More and more police departments in Maryland are joining the rest of us in 2012 and making car accident police reports available online. Calvert County police reports for car crashes will generally be available within 5-7 business days after the date of the accident. This is that rare development in…
The Louisiana Supreme Court this week overturned a jury’s verdict in a sidewalk slip and fall case. The court found that, as a matter of law, the defect on the sidewalk did not present an unreasonable risk of harm. For slip and fall cases, plaintiffs’ lawyers want the story to…
Accident lawyers can’t help but homogenize insurance companies. But the reality is that they are all very different with different models and agendas. On our Maryland car accident claim overview on our website, we provide on the bottom right-hand side a summary of our lawyers’ thoughts on dealing with 18…
The Western District Missouri Court of Appeals last week affirmed a $ 950,000 jury verdict in a motorcycle accident case, concluding that the condition of the road during construction was the primary cause of the man’s injuries. The jury award surprises me. Plaintiff was driving his motorcycle through an “inactive”…
Tuesday, the National Transportation Safety Board called for a nationwide ban on the use of cell phones and text messaging devices while driving although the recommendation is not, as it probably should be, for hands-free phones (or passengers). Maryland already had passed a similar law. This recommendation underscores that the…
In Dunbar v. State Farm, a federal judge in Oklahoma granted summary judgment to State Farm in what was really a silly bad faith case. This case involved a pedestrian accident where somebody backed out of their driveway and hit someone. USAA tendered, albeit slowly, its $100,000 limits for the…
We’ve all been through it before…trying to locate either the defendant or the “friend of a friend” who was with our client at the time of the accident. When this person appears to be absolutely nowhere, it is worth checking out whether this defendant or witness is a guest of…
A wrongful death suit has been filed in Utah, stemming from a horrific boating accident. The facts here are rather unbelievable. The suit contends that the driver of a boat negligently struck the decedent while she was swimming, causing critical injuries, as the propeller “tore” into her torso and lower…
I have never thought about the correlation between the severity of injury in car accidents and the amount of congestion on the highway. But it certainly makes sense that (1) traffic jams lead to more accidents because the traffic is stop-and-go, and (2) high traffic means low speeds, which means…
Before filing a lawsuit in Maryland, or anywhere for that matter, you need to find and serve the defendant. Usually, this is a breeze. But in a painful minority of cases, it can take real effort. Tracking down and locating defendants can get costly. In this economy, people are moving…