Personal Injury & Wrongful Death

A Florida jury awarded a 92-year-old man over $5.3 million in his wrongful death lawsuit against Phillip Morris, the cigarette maker according to The Miami Herald. The man’s wife died in 1996 at the age of 63 from lung cancer after smoking 2 packs of Marlboro’s a day since she was 16-years of age. The apparent theory of the case was that the tobacco industry, including Philip Morris, misrepresented the risk of smoking in its advertising and knowingly sold a product which was addictive. Notwithstanding the ridiculous 1994 sworn testimony of the tobacco industry CEO’s to Congress that “nicotine is not addictive”, this jury found otherwise.
Losing a loved one is difficult especially when that loss is due to the negligence of another person or persons. Finch McCranie, LLP has over 40 years experience pursuing wrongful death lawsuits. If you have lost a loved one and feel you have a wrongful death claim, call our experienced Georgia injury lawyers at 1-800-228-9159 for a free consultation of your case.

If you go on Google and take advantage of a tool known as “Google News Alerts,” Google will send to you via e-mail news accounts in which certain terms are used. I typed in today the terms “police chase killed.” The following are headlines received from newspapers across the country which I received from this Google News Alert:

1) Victim In Police Chase Remembered as Caring Mom;

2) Woman Killed In Crash During Oakland Police Chase;

Georgia injury lawyers have not forgotten the sworn testimony the CEO’s of all of the major tobacco companies gave Congress a few years ago. Who could forget when these prominent men raised their right hands and swore that “Nicotine is not addictive”. Apparently a jury has not forgotten their testimony. Bloomberg reported that in a wrongful death case, a California jury has ordered Altria Group, Inc., the parent company of Philip Morris USA, maker of Marlboro cigarettes to pay $13.8 million in punitive damages to the daughter of a smoker who died of lung cancer. According to the original lawsuit, the cigarette maker misrepresented the risk of smoking in its advertising. In 2002, a jury awarded $28 million to the plaintiff. That award was later reduced and eventually thrown out prior to the most recent trial. The deceased plaintiff who was 64 at the time of the original trial had smoked since she was 17. According to her lawyer, Philip Morris misrepresented the risks of smoking for 50 years.
The Georgia injury law firm of Finch McCranie, LLP have over 40 years experience pursuing wrongful death lawsuits. If you have lost a loved one and feel you have a wrongful death claim, call our experienced attorneys at 1 (800) 228-9159 for a free consultation.

A Douglas County, Georgia woman has been charged with criminal offenses involving drunk driving after a collision early last Monday morning resulted in two deaths of innocent motorists. The Atlanta press reported that Natasha Searcy, 22, was driving drunk in her 1998 Pontiac when she crossed the center line, striking a car driven by 25-year-old Ashley Ingalsbe.

Searcy has been charged with vehicular homicide in the first and second degrees, driving under the influence, not having insurance and failure to maintain lane, and was denied bond.

The press reported that Luke Ingalsbe, 4, died in the crash. Ashley Ingalsbe died Monday afternoon, and Ashley Ingalsbe’s 2-year-old son Jacob and her boyfriend, Thomas Vinnacombe, were also seriously injured.

Our Georgia attorneys frequently receive calls about dangerous drugs which seem to be routinely marketed to unsuspecting consumers and health care professionals. Recently, weight-loss drugs made by mega-manufacturers GlaxoSmithKline Plc and Roche Holding AG were linked to at least 32 reports of serious liver injury from 1999 to October 2008.

The Food and Drug Administration has posted a notice on its web site advising consumers taking Glaxo’s over-the-counter drug Alli or Roche’s prescription Xenical to consult a doctor if they experience weakness, fever, jaundice or other symptoms of liver injury. The FDA did not recommend that patients or doctors stop using these medicines.

Both medicines contain orlistat, a chemical that blocks the intestines from absorbing fat when taken as many as three times a day with meals. The FDA approved Xenical in 1999 for weight loss and weight management in conjunction with a reduced-calorie diet. Alli, half the dose of Xenical, was cleared for non- prescription use in 2007.

Last September a 2 month old child in Demorest, Georgia, died after being suffocated when she became trapped in a pocket of fabric not securely fastened to her bassinet. In January of this year, a 6 month old child in Fort Worth, Texas, died when a fabric flap on her basinett was undone and she became trapped between exposed bars in the bassinet.

Both children died after getting trapped in previously recalled bassinets manufactured by Simplicity. These deaths follow two prior deaths in 2008 under similar circumstances.

Last Thursday, the Consumer Product Safety Commission renewed warnings about the dangers associated with close-sleeper/bedside bassinets. The Simplicity 3 in 1 nad 4 in 1 convertible bassinets contain metal bars which are spaced farther apart than allowed by federal standards.

