be determined, will come from the other attorneys — not from the claimants.
The first partial checks from the settlement fund are to be sent out starting Thursday by the firm administering the claims. Those amounts, roughly 40 percent of expected final settlements for claimants, will go into escrow accounts temporarily. Claimants will get their portion after deduction of lawyer’s fees and any claims by insurers seeking reimbursement for medical care they covered for Vioxx users.
The first payments are only for heart attack cases; payments for stroke cases are set to begin in February.
A 21 year old woman is recovering after surviving five days in a North Carolina ravine that hid the wreckage of her pickup truck from searchers.
Authorities said Amber Pennell was found Monday night in the wreckage in trees and vines at the bottom of a 100 foot deep ravine off a highway.
Her husband Mitchell Pennell said on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that Amber told him she clung to life for the sake of their two young children.
He said surgeons put a rod in his wife’s broken leg and that she would be fine despite a broken arm, skull fracture and other injuries.
Emergency officials said workers used ropes to lower themselves into the ravine and worked 30 to 45 minutes to cut her free. Pennell had gone without food or water for five days in the wreckage.
On July 29, 2000, plaintiff’s decedent Christopher Robinson, 15, and plaintiff Natheena Mumford, 17, were passengers in a 1998 Ford Explorer when the driver fell asleep and drifted off Interstate 75 near Bushnell. The driver suddenly woke up and pulled the truck back onto the road where it rolled over 5.25 times. Christopher died 11 hours later. Natheena sustained multiple fractures.
Robinson’s estate represented by his father, Gary J. Robinson, and Natheena sued Ford Motor Co. for products liability, claiming design defects resulted in the rollover and reduced crashworthiness of the vehicle.
David Renfroe, the plaintiffs’ engineering expert contended that the width of the track of the vehicle was too narrow and the height of the vehicle was too high, thus causing a propensity for the vehicle to roll. The vehicle’s inboard shocks-as opposed to using outboard shocks-caused it to “skate” or skid, thus causing a loss of control. Mickey Gilbert, the plaintiff’s other expert in engineering said that the placement of shocks reduces the skate phenomenon.
The plaintiff’s crashworthiness expert said that the side windows should have been laminated as opposed to tempered, and reinforced framing should have been used. These measures would have lessened the severity of the crash.
Defense counsel contended that the SUV doesn’t have a rollover propensity. The defense’s engineering expert stated that factory testing demonstrated that the Ford Explorer didn’t roll over more then other similar vehicles. The placement of the shocks had nothing to do with the vehicle “skating,” rather it was the force of the accident that caused the “skating”.
Defense counsel argued that the selection of the glass was in compliance with applicable federal motor safety standards. Defense counsel pointed to a 2001 federal study which stated that there is an increased likelihood of injuries with laminated glass.
Christopher died in the hospital 11 hours after the accident. Mumford suffered multiple orthopedic injuries including a fractured back, a fractured pelvis, a fractured collar bone, a fractured wrist and fractured ribs. Her spleen was removed. She had multiple surgeries including hardware implantation. She has since made a good recovery.
No expert medical testimony was presented at trial. Plaintiffs’ counsel asked for at least $30 million at trial.
The jury found that Ford did not negligently place a vehicle on the market with a design defect.
Plaintiffs’ counsel is seeking a new trial. Defense counsel is seeking costs and fees.
A doctor who put a hidden camera in his office’s only working bathroom created a hostile work environment through this and other sexually harassing activities, a group of his former employees claims in New York state court.
According to the complaint, filed by five female employees in the Kings County Supreme Court, Dr. Vincent Pacienza put a bogus “air purifier” directly in front of the toilet seat of the bathroom used by both staff and patients.
Several weeks later officer manager Deborah Schubert discovered a receipt that documented Pacienza’s purchase of an “air purifier with hidden color camera” from an online spy store, according to the suit.
After confirming that the air purifier actually was a camera, Schubert told co-worker Ellen Moreno, and the two notified the Nassau County Police Department, the complaint says.
The police arrested Pacienza at his office June 13 [Donna H1]and charged him with felony unlawful surveillance.
The plaintiffs claim that they were constructively discharged from their jobs as a result of Pacienza’s illegal activities, “since no reasonable person could be expected to return to work for an employer after the commission of such despicable acts of sexual harassment, resulting in a severe invasion of privacy.”
Before his arrest, Pacienza had engaged in other forms of sexual harassment, including a “constant barrage” of sexually inappropriate comments, improper physical touching and a “general sponsoring of a sexually charged workplace,” the complaint says.
On one occasion he allegedly showed the plaintiffs a box of pornographic movies one of his patients had given him that he kept in the office. The box contained sexually explicit, offensive images, the complaint says.
In addition, Pacienza encouraged certain patients in his practice to engage in sexual harassment of his staff.
