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After four fatal car crashes since 2008, a stretch of Route 9 in Cortlandt from the Annsville Circle to the Putnam County border will now have rumble strips on the center of the road to provide warning to inattentive or sleepy drivers to prevent cross over accidents. The roadway, also known as Albany Post Road, is narrow and curvy with grades which obstruct sight distance, adding to the dangers. Since 2008, serious car accidents at this location have claimed the lives of a Canadian trucker, a deli manager, and a Peekskill City attorney, who died this past July when his car collided with another vehicle and rolled over near the ABC Deli.

Other improvements which the DOT has implemented to make the roadway safer include extending a 45 mph speed limit, flashing lights, new warning signs and pavement markings. Alcohol has been a contributing factor in one of the fatalities, with regard to the September 4, 2009 accident which took the life of Ralph Wood, a 56 year old Peekskill resident. The driver of the car that struck the vehicle Mr. Wood was a passenger in was convicted of vehicular manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide in November of this year.

I have traveled on Route 9 near the Annsville Circle on numerous occasions over the last 15 years since moving to the area. I have witnessed numerous near accidents, and have frequently encountered vehicles on my side of the road coming out of blind turns. The State’s action was welcome and long overdue.

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The controversial drug propoxyphene, sold under the brand names Darvocet and Darvon, will be withdrawn from the market after 53 years due to serious heart risks, according to an announcement by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on November 19, 2010. The studies reviewed by the FDA determined that the drug caused dangerous heart electrical changes in otherwise healthy people. The removal of propoxyphene ends a 32 year crusade by the Health Research Group of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group out of Washington, to stop manufacture of the drug.

An FDA advisory committee voted 14-12 to remove the dangerous drug from the market in January of 2009, and it unclear why it took almost 2 additional years before the removal was finally effectuated. Great Britain banned the drug in 2005 and the European Union followed in 2009 after reports of an unusual number of deaths in Florida, where medical examiners do more toxicology studies.

There was some opinion that patients with severe pain might be switched to other medications which could cause more sedation, dizziness and falling. Medications that will most likely be used instead of Darvocet include Extra Strength Tylenol, Tramadol and low doses of hydrocodone or oxycodone. Propoxyphene was the 38th most prescribed drug in 2009 according to SDI/Verispan, a medicine information company, with 17.5 million prescriptions in the United States.

According to John J. Jenkins, director of the Office of New Drugs at the Food & Drug Administration, “the benefits of [propoxyphene] no longer outweigh its serious heart risks.” The drug had been on the market since 1957, when it was manufactured by Eli Lilly, which profited in the billions from the drug until it sold the rights to Xanodyne Pharmaceuticals in 2005. Xanodyne voluntarily agreed to withdraw the drug after hearing last week from the FDA.

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Many of our clients have suffered injuries in elevators, either by a free falling elevator, an elevator that mis-leveled, or being struck by an elevator door that closed too fast. In older apartment buildings in Manhattan and the Bronx, for example, the elevator doors are frequently manual, and have not been properly maintained. Especially for older clients, they can be struck by a door which comes back at them too fast, often with disastrous results.

If you are injured in an elevator accident, here are six critical things you need to do immediately:

1. Write down the number of the elevator and the any information about the manufacturer contained inside;
2. If there is inspection information posted inside the elevator, record this as well;
3. Obtain the names, addresses and phone numbers of any witnesses to your accident;
4. Take photographs from inside and outside the elevator, of the inspection certificate, elevator doors, numbers or other identifying information outside the elevator;
5. Report the accident to building management, and obtain a copy of the report before you leave the building if you are physically able to do so;

6. Try to obtain the name and address of the elevator maintenance company.

When you report the accident, you can expect that you will be contacted almost immediately by either a claims administrator or insurance representative seeking information about your accident and injuries. These representatives are trained in asking questions designed to place the fault of the accident on you–i.e. you were on a cell phone, late for a meeting, distracted by children, or simply not paying attention to your surroundings. Simply put, it is imperative that you retain an attorney immediately who will provide you will skilled and experienced legal representation and procure the maximum compensation for your injuries, medical bills and lost earnings.

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According to a study in the Archives of Surgery, as reported in the the New York Times October 19, 2010 edition, from 2002 through mid-2008 in Colorado, surgeons reported an astounding 25 operations on the wrong patient, and 107 surgical procedures on the wrong body part. The data was drawn from an insurance database in Colorado that involved 6,000 physicians.

Examples of the medical malpractice committed include the most egregious case, in which a chest tube was inserted into the wrong lung, which was healthy, causing the lung to collapse and the patient to die. Surgeons also operated on the wrong side of the brain, removed a healthy ovary and performed surgery on the wrong hand, elbow, knee and eye.

Dr. Philip F. Stahel, chief of orthopedics at the Denver Health Medical Center, noted that: “These data are shocking…These are catastrophic events that are unacceptable. They have been termed a never event–because they should never happen.”

