Edward Myles, a truck driver, claimed that he lost earnings due to the defendants’ unfair acts and practices. The claim stemmed from the defendants’ breach of contract relating to the sale of commercial trucking equipment.
Mr. Myles claimed loss of revenue due to the defendants’ intentional interference with a third-party contract.
The defendants denied all of the plaintiff’s claims and filed a counterclaim seeking to recover the unpaid balance on the equipment.
The lawsuit brought by Patricia Emrickson against Fernando Morfin was dismissed with prejudice because Ms. Emrickson’s attorney relied on an online search service that had inaccurate information about the current address for the defendant, Mr. Morfin. Under Illinois Supreme Court Rule 103(b), a suing plaintiff has a duty to use reasonable diligence in serving a defendant with the complaint.
In this case, the lawsuit was filed by Ms. Emrickson just a short time before the two-year statute of limitations had run out. Although the lawsuit was filed in a timely fashion, Mr. Morfin was not served immediately with the complaint, which alleged that Ms. Emrickson was injured in a car accident. It took 13 months before Mr. Morfin was finally served with a summons.
According to the Illinois Appellate Court, Ms. Emrickson chose not to use reasonable diligence in having Mr. Morfin served before the statute of limitations expired, opening the way for Mr. Morfin to dismiss the case with prejudice under Rule 103(b).
In 2002, the Illinois Central Railroad was sued in the State of Mississippi where plaintiff Walter Fennell lived. The lawsuit alleged that he and others were exposed to asbestos when working for the railroad. After discovery was completed in 2006, the trial court in Mississippi dismissed the case without prejudice. The plaintiff, instead of re-filing in Mississippi, filed the lawsuit in the Circuit Court of St. Clair County, Ill., in 2009.
Again after discovery had been conducted, the defendant, Illinois Central Railroad, moved the court to dismiss the case under the interstate doctrine of forum non conveniens. The St. Clair County circuit court judge denied that motion and the case was appealed to the Illinois Appellate Court, which also affirmed the trial judge’s decision. This occurred in 2010. The case was then appealed to the Illinois Supreme Court.
The Illinois Supreme Court ruled that the citizens of St. Clair County should not be asked to bear the burden of this lawsuit because the vast majority of the identified witnesses, treating physicians and some of the plaintiffs were residing in Mississippi and not in Illinois.
Peggy LeGrande, who worked as a flight attendant for Southwest Airlines, was injured when the plane she working in encountered severe turbulence. She brought a lawsuit against the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. §2674, claiming that the air traffic controllers employed by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) were negligent when they chose not to warn the flight’s captain that turbulence had been forecasted for the plane’s flight path.
At the federal district court level, the judge ruled that FAA employees did not breach any duty owed to Ms. LeGrande and granted summary judgment to the United States. On appeal to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, the plaintiff sought reversal of the district court’s judgment.
On appeal and for the first time, Ms. LeGrande raised the issue that her injuries came from the negligence of a National Weather Service (NWS) meteorologist. Because the FAA breached no duty owed to Ms. LeGrande and because she failed to give NWS the written notice that the FTCA statute requires, the Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the district court.
A Cook County jury has found in favor of an injured driver whose car was rear-ended at a traffic light on eastbound Liberty Street at Route 59 in Aurora, Ill. The crash took place on Jan. 23, 2008 when the 19-year-old defendant failed to stop his vehicle and rear-ended the car driven by the plaintiff, Mr. Castillo. Although there was very little damage to the cars, Mr. Castillo, 38, was taken to the emergency room at Rush Copley Medical Center in Aurora. He was released after x-rays were shown to be negative.
Mr. Castillo sustained neck pain and low back pain and received no medical treatment since 2008. He missed three months of work as a bricklayer totaling a claimed amount of $33,000 in lost pay.
However, at the time of the crash, the plaintiff was unemployed. He received a job offer after the crash, but was unable to accept it due to his injuries from this crash. The wage loss claim was based on the job he was forced to refuse.