The plaintiffs say they complained to Pacienza about his sexually discriminatory conduct “on numerous occasions,” but the comments and pornography continued.
The complaint against Pacienza and his practice, Manhasset Cardiovascular P.C., includes claims of sexual harassment and hostile work environment under the New York State Human Rights Law; constructive termination in violation of the NYSHRL; and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
The plaintiffs are asking the court for back pay, front pay, compensatory damages, punitive damages and an injunction barring Pacienza and his practice from engaging in additional illegal conduct.
An inmate in Dallas County jail was awarded nearly a million dollars for damages suffered when he was denied adequate medical care..
Stanley Shepherd is partially paralyzed from a seizure he suffered in January 2004 while in jail. According to the lawsuit, Shepherd was not seen by a nurse until 15 minutes after the seizure began and was not taken to a hospital until an hour after his seizure.
The lawsuit claimed that Shepherd was denied necessary blood pressure medication prior to the seizure and that nurses falsified his records to indicate that he had received the medication.
Shepherd now suffers from paralysis in the left side of his body and requires the use of a wheelchair. The incident also left Shepherd with speech, hearing and visual impairments as well as an inability to eat anything other than soft food.
The Dallas County Jail has been criticized for in the past for improper medical care. In 2007, the county agreed to a settle with three families for almost $1 million. Those cases involved mentally ill inmates who were denied medication.
“The medication delivery system was so deficient and it was known to the county for a long period of time. The only question is how many other people the same thing has happened to,” said Don Tittle, attorney for Shepherd.
On April 11, 2004, Keneshia Scott, 17, daughter of plaintiffs Monica Tyler and Kenneth Scott, attended a birthday party at Cardi’s, a club in Houston. The club was owned Ted Kaldis, and the party had been organized by Lance Limbrick, son of Cheryl Nelson. During the party, a disturbance took place in the club, and Keneshia left the building. While crossing a parking lot owned by the Bissonnet Center, she was fatally shot by a stray bullet fired by Eric Smalls. Smalls was later convicted of murder.
Tyler and Scott, on behalf of Keneshia’s estate, sued Cardi’s, Kaldis, Limbrick, Nelson, the Bissonnet Center, and Quincy Dalcour, another person involved in the organization of the party, alleging premises liability. The plaintiffs claimed the disturbance in the club which caused Keneshia to leave the building and the presence of Smalls outside the building were the result of negligent security.
The defendants denied liability. Defense counsel for Kaldis, Limbrick, Nelson and Dalcour argued that Smalls was the sole proximate cause of Keneshia’s death and that he was never inside the club on the night in question. The defense also argued contributory negligence on Keneshia’s part.
The Bissonnet Center settled before trial for $150,000.
The bullet struck Keneshia in the hip and ricocheted upward off the hip bone into her torso. She was taken to the hospital, where she died of massive internal bleeding. She was 17.
Her parents sought $1.3 million for their daughter’s wrongful death and pre-death pain and suffering.
The jury found Limbrick 25 percent liable for Keneshia’s death, Kaldis 35 percent liable, Smalls 30 percent liable, and Keneshia 10 percent liable. The Bissonnet Center was found not liable. The plaintiffs were awarded $1,297,826.09, which was reduced to $1,168,043.48 due the jury’s finding of comparative negligence.
Infections may play a bigger role in premature birth than doctors have thought, says a new study that found almost one in seven women in preterm labor harbored bacteria or fungi in their amniotic fluid.
It’s a small study, and it doesn’t prove that the germs triggered the early labor.
But Monday’s research used specialized molecular testing to uncover microbes that ordinary methods miss, and thus uncovered more women with simmering infections than previously estimated.
The more heavily infected the amniotic fluid, the more likely the woman was to deliver a younger, sicker baby, researchers reported in PLoS One, the online journal of the Public Library of Science.
“We don’t think any organisms belong in the amniotic sac,” said Stanford University microbiologist Dr. David Relman, the study’s senior author. “You’d have to presume there’s something wrong.”
More than half a million babies a year are born premature, before completion of 37 weeks of pregnancy. It’s a toll that has steadily risen for two decades, yet doctors don’t know the cause of most preterm births or how to prevent them. Every extra week in the womb helps. Those born before 32 weeks face the greatest risk of death or devastating disabilities, but even babies born a few weeks early can face serious problems.
Certain infections, such as vaginal or urinary tract infections, are known to raise the risk of premature birth, presumably by causing inflammation that in turn triggers labor.
But how much of a role infections play, especially those that don’t cause outward symptoms, has been a key question, said Dr. Michael Katz of the March of Dimes, who wasn’t part of the new study.
So the Stanford team tried a new approach.