In our practice, we have represented clients who had surgical instruments left in their chests, and more recently, a client who suffered unnecessary surgery when his doctor was “out sick” the day of the procedure, and the doctor’s partner operated on the wrong side. He was then forced to undergo reconstructive surgery, as well as surgery on the correct body part. Needless to say, in that case, the insurance company and doctor decided that the sensible decision was to settle the case before a jury was given the opportunity to decide the amount of damages.

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The Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released a new study with surprising results. Fatal car accidents involving teens steadily declined from 2004 through 2008, despite the increasing popularity and dangers of texting while driving and the numerous warnings of distracted driving on the nation’s roadways. The number of fatalities dropped from approximately 2,200 in 2004 to roughly 1,400 in 2008. The study examined 16 and 17 year old drivers, who were involved in 9,600 accidents during the five year period, with more than 11,000 dying, including more than 4,000 of the teen drivers and in excess of 3,400 passengers.

Teen Fatalities have been declining since 1996, with the advent of safer vehicles equipped with air bags and highway improvements. The study also determined that non-fatal car crashes have dropped by 31% from 2004 through 2008. According to experts, another major reason for the decline in fatalities is that the majority of states are now enhancing restrictions on when teens can drive and when they can have passengers in their vehicles. A spokesman for the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Russ Rader, noted that teens are not necessarily driving safer but “state laws enacted in the last 15 years are taking teens out of the most hazardous situations.”

The CDC study revealed that Wyoming has the highest fatality rate, with approximately 60 16-17 year old driver deaths per 100,000 drivers that age. New York and New Jersey have the lowest rate, at about 10 per 100,000.

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A September 23rd report from the American Journal of Public Health indicates that distracted driving fatalities have increased substantially between 2005 and 2008. The report uses data from the National Center for Statistics and Analysis’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System, which revealed that fatal car crashes due to texting while driving increased 28% from 4,752 deaths in 2005 to 5,870 fatalities in 2008. This past January, the federal government banned bus and truck drivers from using handheld devices to send text messages on interstate highways.

According to Jennifer Smith, of the safety group FocusDriven, the more than 5,000 traffic fatalities annually from cell phone use is “equivalent to a major airliner going down each week in this country…if that was happening, they would ground all flights until they figured out what the problem was and they solved it.” The deadly consequences of distracted driving was the main topic in a government summit the past week in Washington, D.C. Officials called for tougher enforcement against the use of handheld devices on the roadways to counteract the growing trend of fatalities due to distracted driving crashes.

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This past Saturday, six people were killed in a Church van fatal rollover accident on the New York State Thruway just north of Harriman. The accident happened when a rear tire blew out, causing the driver to over correct, the van to roll over several times, and nine passengers to be ejected from the vehicle. The church group was on their way from the Bronx to a banquet in Schenectady, New York.

Tragically, the Ford Econoline van that the 14 passengers were riding in is known, as other 15 passenger vans are, for being prone to rollovers, and particularly when the vans are at full capacity. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, tire failures are the most common cause of fatal rollovers in passenger vans. Apparently, the rear tires in the vans are placed under tremendous stress when large passenger loads shift the center of gravity to the rear. The vans have a tall center of gravity and poor rear suspension, so that when at full capacity, the center of gravity is increased upward and toward the rear axle. Then, when there is a tire failure, the van will fishtail and rotate, going into a sideways rollover.

Certainly, requiring van manufactures to install rear seat belts would lessen the severity of accidents, as all of the fatalities in this accident involved rear passengers who were not belted and were ejected through the windows and killed. According to the NHTSA, from 2003 through 2007, 473 occupants of vans died in crashes, and of these, 56% were rollovers. A full 80% of those killed were not wearing seatbelts. The NHTSA has issued safety recommendations for the operation of passenger vans, which include keeping tires properly inflated, requiring that drivers have commercial licenses, and seating passengers, to the extent possible, near the front of the van. in 2002, The National Transportation Safety Board reported that over a 20 year period, the rollover rate for fully loaded passenger vans was about three times the ratio of vans with fewer than 5 passengers.

The six people killed in the September 18 accident were Bishop Simon White, his wife, Zelda White, the Rev. Titus McGhie, Avril Murray, Evelyn Ferguson, and Elaine Reid. State Police investigators are still seeking a statement from the the driver of the van, Bernard Lallibeaudiere, who is undergoing treatment at St. Francis Hospital in Poughkeepsie.

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When a client walks into our White Plains, New York office, having suffered a serious injury in a car crash, slip and fall accident, or from using a defective or dangerous product, we envision that this new case will reach trial, and want to preserve evidence as soon as possible. One of the most important types of evidence to prove your personal injury case in Court is photographs–of the smashed in back of your car, uneven and broken sidewalk or stair, or icy driveway. Each of these conditions frequently disappears and is lost forever shortly after the accident. The car is taken to a repair shop and declared a total loss; the owner of the stairway sends out a contractor to fix the broken stair, or the icy driveway is cleared up through a quick application of salt or a warming trend in the weather.

