New York Injury Talk Blog

For many, July 2, 2005 was just another summer day. For one couple, it was the day a fatal DUI crash in New York killed their niece and other members of their family on their sister’s wedding day. The crash, which took place on the Long Island Sound, involved 24-year-old Martin Heidgen, who had over 14 drinks before striking a limo headed away from a wedding head-on. The crash decapitated seven-year old Katie and killed Stanley Rabinowitz, 59, who was driving the limo.

Now the family is coming forward on Oprah to share their story and its devastating details for a national audience. The family is still recovering from the deaths and the gruesome accident, which involved over 70 rescue workers and paramedics and left several of the surviving family members physically and emotionally wounded.

The couple had done everything within their power to prevent drinking and driving at their wedding. However, their decision to have the wedding on the DUI-heavy July 4 weekend had life-long ramifications. Though the driver, who drove the wrong way for over two miles before striking the limo head-on, is serving an 18-year jail sentence for his crime, nothing can ever replace little Katie and the other family members who died in the head-on car crash.

Continue reading "Couple Shares The Wreck That Ruined Their Lives on Oprah" »

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Posted In: Automobile Accidents

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Two more construction workers died at work this last week. This coming after the New York Times reported that thousands of construction workers gathered on April 29th to mourn the loss of 13 people who have been killed in New York construction accidents just this year. Only one day later, on April 30th, another construction iron worker fell 25 feet from a building under construction on East 29th street in Manhattan.

Authorities identified the worker as Christopher Gunn. According to the authorities Gunn, 28 was attempting to maneuver a twenty foot steel I-beam that was being lifted into place by a crane. The accident took place at approximately 8:30AM on April 30th. Gunn fell two stories after he slipped and fell from the building that is under construction between First Avenue and Franklin D. Roosevelt Drive. The fall caused Gunn’s safety helmet to fracture and left him on a concrete slab-unconscious, according to witnesses at the scene.

The Times indicated that the federal and city Occupational and Safety Administrations are investigating the cause of several fatal construction accidents in New York City. Acting buildings administrator, Robert D. LiMandri, taking the place of Patricia Lancaster who resigned last week under heavy construction safety scrutiny, indicated, “We are going to get to the bottom of it. Development must not take place at the expense of the workers building our city.”

Continue reading "Iron Worker Critically Injured After Falling 25 Feet in Construction Accident" »

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Posted In: Construction Accident

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Last month Mayor Bloomberg and his administration announced that the city will hire sixty-three more safety inspectors in light of the alarming number of construction deaths and accidents in New York City. The fatal accidents and inspection flaws also led to the resignation of Patricia Lancaster, the first female New York Buildings’ Department Commissioner. The cost of adding the new inspectors will be $5.3 million a year, but the Mayor reported that the city is in the “midst of a historic building boom, and the added development demands that we devote sufficient resources to aggressively enforce site safety.”

One of the advantages of additional safety inspections will be that inspectors may make unannounced inspections for the purpose of determining whether previous safety violations have been rectified. In addition, the inspectors will oversee and tighten a certification program for architects and engineers to get rid of those who have numerous code and zoning violations.

As a result of insufficient building inspectors it was cited that flawed inspection practices had led to the wrongful death of two firefighters in a 2007 blaze at the Deutsche Bank Building in Lower Manhattan. Apparently, according to investigators, building inspectors had failed to notice several violations at that site, including the dismantling of a standpipe that would have carried water to the firefighters.

When Mayor Bloomberg took office in 2002, he promised to reform the Department of Buildings, a 116 year-old institution, plagued by corruption and accused of incompetence. While some progress has been made deaths so far in 2008 are more than all of 2007!

Construction workers, and all workers, have a right to work in a reasonably safe environment. If you, a friend or family member have been severely injured because of the negligence of your employer please call the workers compensation attorneys at Wingate, Russotti & Shapiro, LLC, for a free consultation. We have recovered more than $50,000,000.00 for the victims of construction accidents.

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According to a story in the New York Times, on June 21st a sixteen year-old driver fled the scene of a hit and run accident that injured four people, including two toddlers. Witnesses to the accident said that the car struck two children in Manhattan, who were playing on a sidewalk. When the driver fled the scene he left the two children, both two years of age, bleeding on the sidewalk. The other two victims of the hit and run, a sixteen year-old and a nineteen year-old, were listed in stable condition. Police officers caught up with the driver and arrested him on charges of reckless endangerment, reckless driving and leaving the scene of an accident.

Shockingly, this hit and run on June 21st follows a string of recent similar events at three Manhattan locations-hitting a total of 18 people. Three of those injured were hospitalized in serious condition and eleven others were treated for less serious injuries.

In one case, a sixty year old driver made the mistake of hitting the gas instead of the brake while pulling out of a parking spot. As a result, the car struck seven pedestrians in Chinatown on the sidewalk and a bench. Two of those people were hospitalized in serious but stable condition.

Continue reading "Sixteen Year-Old Driver Flees Scene of Hit and Run" »

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Posted In: Automobile Accidents

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According to a New York Times article, around 5PM on June 20th, eight pedestrians were hit and injured by a hit and run driver in Manhattan in the Midtown garment district. The accident occurred when a vehicle, a dark blue Ford Explorer, jumped the curb-plowing into the group of pedestrians. The driver fled the scene and was later questioned by the police.

While the police indicated that none of the injuries were likely fatal, eight patients were treated for injuries. Three of the patients were taken to Bellevue Hospital where one was found to be in serious condition, one in serious but stable condition and one in stable condition. St. Vincent’s Hospital cared for four more of the victims who were diagnosed as being in stable condition with minor injuries. A final victim was treated and released at the scene.

