Articles Posted in Auto Accidents

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A recent Illinois Supreme Court decision affects the way Illinois personal injury attorneys are compensated by medical lien holders, such as as hospitals, clinics, or doctors. Wendling v. Southern Illinois Hospital Services, et al. and Howell v. Southern Illinois Hospital Services, Nos. 110199, 110200 Cons reversed an appellate court decision that held that hospitals were responsible for paying plaintiff attorney fees when the plaintiff’s attorney had assisted in securing payment for the hospital’s outstanding medical lien.

The original lawsuit revolved around three different plaintiffs who were injured in three separate car accidents; however, each plaintiff was treated at hospitals owned by Southern Illinois Hospital Services. Each plaintiff failed to pay his or her hospital bills, so Southern Illinois Hospital Services filed medical liens for each plaintiff under the principles of the Healthcare Services Lien Act.

A lien is entered when an entity, in this case Southern Illinois Hospital Services, lays claim to future funds in payment for past services provided. Because the individual plaintiffs failed to pay their medical bills, the hospital was seeking payment from the defendants who caused the injuries that necessitated the hospital treatment. The idea is that had the defendants not caused the auto accidents, the plaintiffs wouldn’t have needed treatment, and the hospital wouldn’t be left with unpaid bills. Therefore, if proven negligent, then the defendants are responsible for paying the outstanding hospital bills.

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An Illinois personal injury lawsuit resulting from a head-on collision resulted in a $483,000 verdict. While there was not any debate regarding who was at fault for the car accident, there was some disagreement as to the extent of the plaintiff’s injuries and whether her sustained injuries had impacted her career; Gina Guide v. James Garlanger, 09 L 1867.

The plaintiff, Gina Guide, was a two-time U.S. national weightlifting champion and was training to earn a slot on the 2012 U.S. Olympic weightlifting team. However, on November 21, 2007, James Garlanger was out driving in icy and snowy conditions when he lost control of his car. Garlanger’s car crossed into oncoming traffic and crashed head-on into Guide’s vehicle.

The 22 year-old Gina Guide sustained a compound fracture and dislocation of her right ankle, multiple fractures along her tibia and fibula, and several torn ligaments. Since her 2007 car crash, Guide has required three different surgeries to treat her leg injuries and is likely to need two additional procedures. And despite all these procedures, Guide walks with a permanent limp and cannot flex her right ankle.

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While Illinois is amending its motor vehicle laws to offer more protection to bicyclists, an advocacy group is petitioning for additional safety measures. The Active Transportation Alliance (ATA), an organization whose mission is to make Chicago streets safer for bicyclists, motorists, and pedestrians, is campaigning to increase the public’s awareness regarding the dangers of bicyclist and car door collisions.

A bicycle-car door collision occurs when a driver opens his or her car door without first checking whether any bicyclists are coming; the bicyclist typically does not have enough warning to avoid the car door and ends up crashing into it. According to the ATA, car door accidents are the most common manner in which Chicago cyclists are injured; however, the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) does not maintain records on the number of bicycle-car door accidents in Illinois.

Illinois averaged over 3,500 crashes between bicyclists and motor vehicles each year from 2005 to 2009. According to IDOT, 18 to 27 of those crashes result in cyclist’s deaths and over 3,300 injuries every year. However, IDOT does not currently track the number of bicycle accidents in which a motor vehicle’s door is thrown open in the path of a moving bicycle. Without official records documenting the degree of the problem it is difficult for advocacy groups like ATA to raise motorist awareness and effect change in driver habits. In addition, a spokesperson for ATA stated that excluding dooring accidents from Illinois crash reports could decrease Illinois’s vehicle-bike accident report statistics by 15 percent.

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An Illinois judge approved a $5 million settlement in a trucking accident lawsuit brought by the estate of an Illinois civil attorney who was killed in a two-vehicle accident near Streator, Illinois. The settlement in Estate of Richard J. Berry v. OSF Healthcare System Corp., et al., No. 10 L 14, represents one of the largest personal injury settlements in LaSalle County, Illinois.