Four teenagers went out to dinner and later had a party in the basement home of the Gordons, the parent home of one of the teenagers. The incident took place in July 2006. Two of the individuals, Hoyle and Peabody, arrived and talked with the Gordon mother, Rachelle. Hoyle smoked one cigarette and believed that the younger Gordon and Peabody each smoked one cigarette too.
Hoyle remembered putting out her own cigarette when finished, and she and her friend Gordon left after midnight. Peabody and Blake left separately.
Keyth Security Systems and Security Associates International, Inc., were responsible for the Gordon’s home fire detection system. That fire detection system failed to detect a fire that started in the basement that night. The fire resulted in the deaths by carbon monoxide poisoning of the Gordon family.
Peter Nowak, 54, was stopped at a red light on eastbound Lake-Cook Road in Palatine, Ill., on April 14, 2010 when Nowak’s car was rear-ended by defendant Ball. Nowak’s testimony was that he never saw the Ball vehicle prior to the crash.
Nowak contended in his lawsuit that the impact from the crash aggravated a previously asymptomatic bulging disc at C5-6. The crash caused Nowak to experience cervical radiculopathy, which is described as neck pain that may radiate into the shoulder and arm. Nowak also claimed loss of range of motion and a cervical facet syndrome, which required two injections and possibly a future surgery. Cervical facet syndrome is a common cause of neck pain. This occurs when the joints of the neck become inflamed. The facet joints are located between the disc and the vertebrae in front of the boney bumps that can be felt on the back the neck.
In addition, Nowak claimed that he had developed severe pain from the neck injury, suffered from depression, anxiety, insomnia, nightmares and post-traumatic stress disorder.
The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has found in favor of a truck driver, Billy Couch, employed by B&B Trucking, a U.S. Postal Service contractor that sued the government under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) for injuries he suffered. The court considered whether the postal service was immune under the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act as a “borrowing employer.”
However, since this case was a federal matter, the federal courts have applied an alternate definition of “loaning employer.” Belluomini v. United States, 64 F.3d 299 (7th Cir. 1995), and Luna v. United States, 454 F.3d 631 (7th Cir. 2006).
In this case, Couch’s employer was a contractor engaged by the U.S. Postal Service, hauling mail to postal facilities. Couch was delivering a truckload of mail to an Elk Grove Village, Ill., facility. A federal employee allegedly ran over Couch’s foot with a forklift and injuring him. Couch died two years later from lingering complications stemming from that injury.
A Will County, Illinois, jury verdict has been reversed by the Illinois Appellate Court for the Third District. In this case, Yvonne Johnson was injured in a Casey’s General Store parking lot when she was struck by a vehicle operated by the defendant, Charles Bailey. At the Bailey deposition, photographs of the parking lot taken by Mr. Bailey were introduced. He had taken the photos using his own vehicle and that of his fiancé’s as props.
At the Johnson deposition, she testified that she had injured her neck, head, shoulders and back in a 2005 fall unrelated to this incident. From that time on, she continued to see a chiropractor who completed her treatment, but he continued to treat her after she was injured in this accident.
Prior to the beginning of the jury trial, Johnson filed a motion seeking an order precluding the photographs of the parking lot outside the Casey’s General Store. Johnson argued that Bailey had not laid a proper foundation for them in his deposition and that they should not be used at trial without laying a proper foundation.
A Cook County jury has found that FedEx was not responsible for injuries to Cesar Fernandez on June 13, 2009 when the car he was driving was rear-ended by a FedEx truck. Fernandez was stopped at a red light on Cicero Avenue at 31st Street when his car was rear-ended by a FedEx delivery truck.
The speed of the FedEx truck was disputed, but may have been between 5 mph to 30 mph. The driver of the truck did not testify at trial.
Fernandez, 45, complained of neck and back pain at the scene and was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital where he was treated and released with a diagnosis of lumbar and cervical strain.
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