California Injury Blog

Published on: July 17, 2007

Fatal Drowning Occurs in Backyard Swimming Pool During a Party

By Brian Chase

It was a crowded pool at a birthday party in a Villa Park home. It was a perfect day for a party – warm and sunny. There were plenty of kids in the pool and even more adults standing around the pool watching them. But not one of those kids or adults noticed 4-year-old Aurora Pruitt of Moreno Valley slip underwater and drown in the shallow end of the pool, according to an article in The Orange County Register.

The article states that there were as many as 15 children in the pool ranging in age from 3 to 16 years old. According to the report, five adults were watching the children. They made the horrible discovery at lunch time when all the children got out of the pool except for little Aurora. A parent, who saw her at the bottom of the shallow end of the pool, pulled her out and tried to resuscitate her, but didn’t succeed. Paramedics rushed her first to Chapman Medical Center and later to Children’s Hospital of Orange County in Orange, where she died just after 9 p.m. Tuesday.

According to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, 18 children under the age of 18 have drowned in Orange County since January and nine of those children who drowned were under 13 years of age.

These are truly alarming numbers for Orange County. Drowning is the leading cause of death for young children in Orange County and California where backyard pools are the norm rather than the exception. Pools are a great resource and a pool parties are a great activity for the summer. But they can also be a liability. If a child drowns in your backyard pool under your watch, you could be held liable.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 16, 2007

California Nursing Home Fined $100,000

By Brian Chase

I recently came across an article in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat titled “Despicable People”. Obviously I was intrigued. But as I continued to read the article, I was hardly surprised to find out that it was about a Petaluma nursing home that was fined $100,000 for poor care and neglect of a 76-year-old woman.

According to the newspaper article, her husband and daughter placed Mary Keel at Pleasant Care Convalescent Home after the woman suffered a stroke. Now, our firm, Bisnar Chase Personal Injury Attorneys, has represented numerous victims of nursing home abuse and negligence. But this is one of the worst stories I’ve ever heard. Apparently, Keel’s sat in dirty clothes unchanged for weeks and was even allowed to eat her meals as she sat on soiled diapers! State investigators found 17 violations in that nursing home in connection with Keel’s death.

The facility is also reportedly one of 30 owned by Pleasant Care Corp., a La Canada-based company, which is in legal and financial hot water after many of its facilities were found to be far below state standards. And I’ll bet most of these sub-standard facilities were also understaffed. That’s how unscrupulous nursing homes, that don’t care whether people live or die, make their big bucks. They literally build their castles over the tombstones of those they were supposed to serve.

And it’s not as if they do it for free. Families pay good money to place their loved ones in these facilities. In fact, this article states that the Keels paid a “base rate of $5,400 per month.” And I know from personal experience, that more than money, it’s emotionally hard for families to make that decision.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 14, 2007

The Horrors of Salmonella Poisoning

By Brian Chase

Even though it was four years ago, Robert Rise says he will never forget the excruciating pain, “Like someone was sticking a knife through my intestines,” the 60-year-old Helendale resident says. He wasn’t in a traffic accident or injured in a fall. Robert ate sushi.

Robert remembers the day, August 28, 2003. Robert had lunch at the Karuta restaurant, a Buena Park sushi place near where he worked. Robert ate sushi topped with a raw quail egg, something he’ll never do again. Robert wound up in the hospital for a week with salmonella poisoning. He lost 15 pounds in the first two days. He suffered sharp, cramping pain, the worst diarrhea he had ever known, cramps and vomiting.

Continue reading →

Published on: July 13, 2007

Nursing Home Wrongful Death Lawsuit Awarded $54 Million by Jury

By Brian Chase

A jury in New Mexico, while acknowledging that a nursing home was negligent, awarded $54 million to the family of a woman who died in the facility, according to a news article in the Albuquerque Tribune. Most of the award – about $50 million – was in punitive damages.

Lori Keith, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of her deceased mother, was awarded the damages on June 28 after jurors agreed that ManorCare Inc., an Ohio-based nursing home corporation, neglected Keith’s 78-year-old mother to such an extent that she died. The lawsuit alleged that the nursing home tried to cover up Barbara Barber’s death by taking away sheets and other items from the room.

Her mother was supposed to leave ManorCare to stay with family barely a week after she died, Keith said. So when she got a phone call about Barber’s death, Keith said she became suspicious. Keith told the newspaper that what she wanted from the lawsuit was not money, but an admission of guilt from the corporation and justice for her mother.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 12, 2007

Paralyzed Bus Passenger Gets Nearly $14 million For MTA Crash

By Brian Chase

A Los Angeles jury recently decided that the County Metropolitan Transportation Authority should pay $13.8 million to a 58-year-old man who was partially paralyzed in a crash with a parked big-rig, according to an Associated Press news report posted on the San Diego Union Tribune’s Web site.

Joseph L. Garcia was in a bus that was traveling west on Santa Monica Boulevard on June 25, 2005 when the bus hit the big-rig. All six passengers who were on board were hurt, but Garcia suffered the most serious injuries including permanent brain damage and paralysis on the left side of his body.

The jury deliberated a day before returning a verdict on June 11. Interestingly enough, Garcia’s attorney had asked the jury for a $40-million award. MTA officials said they accept the jury’s verdict. They even tell the Associated Press that it was an “unfortunate situation” and that they tried to settle the case and had told the plaintiff’s attorney all along that they would cover his medical expenses. According to the plaintiff’s attorney, MTA had offered $5 million to settle the case before the trial began.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 11, 2007

Clergy Abuse Fraud Claims Revived by Wisconsin Supreme Court

By Brian Chase

Victims of clergy abuse granted opportunity to hold Catholic Church accountable.