The decedent, Richard Berry, was a partner in his own firm and had been practicing law in Illinois since the mid-1970s. Mr. Berry was widely respected in the legal community and was known to be a very capable trial lawyer. The Illinois wrongful death lawsuit was brought by his wife and three adult children, all of which will receive a portion of the Illinois settlement.

The Illinois wrongful death lawsuit was brought against OSF Healthcare System Corp., a Peoria-based company; its subsidiary, OSF Saint Francis, Inc.; and David DeFrance, the other driver involved in the two-vehicle accident which led to Berry’s death. All parties involved contributed to the $5 million settlement to Mr. Berry’s surviving family members.

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The United States Supreme Court has ruled that a family is allowed to pursue its lawsuit in California against Mazda Motors of American, Inc. in the case of The Estate of Thanh Williamson v. Mazda, 08-1314. The product liability lawsuit deals with claims that the auto company’s 1993 Mazda MPV minivan were unsafe because the middle seat of the vehicle’s second row was only equipped with lap seat belts.

The wrongful death lawsuit was filed after Thanh Williamson, a Utah mother, died in a 2002 auto crash. Mrs. Williamson was seatbelted into the back middle seat of the family’s Mazda minivan at the time of the car crash. According to eyewitnesses of the car accident, the impact of the car crash caused Mrs. Williamsons’s body to jackknife around the lap seat belt, which resulted in her fatal internal injuries.

Again, central to the estate’s product liability claim was that the seatbelt the late Mrs. Williamson was using was not equipped with a harness or shoulder belt. However, this option is not required by federal regulations. While federal law does require that a vehicle’s front and rear outer seats come equipped with both lap and shoulder belts, car manufacturers may decide whether or not to also provide this option in their middle or aisle seats.

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An Illinois personal injury lawsuit settled for $2.93 million in Lake County, Illinois. The Illinois lawsuit of Jeffrey Cox v. Anthony S. Phillips, et al., No. 08 L 488, arose as a result of a 2006 car accident. The lawsuit carried claims not only of the personal injuries sustained by the plaintiff driver, but also involved a workers’ compensation claim for the plaintiff’s lost time from work following the Illinois truck accident.

In 2006, the plaintiff, 51 year-old Jeffrey Cox, was driving his pickup truck near the intersection of Hardigan Road and Rte. 12 in Lake County, Illinois. At the time of the Illinois truck accident, Cox was driving through the intersection with a green light. According to his Illinois personal injury complaint, Anthony Phillips t-boned Cox’s vehicle after running a red light at the Lake County intersection.

Phillips was traveling at high speeds at the time of the t-bone truck collision, causing fairly severe injuries to Cox’s shoulder and leg. While Cox’s shoulder healed without any major interventions, Cox’s leg injury required surgery, thereby increasing the time required for his healing process.

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On May 25, 2005, the defendants’ 79,000 lbs.Mack truck rear-ended the plaintiff’s Toyota Tundra pickup truck at 10-15 mph. The impact, considered hard by the plaintiff, caused a C4-5 herniation in Keith Gallaugher’s neck and a tear in the posterior longitudinal ligament. The trucking accident eventually led to the filing of Keith Gallaugher v. Roy Cranmer, Arrow Specialized Carriers, Inc., 07 L 172.

About five months after this truck and pickup truck collision, Gallaugher, the driver of the Toyota pickup underwent an interior cervical fusion at C4-5 with bone and plate fixation.

Mr. Gallaugher sought at trial the recovery of $100,000 for loss of normal life and $200,000 for past and future pain and suffering. This was to go along with his medical expenses of $57,366 as well as lost time from work of $6,250.