Thus, it is our advice that immediately after the accident, you have a friend, relative, or witness take photographs of the scene of the accident, and of the cars involved if it was an auto accident. Obviously, if you are able to, you can do this yourself, but often, the injuries you have suffered prevent this. If you wait until the next day or a couple of days later, particularly with regard to weather related accidents, the evidence is likely to be lost forever.

The reason that photographs are so critical is that insurance companies utilize them to determine the severity of an accident, and to decide in many cases whether your injuries were caused by the accident. The second reason is that if the case does not settle before trial, jurors often expect to have visual proof of the damage to your vehicle, or the stairway you fell on, before deciding whether the defendant is at fault for your injuries.

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According to the final New York State Police report, issued last month, Diane Schuler was speeding at a whopping 85 miles per hour in last July’s fatal car crash on the Taconic Parkway in which 8 people died. The fiery crash occurred on July 26, 2009, when Ms. Schuler, traveling with her three nieces and two children, was driving southbound in the northbound lanes of the Taconic Parkway with a blood alcohol content of .19 (more than twice the legal limit) and high on marijuana. Everyone was killed in the Schuler vehicle with the exception of her then 5 year old son Bryan, and all three occupants of the vehicle driven by Guy Bastardi, which was traveling northbound in the left lane, were also killed.

Daniel Schuler, the husband of Diane Schuler, claimed last year that his wife must have had an illness or medical problem which caused her to drive so recklessly on the wrong side of the parkway. There was talk of exhuming Ms. Schuler’s body to conduct a separate autopsy to potentially rebut the findings of the Westchester County Medical Examiner’s Office, but to date there has been no evidence to refute the Westchester Coroner’s findings that Schuler was high and intoxicated at the time of the accident.

Understandably, the Bastardi family has commenced litigation against the Estate of Diane Schuler for the deaths of 81 year old Michael Bastardi, Sr. and his 49 year old son, Guy Bastardi, who was behind the wheel when the tragic accident occurred. The lawsuit is pending.

When you combine the speed of the Schuler vehicle at 85 m.p.h with the alleged speed of the Bastardi vehicle at 74 miles per hour, the vehicles were approaching each other at 233 feet per second–(Total of 159 miles per hour X 1.466 feet per second= 233 feet per second). Thus, there is no question that Guy Bastardi had no time to react or take evasive action from the Schuler vehicle. The only real question in this lawsuit is how much automobile insurance or umbrella insurance coverage the Schuler family had in effect on the date of the accident to compensate the Bastardi family. To date, we are not aware whether the family of the late Daniel Longo, also in the Bastardi vehicle, intends to commence legal action against Schuler’s estate.

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In the summer of 2008, then 22 year old Jacy Good was on her way home to Lititz, Pennsylvania with her 57 year old parents after graduating from Muhlenberg College. Suddenly, her entire life was turned upside down when a tractor-trailer slammed head on into her car, killing Jacy’s parents Jay and Joan Good, and leaving Jacy with permanent injuries including a collapsed lung, shattered pelvis, a lacerated liver, and worst of all, a traumatic brain injury that has caused faltering speech and difficulty concentrating. The truck driver had been forced to swerve to avoid a vehicle driven by an 18 year old who blew through a traffic light while speaking on his cell phone. The 18 year old driver was issued a ticket for disregarding a traffic control device but investigators were not able to determine if he went through the light because he was on his cell phone.

As a result of the accident, Jacy has now become a nationwide advocate to ban all cell phone usage by drivers. She noted: What is that important that you have to put everyone else on the road in jeopardy?” Since 2001 in New York, pursuant to Section 1225-c (2) (a) of the Vehicle & Traffic Law, it has been unlawful to use a mobile phone while a vehicle is in motion, unless the motorist has a hand-held device. Then last year, the New York State Legislature passed a law banning texting while driving. However, the offense was made secondary, meaning that in order to be charged with texting while driving, the officer would first have to charge the driver with a primary offense such as speeding or passing a red light. This month, the Legislature passed an amendment to the texting ban, making it a primary offense, and the amended law awaits approval by the New York State Senate before Governor Paterson can sign the bill, which he is in favor of.

Nationwide, 5,870 people were killed in car crashes in 2008, based upon data from the National Safety Council. The Council has urged legislatures to outlaw all cell phone use while driving, as it is clearly a major contributor to the overall epidemic of distracted driving, which also includes motorists who are too tired to drive, eat, drink or smoke while driving, attend to children, or focus on their radios or GPS devices instead of the road.

In June, Ms. Good and her boyfriend Steven Johnson, (who gave up his intention of a career in banking and has become inspired by Jacy’s accident to become an occupational therapist), spoke at nearby Ardsley High School about the huge risks and dangers from using cell phones while driving. Mr. Johnson told the students that he will never forget, and hopes that they never will either.

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