The recent case of Zaldivar v. Prickett, before the Georgia Supreme Court, dealt with issues of vicarious liability and negligent entrustment as they relate to car accident litigation. Vicarious liability is a kind of strict, secondary liability that originates from the doctrine of respondeat superior. That isthe responsibility of a…
Two vehicles crashed at an intersection in January 2012, with the impact sending one of those vehicles careening toward the sidewalk, where it struck a bicyclist. The cyclist was seriously injured. Subsequently, he sued both drivers, whom we will refer to here as V1 and V2. He alleged both had…
It was supposed to be one of the most joyous times in the young couple’s lives. They were recently married and had won a trip through their church to attend a marriage retreat in Fort Lauderdale. They were also expecting their first child, a boy, who was due within two…
In any car accident lawsuit, there are a number of elements that must be proven in order for the case to be successful. Those elements include: Defendant owed plaintiff duty of care; That duty of care was breached; That breach resulted in injury to plaintiff; Plaintiff suffered damages as a…
Emergency responders – including police officers – are given an enormous responsibility to make it to emergencies quickly. However, there is also an expectation that they will do so as safely as possible. These government workers are given a great deal of latitude in terms of liability, but only so…
A 4-year-old boy was killed and his 2-year-old sister severely injured after a box truck driven by an 18-year-old plowed into the back of their father’s vehicle early one Saturday morning. The 4-year-old was pronounced dead at the scene in Davenport by emergency workers, while his sister was flown to…
One was a 17-year-old, just graduated from high school, on her way to the University of Miami in the fall. The other was a 29-year-old medical student, preparing to begin his clinical rotation this summer. Now, both are gone. It happened on I-75 through Pembroke Pines, when a construction truck…
Defendants in personal injury cases are tenacious when it comes to rooting through the records of the plaintiff. Of course, there are often legitimate purposes served in these efforts, primarily in determining whether the causation and extent of injury are as claimed by plaintiff. But many of these efforts go…
Distraction among those behind the wheel is a serious problem in Florida. Officials with the Florida Department of Transportation calculate some 42,000 crashes in the Sunshine State were attributable to distraction. That’s almost certainly a low estimate because distraction is not as easy to to track or quantify as, say,…
A 43-year-old man was lucky to be alive, let alone escape with only minor injuries, after he lost his balance on the Sunshine Skyway bridge while changing a tire, sending him plunging over a railway and down about 30 feet to the water below. Authorities say the man stopped on…