In what was a historic decision, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ordered the revival of lawsuits claiming fraud against the Archdiocese of Milwaukee in various alleged incidents of molestations by priests.

According to a news report by the Associated Press, the court closed the door on negligence suits filed by abuse victims against the diocese because the three-year statute of limitations had expired. But the state high court, in a surprise move and a 5-2 decision, reinstated the victims’ claims of fraud and ordered further proceedings to determine if the six-year limit for such claims had expired.

Victim advocates welcomed the court’s unprecedented decision saying it will give victims of such abuse an opportunity to seek justice against Wisconsin church officials who knowingly covered up abuse for many years. Peter Isely, director of Survivor’s Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP),was quoted in the article stating the monumental decision allows victims to hold perpetrators accountable for their actions.

“There was an intentional policy to misrepresent, deceive and lie to every citizen in this state as bishops systematically transferred known child rapists through virtually every community in Wisconsin,” he told the news agency.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 11, 2007

Pedestrian Accident Fatality Blamed on City’s Failure to Install Traffic Signal

By Brian Chase

A municipality cannot be sued over its failure to install a traffic signal at an intersection where a boy was killed, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled in affirming a summary judgment, according to an article in Lawyers USA weekly magazine.

According to the article, the plaintiff’s 13-year-old son was fatally struck by a car while he tried to cross an intersection in Phoenix. The plaintiffs alleged in the lawsuit that the teenager died because the city did not place a traffic signal at the busy intersection where the accident occurred. The parents particularly accused the city of being negligent in “adopting and implementing a traffic control computer program that prioritized the need for signals based on an intersection’s traffic volume, proximity to schools and collision history,” the article stated.

The city claimed immunity for policy-making decisions made by a municipality arguing that the decision not to put a traffic signal at that intersection fell within the scope of such immunity. The court agreed and in fact, said this is especially the kind of decision that should be protected because it involved the “exercise of discretion” and involved determining how to study the traffic issue, the type of resources to allocate for its study and execution and what process to follow in order to achieve that.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 10, 2007

Ford Excursion Rollover Fatal to Orange County Passenger

By Brian Chase

A 21-year-old man died in the early morning of July 1st, 2007 after the sport utility vehicle in which he was a passenger, flipped over on the freeway, according to an article in The Orange County Register.

Cesar Sanchez was reportedly ejected from the Ford Excursion after the SUV rolled over at about 1:22 a.m. as the vehicle was traveling eastbound on the 91 Freeway to the Costa Mesa (55) Freeway transition.

The driver of the Excursion, whose name was not released, lost control of the SUV for an unknown reason, California Highway Patrol officials told the newspaper. After the driver lost control and turned sharply off the shoulder, the Excursion flipped three times throwing Sanchez out of the vehicle. He was taken to Western Medical Center in Santa Ana where he was
pronounced dead shortly thereafter. No information was released about the driver’s identity or his condition. Also, it is not known whether Sanchez was wearing his seatbelt when the SUV rolled over.
Continue reading →

Published on: July 9, 2007

Clergy Abuse of Adults – Predator Catholic Priest

By Brian Chase

The majority of victims of clergy sexual abuse are women, not young boys. Many of these women hesitate to discuss their experiences because of shame and the paralyzing belief that they somehow “deserved it”. These statements are taken from Peggy Warren’s website where she tells her story of manipulation and sexual abuse at the hands of her Catholic priest.

Peggy and her husband, Bret Warren, tell their story of “…lies, deceit, corruption, cover-up, double talk, reverse accusations, forgetfulness, back stabbing, hate and pure bull—-, all from the Catholic Church, more specifically the Diocese of Wichita…” on their website, designed to broadcast their story and be a resource for other abused women. It is a story of a predatory Catholic priest operating in Wichita, Kansas and the havoc his actions wrecked on the Warren family. It is the story of a clergyman, Nicholas Voelker, acting out his own issues and taking advantage of his position of trust to sexually assault a parishioner and how the Catholic Church hierarchy handled it.

Read our interview of Peggy Warren “Adult Victims of Clergy Abuse — They Suffer in Silence”.

Continue reading →

Published on: July 8, 2007

Time for a Great New American Enterprise – The 100 Mile Per Gallon Automobile

By Brian Chase

American automakers are fighting hard to stop a Senate bill that proposes a 40% increase in automobile fuel economy within thirteen years, by the year 2020. Instead of fighting to maintain their inefficient ways and continually losing market share to foreign car makers, why isn’t the American automobile industry challenging itself and foreign automakers to develop the most fuel efficient and safe automobiles?

Why this “can’t do” attitude from the American auto industry? They do everything they can from lobbying, to threats, to propaganda to fight progressive fuel economy and safety legislation. Why does the American auto industry have to be mandated by laws to do the right thing when it comes to auto safety and efficiency? Their political and lobbying power is so great; they pressure our elected representatives into mediocrity and make them back down from doing what is in the country’s best interest?

Do you see the European and Japanese automakers fighting against fuel economy and safety regulations? The foreign automakers seem to be developing safer, smarter and more efficient cars without government regulations. Is it possible that the American’s “can’t do” attitude is what has gotten them into their poor economic performance of late and has lost them major portions of the American automobile market?

President John F. Kennedy, in a speech to a joint session of Congress on May 25, 1961 said, “Now it is time to take longer strides–time for a great new American enterprise–time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.”

President Kennedy committed the United States to achieve, before the decade was out, “… landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.”
Continue reading →