Mr. Ralph Hasbani, 23, who was working at a nearby cell phone store at the time, commented that pedestrians screamed as the car plowed onto the sidewalk. “I saw four people under the car. It took six or seven guys to pull everyone out. There was one kid who walked out from under the car. The driver ran after the accident,” Hasbani said.

Continue reading "8 Pedestrians Injured by Hit and Run Driver in Garment District" »

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The New York Times reports, that in early June, after an unprecedented number of fatal construction worker accidents, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the City Council have unveiled a 13 point legislative package that is intended to increase oversight of building sites and increase fines for violation, while requiring registration of all key contractors. The legislation follows an “unacceptably high number” of fatalities, according to Bloomberg. Fifteen people have already died in 2008, compared to twelve fatalities for all of 2007.

Construction companies with sketchy safety records could find permits suspended or revoked-even stopping them from doing business after repeated violations. The legislation also gives the Buildings Department the authority to assign safety monitors to those sites with repeated violations and a history of hazardous conditions. The Times went on to indicate that the new legislation will help the Buildings Department in their efforts to hold contractors more accountable for their safety records. The legislation will also introduce new training requirements and safety rules in key areas-such as crane operations.

In the coming months, Mayor Bloomberg plans to add up to fifty-six new building inspectors which will bring the total to 461-that is up from 277 in January of 2002. While the Buildings Department has issued more than 1200 ‘stop work’ orders and almost 4,000 violations in May 2008, those actions have not put an end to construction accident injuries due to negligence.

Continue reading "Mayor Bloomberg and The City Council Present New Safety Plan for Construction Sites After Unprecedented Construction Worker Deaths" »

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Late last year private equity firms came under the scrutiny of the United States Senate, according to a story in The New York Times. It seems that private equity firms have been snatching up nursing homes all over the country-structuring complex levels of ownership in an attempt to avoid liability from lawsuits handled by New York personal injury lawyers.

Both Democrats and Republicans support oversight and an investigation into why it seems that nursing homes bought by private investor groups scored poorly on 12 to 14 indicators used by regulators to track ailments of long-term residents. In two separate letters, Chuck Grassley [Rep], of Iowa, asked the Government Accountability Office, Congress’s investigative arm, to examine how private equity ownership had affected the quality of care in nursing homes. In one of those letters, reprinted in the Times, Grassley questioned the legal schemes used by investment firms to shield them from liability-in effect denying both patients and family members any legal remedy against nursing homes. Grassley further indicated that the use of such varied and complex ownership structures voided any transparency that would indicate who was responsible for resident care and the operation of investor-owned nursing homes.

According to another New York Times article, corporate structures employed by the investor-owned nursing homes allows them to bypass typical disclosure requirements mandated by Medicare and/or Medicaid funded nursing homes.

The complex structuring of private equity nursing homes seems to reinforce the notion that safety may be compromised for a good return on investment.

Continue reading "Nursing Homes Structure Ownership in Ways to Avoid Liability for Negligence, Abuse, and Death of Patients" »

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Posted In: Nursing Home Abuse

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In March of this year, according to a story in the New York Times, the Senate, responding to an ever-increasing number of injuries from defective toys and other consumer products, approved a measure to overhaul the country’s product liability laws and to fortify the safety agency that is charged with oversight of the consumer marketplace.

The new legislation will increase the staff and budget of the Consumer Product Safety Commission as well as create a public database which will contain consumer complaints about defective products. These changes will allow state prosecutors to take action if they believe that the federal government is not acting to protect consumers.

According to the Times, this is the first time in eighteen years that Congress has acted to adopt major consumer product legislation. The new legislation comes at a time when federal regulators are playing ‘catch up’ in a world of explosive growth of foreign imports. This is especially true when the imports are coming from countries with little to no safety standards. In which case the new legislation could prevent someone from being killed or injured by a defective product from one such country.

Many safety standards that had previously been only voluntary will now be mandatory, and toys would be required to undergo testing in compliance with a comprehensive new set of rules. The Senate bill goes further in increasing the maximum penalty for violations of safety standards from $1.2 million up to a maximum of $20 million.

Continue reading "Washington DC - Senate Votes to Protect Consumers With Stronger Product Safety Laws" »

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Posted In: Product Liability & Recalls

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According to a recent study by Federal Health officials, only minimal penalties are assessed to organizations that have been repeatedly cited for nursing home abuse of their patients. Congress has established strict standards for nursing homes as far back as 1987, and both Presidents Clinton and Bush, along with the nursing home industry have announced many initiatives to improve nursing home care.

However, The New York Times reports that Congressional Investigators, an investigative arm of Congress, has commented that “Some of these homes repeatedly harmed residents over a six-year period and yet remain in the Medicare and Medicaid programs.” Further, the report illuminated the fact that because of the ‘slap on the wrist’ penalty mentality, some nursing homes cycle ‘in and out of compliance’ with federal standards and such nursing homes present a continued threat to the health and safety of their patients.

The report went on to indicate that the accountability office under the Bush administration rarely uses its authority to deny payment to homes with a history of compliance problems. Fines are typically far less than the maximum $10,000 a day according to the report. Apparently, the Bush administration prefers to impose lighter fines fearing that imposing the $10,000 maximum penalty may force some nursing homes into bankruptcy. Instead, those facilities guilty of nursing home neglect are given a grace period.

Continue reading "Federal Report Finds Nursing Home Abuse Still Prevalent " »

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Posted In: Nursing Home Abuse

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