In many of the medical negligence and pharmaceutical liability cases our lawyers handle, we find numerous perks being provided to prescribing physicians by drug companies.
The New England Journal of Medicine, the most prestigious medical journal in the country, has published an article concerning the relationship between doctors and drug companies. The article reports that several United States Senators have introduced a bill in the United States Congress that would require manufacturers of drugs and medical devices with annual revenues of more than $100 million
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On June 15 of this year, we wrote an article on this blog about how pharmacy errors were causing serious injuries and wrongful deaths at an alarming rate on a nationwide basis. The problem about which we wrote unfortunately was the topic of a headline article in the news today concerning the death of a 3-year old child in Gainesville, Florida. This child died from a medication overdose. Instead of receiving the prescribed dose of a medication ordered by the doctor, the pharmacy gave him
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Every year our lawyers handle many cases involving unsafe products which are subject to recalls issued by the The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). Tragically, many of these cases involve the deaths of young children and infants.
The CPSC is the federal agency which is charged with protecting the public from unreasonable risks of serious injury or death from more than 15,000 types of consumer products under the agency’s jurisdiction. Deaths, injuries and property damage due to consumer product incidents cost the nation more than
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Our lawyers have previously written about procedural “Traps for the Unwary” which occur in the context of serious injury or wrongful death claims. We write again about this problem because we continue to see this issue in our practice.
To be victimized by a negligent act such as being seriously injured by a drunk truck driver is bad enough but to be further victimized by a statute of limitations would only compound the tragedy. Unfortunately, Georgia serious injury lawyers like ourselves often see cases
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On this Georgia Injury Lawyer blog, our attorneys have previously written about motorcycle accidents involving serious injury or wrongful death. Based on the rise in the number of serious injury and death claims our firm is handling at present, our firm’s experience mirrors what the statistical evidence indicates: These tragic cases are on the rise.
The National Center for Statistics and Analysis, a division of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), keeps statistics for motorcycle accidents each year. NHTSA also uses a
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Our lawyers are constantly amazed at the number of Chinese made toys which enter the United States only to be recalled later as health hazards to children.
Last Thursday, Mattel Inc., the nation’s largest toy maker, recalled an additional 38,000 “Go Diego Go!” toys Thursday as part of a larger recall of 665,000 lead-contaminated children’s products.
The latest recall involves orange and yellow Go Diego Go! Animal Rescue Boats, manufactured in China and imported by Fisher-Price. Surface paint on the boats contains excessive levels of
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Our attorneys have investigated wrongful death cases involving automatic external defibrillators (AEDS). An AED is a computerized medical device that checks a person’s heart rhythm, can recognize a rhythm that requires a shock, advises when the shock is needed, then prompts a rescuer to take the proper steps. An AED is a portable device, usually eight to ten inches square and weighs only one to two pounds.
Many businesses, churches, shopping malls, and other areas where large numbers of people congregate have begun to place
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As a Georgia injury lawyer, I am always reading about dangerous drugs. One such drug is Zelnorm^® , a drug used in the treatment of Irritable Bowel Syndrom (“IBS”) and chronic constipation in individuals under 65 years of age.
On March 30, 2007, the FDA requested that Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation (“Novartis”), the manufacturer of Zelnorm, voluntarily remove the drug from the market. The recall is based on findings of an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes associated with the drug from clinical
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Finch McCranie, LLP currently represents three individuals who have been tragically added to the ever growing and long list of innocent victims either killed or seriously injured in a police chase case. In two of the cases we filed on behalf of these victims, the police department involved is seeking to have the claims dismissed based on an argument that the Georgia Legislature has allegedly abolished the legal doctrine joint and several liability. While the law does not support the government’s argument, nonetheless, this argument is likely to be seen in every police chase case filed in Georgia until such time as the Georgia Supreme Court has officially rejected it.
Georgia law has long followed the doctrine of joint and several liability. If two or more people acting in concert with one another (even though not associated with one another) nonetheless contribute to damages to an innocent third party through their actions either, or both, may be sued and either, or both, are 100% individually liable for the damage caused by their acts. In short, if the acts of one person combine with the acts of another to produce an injury to an innocent third party, Georgia law has long been that either or both parties may be sued and either or both parties held 100% liable for the full extent of the damages inflicted. This is in essence what the doctrine of joint and several liability doctrine has stated in Georgia for 200 years. Thus, in a police chase case, if the fleeing suspect causes the damage to the innocent third party, he may be sued. Also, if a police officer recklessly disregards proper police procedure (and thereby contributes to plaintiff’s damages) he may also be sued and held jointly liable. This is how the joint and several liability doctrine applies in a police chase case. Recently, however, jurisdictions sued in high speed police chase are contending that the Georgia Legislature allegedly changed this law in 2005 when the infamous “SB3″ tort reform package was enacted into law.
One of the provisions of the tort reform package was an amendment to O.C.G.A. § 51-12-33 which does say that in those cases where the plaintiff is himself to some degree responsible for his own injuries that in such a limited context a jury may individually apportion damages against named defendants, and even non-parties, rather than holding all the responsible parties each 100% liable each for all of the plaintiff’s damages. What is noteworthy about this modification to the law, however, is that it only applies in those cases where the plaintiff himself was to some degree responsible for this own damages.
In virtually every police chase case we have seen, our clients are totally innocent third parties caught up in the chase. In most cases, the injured third party is simply at the wrong place at the wrong time and is crashed into either by the fleeing suspect or the police vehicle. In such circumstances, it is absurd for a police department to contend that the innocent third party somehow was responsible for creating his own damages. And yet, even though the innocent third party cannot be legitimately claimed to have in any way contributed to their own damages, police departments in Georgia and their attorneys are now asserting that such innocent victims should not recover damages under the longstanding joint and several liability doctrine but should instead be limited in their damages as if they somehow contributed to their own damages. In short, they seek to have juries apportion damages against the most responsible party (the fleeing suspect) thereby abrogating completely the joint and several liability doctrine for the police officer.

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One of the most tragic circumstances we as lawyers face in our daily practice is representing clients who have suffered serious personal injury or the wrongful death of a loved one due to the negligence of an uninsured (or underinsured) driver. Regrettably, we have seen this far too many times. The results of being involved in a collision with an uninsured driver are particularly tragic because in such cases there simply are no available funds to compensate the innocent victims. This, of course, reminds us
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