Another bank with a large presence in Georgia has bowed to pressure from consumers and consumer advocacy groups and abandoned the unfair practice of mandatory arbitration. Bank of America Corp. announced it will stop requiring that disputes with its credit card holders and banking and lending customers be settled by binding arbitration.

As we have written before, many consumers are unaware that card agreements typically include a clause that waives a card holder’s right to sue. Lenders instead use arbitration to go after delinquent accounts and employ arbitrators to fight disputes with their customers. These so called “neutral arbitrators” have been shown to be biased in favor of the large corporations and banks which frequently use their services.

In fact, last month the biggest arbitration group, the National Arbitration Forum in St. Louis Park, Minn., agreed to stop arbitrating credit card disputes after being sued by Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson, who alleged violations of state consumer fraud, deceptive trade practices and false advertising laws by hiding financial ties to collection agencies and credit card companies.

A health insurer which sells policies in Georgia and other states has been subjected to a major fine and other sanctions by the state of New York, after New York officials accused it of leaving patients with huge hospital bills.

The American Medical and Life Insurance Co., advertising through an intermediary called Cinergy, markets health insurance as a lower cost option for the uninsured and underinsured. It was pitched as costing just $5 a day, or the cost of a hamburger or pack of cigarettes.

In one TV ad, the narrator said the insurance is available “regardless of any pre-existing conditions,” while the print on the screen stated “most pre-existing conditions accepted” and the fine print stated there is a six-month waiting period.

We read this week the tragic news of eight (8) deaths in a police chase in California. According to news accounts, the police were trying to stop a Dodge Neon over alleged traffic infractions when the pursuit began. Is it worth risking the death penalty to innocent members of the motoring public to catch a traffic violator? There is nothing in the news accounts indicating that this violator was known to the police to be violent. Nonetheless, even though police chases present much greater dangers to the public themselves than do mere traffic violators, nonetheless, the pursuit ensued and the end result was the death of eight (8) individuals. It is not known whether one of the eight (8) was the suspect, but obviously at least seven (7) of the eight (8) were totally innocent in the premises and tragically many of the decedents were children ages 1 through 7.
This case is a classic example of what is wrong with police chases throughout this country. The police continue to believe that they have to chase violators otherwise they will be promoting a disregard for the law. Research and statistics show that if you terminate chases like the one in issue, there is no corresponding increase in the number of violations which later occur. There is a decrease, however, in serious injuries or deaths caused by unreasonable and unsafe police chases.
Our condolences go to the families involved in this great tragedy. Sooner or later the law enforcement community is going to have to accept the reality that being that police chases are too dangerous to justify unless the suspect being chased is known to be dangerous. Yes, the police should chase violent felons, rapists, murders, and carjackers. No, they should not chase mere traffic violators or non-violent offenders unless it is clearly safe to do so. If the roads are empty, it is late at night, and there are no other motorists on the road then chase such a suspect, however, if the chase is being conducted in an urban setting where other motorists are on the road, it is not worth imposing the death penalty on the innocent in order to catch a traffic violator

Georgia injury lawyers representing victims of medical malpractice are still disheartened about the so-called “tort reform” that the Georgia Legislature has enacted in the last two or three years. Most Georgia citizens have no idea that they have given virtual immunity to Georgia emergency room physicians. If you are a patient in a Georgia hospital emergency room and you are seriously injured or meet your death as a result of an emergency room doctor’s negligence or medical malpractice, you cannot sue the doctor or the hospital for damages “unless it is proven clear and convincing evidence that that the physician or health care provider’s actions showed gross negligence”. In Georgia if you are lucky enough to make it out of the emergency room and you are injured or die as a result of medical malpractice committed elsewhere, you are limited to a recovery of $250,000.00 in non-economic damages thanks to the good work of conservative Georgia legislators looking out for big business at the expense of Georgia citizens.
Recently, a Virginia jury awarded $4 million to a woman whose heart condition was misdiagnosed by an emergency room physician in Virginia. According to the lawsuit, the woman was forced to undergo a heart transplant as a result of the misdiagnosis. The condition could have been treated with medication had it been caught early enough, according to the victim’s lawyer. The award was later reduced to $1.8 million which is the cap on medical-related damages in Virginia. If she had been in Georgia, it is likely the woman would have no case whatsoever under Georgia law because the doctor’s negligence/malpractice was committed while she was a patient in the emergency room.
The Georgia medical malpractice lawyers at Finch McCranie, LLP have many years of experience in medical malpractice cases and we are committed to providing personal service and to obtaining fair compensation for all of our clients. Call us at 1-800-228-9159 for a free consultation