The defendant admitted negligence, but denied causation and contested the nature and extent of the plaintiff’s injuries. The defendant used a biomechanical scientist to dispute the low-speed impact caused the cervical herniation. In low impact cases, it has become a common occurrence in jury trials for defendants particularly, to present biomechanical expert testimony to dispute the nature and extent of plaintiff’s injuries.

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An Illinois personal injury lawsuit that was brought as a result of a 2006 car accident that left the plaintiff with back and knee injuries. The defendant driver was intoxicated at the time of the Illinois car crash and collided not only with the plaintiff’s car, but also with several other stopped cars. The Illinois auto crash lawsuit was settled prior to trial for $5 million; Joseph Ambrogio and Debra Ambrogio v. Gary W. Ericksen and U.S. Fire Protection, Inc., 06 L 6380.

The Illinois auto crash lawsuit was brought against not only Gary Ericksen, the driver who allegedly caused the accident, but also his employer, U.S. Fire Protection, Inc. At the time of the Illinois car accident, Ericksen was driving a work van owned by U.S. Fire Protection, Inc. Under Illinois law, an employer is liable for any accident that occurs with their vehicles if the employee is operating within the confines of their employment.

Prior to the car accident, Ericksen had been working as a foreman sprinkler fitter at a Wheeling, Illinois construction site. He and some of his fellow crew members left the construction site to have lunch at a bar across the street. Ericksen was returning from lunch when he came to an overpass where a line of cars were stopped in traffic. Ericksen allegedly failed to stop in time and hit several of the cars; the plaintiff, Mr. Ambrogio, was the second vehicle in that line of cars.

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A Cook County jury returned a $750,000 against the City of Chicago as a result of an Illinois car accident involving a Chicago police officer. The Illinois jury verdict took into consideration the resulting chronic injuries to the plaintiff as well as his past and future lost time from work in Marek Rajewski v. City of Chicago and Judy Johnsen, 08 L 11949.

The Illinois auto accident occurred right outside of the Chicago Police Department’s 16th District Jefferson Park Police Station, located at 5151 N. Milwaukee Avenue. The plaintiff, Marek Rajewski, was a 56 year-old maintenance employee who had been assigned to the Jefferson Park Police Station for almost ten years. After ending his janitor shift, Mr. Rajewski collected his car from the south employee parking garage and was exiting onto Milwaukee Avenue.

As he was turning north on Milwaukee Avenue, Rajewski collided with Officer Johnsen, who was driving southbound on Milwaukee Avenue against the flow of traffic. Officer Johnsen was driving her squad car into the same employee parking lot that Rajewski was exiting. According to her testimony, Johnsen was driving her squad car to her personal car in order to retrieve some police reports she had forgotten in her vehicle. She had elected to drive the 50 feet from the north employee parking lot to the south lot rather than walking.

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Despite the defendants’ claims that the plaintiff had not been seriously injured in a Cook County car accident, the Illinois jury awarded him $97,433 in Kenneth Linkevich v. Jose A. Alarcon and Yemi O. Oyewole, 09 L-635. The Illinois personal injury claim was filed by the plaintiff driver, who was injured when his car was struck by the defendants’ two vehicles after they collided at an intersection.

In 2007, plaintiff Linkevich was stopped at a red light at an Illinois intersection, facing east on Apple Valley Drive in Bartlett, Illinois. While Linkevich was waiting for his light to turn green, Jose Alarcon began making a left-hand turn from northbound Route 59. However, in the process of turning, Alarcon crashed into a southbound car being driven by Yemi Oyewole. Alarcon and Oyewole’s vehicles not only crashed into each other, but then spun and crashed into Linkevich’s stopped vehicle.

Plaintiff Linkevich was 39 years-old at the time of the Illinois car crash and was employed as a truck driver. As a result of the car accident, Linkevich sustained an acrominal impingement injury, a disc herniation in his lower back, and developed arthritis in his right shoulder. Linkevich was unable to return to work for at least two weeks following the car accident.

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