They turned to samples of amniotic fluid saved from women who had gone into preterm labor at a Detroit hospital between 1998 and 2002. Doctors at the time tried standard tests to detect infection, and saved the leftover fluid for research.
This time around, Relman and research fellow Dr. Dan DiGiulio used more sophisticated testing known as PCR to find and reproduce bits of genetic material from germs. They used only fluid that had been collected through a syringe in the abdomen - like routine amniocentesis tests are done - before the women’s water broke, to ensure the tests didn’t detect post-labor germs. Ultimately included were 166 women, 113 of whom delivered prematurely.
Some 15 percent of the women harbored bacteria or fungi, and those who did all delivered prematurely. Adding the PCR tests found 56 percent more infected women than standard testing alone detected.
Even that is likely an underestimate, the researchers concluded, because they were using samples so old that the DNA in them had begun degrading.
The standard tests were especially likely to miss infections in women whose babies were born extremely premature, before 25 weeks.
And there was a surprising variety of germs: 17 bacterial species - including one never-before-seen type - and one fungus.
“It’s a very, very important first step,” the March of Dimes’ Katz said of the research. But, “there are still many hurdles.”
Next researchers will have to prove if harboring these germs really predicts who will go into preterm labor. Relman’s team, with funding from the National Institutes of Health, now is studying 2,000 women who get routine amniocentesis in their second trimester, to try to answer that.
If so, then the questions become where those germs originate, whether there’s a less invasive way to find who’s at risk, and if there’s any treatment that might help.
A Texas motorcoach operator forced out of service by federal authorities last week was involved in at least two deadly accidents in Mexico before being shut down, court records show.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on Friday ordered Autobuses Rio Verde of Irving to cease interstate operations because of its links to Green River Buses LLC of Dallas, which had received a similar order in April.
Court records examined by The Associated Press show a bus operated by Autobuses Rio Verde was involved in a fatal crash in Mexico on July 3, less than two years after a bus operated by Green River Buses was involved in a similar one.
The July 3 accident killed a 19-year-old woman and her unborn child, according to the court records. The earlier accident occurred Oct. 9, 2006, and resulted in at least three deaths, including the driver and a passenger, the records show.
The order against Autobuses Rio Verde stated that the motorcoach operator and Green River Buses had vehicles, drivers and management in common. Autobuses Rio Verde owner Marco Vasquez previously was the terminal manager for Green River Buses, while Green River Buses owner Luis Patino was manager and safety director for Autobuses Rio Verde.
Patino did not respond to a phone message from the AP. A call to Vasquez seeking comment went unanswered.
The FMCSA had given Autobuses Rio Verde the green light to begin transporting passengers on June 5, six weeks after Green River Buses was ordered to stop doing business because of an unsatisfactory safety rating, according to the agency.
Its order Friday followed inquiries by the AP into the two companies.
The agency has been cracking down on so-called “rogue” motorcoach operators in the wake of an Aug. 8 bus crash near Sherman that left 17 passengers dead. The operator in that accident, Iguala BusMex Inc., was an offshoot of another company, Angel Tours Inc., that had been shut down earlier.
The FMCSA’s investigation of Autobuses Rio Verde stemmed from a random roadside bus inspection, which revealed the company’s ties to Green River Buses, agency spokeswoman Kristin Schrader said.
Benny Agosto Jr., an attorney representing the family of the Houston woman killed in the July crash, said he knew a day after getting the case that Autobuses Rio Verde was connected to Green River Buses.
“These companies have gotten used to making money by cutting corners,” he said. “Unfortunately, what’s at stake is the lives of their passengers.”
Lawsuits stemming from the crash have been filed in Houston and Dallas.
The driver left the scene of the accident, which occurred 35 miles south of Nuevo Laredo, according to one of the lawsuits.
The October 2006 crash occurred in the Mexican state of San Luis Potosi. It resulted from the bus colliding with a tractor-trailer after the driver fell asleep at the wheel, according to a lawsuit filed in Dallas County.
A lawsuit was recently filed by a former signal maintainer for Norfolk Southern Railway against his employer.
The suit claims the company failed to provide the plaintiff with a safe place to work.
Timothy Gasper was reportedly severely injured while working near New Castle, Indiana in 2005.
The injuries occurred when Gasper’s vehicle was struck by a train.
Gasper filed a lawsuit claiming Norfolk violated provisions of the Federal Employer’s Liability Act (FELA) by failing to provide a safe place for their employees to work.
The suit also claims the company failed to provide them with sufficient manpower and safe tools and equipment.
Gaspar says the train accident caused him to sustain permanent injuries to his neck, shoulders and entire body.
As a result of his injuries, Gaspar says he has been caused great pain and suffering, mental anguish and has had a loss of wages.
The lawsuit is seeking compensation in excess of $100,000.