Fort Lauderdale injury attorney

Published on: December 12, 2018

Drunk Car Hit Me in Fort Lauderdale? Now What?

Occasionally our Fort Lauderdale car accident attorneys are asked, “A drunk car hit me? Now what?”

First we need to clarify: While the car may have been the object that struck you or your vehicle, it was in fact the driver who was impaired. It is also the driver who would be held accountable if you’re asking what to do if a “drunk car hit me.”

The good news is Florida law enforcement officials launch regular crackdowns on drunk drivers over holiday weekends – necessary because drunk driving accidents in Florida tend to be higher over these high travel periods. NBC-2 in Cape Coral-Fort Myers on Florida’s Gulf Coast announced numerous police departments plus the Lee County Sheriff’s Office would be launching their own, Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over” campaign over the recent Thanksgiving holiday weekend, a national effort repeated by law enforcement agencies across the country. Heightened enforcement has been shown to reduce drunk driving crashes, injuries and wrongful deaths in Florida, but of course they don’t eliminate them entirely.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report 2.1 percent of Florida drivers admit to driving after having too much to drink, higher than the national average of 1.9 percent. Continue reading →

Published on: June 19, 2016

Report: Drivers Face Few Penalties for Cycling Deaths

By Dean Freeman

Last fall, a 54-year-old cyclist was struck by a pickup truck driver in Melbourne. The impact sent her flying over the handlebars. First responders, fighting to save her life, found her phone and sent her husband a text message: “Been an accident on Post Road.”

In the end, they couldn’t save her. Her husband of six years says he lost everything that day. The driver, however, walked away unscathed. As Florida Today reported, he did not face any criminal charges.

In fact, very few motorists face criminal charges following bicycle accidents or pedestrian accidents – even when someone dies. As one traffic sergeant explained, so long as you weren’t impaired by alcohol or drugs and didn’t intentionally hit the person, there are typically no penalties. This is true even if you are at-fault for the crash. Continue reading →

Published on: June 25, 2015

Browder v. City of Albuquerque – Suing Government for Traffic Injuries

By Dean Freeman

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 long as they are acting within the scope of their employment and only as long as they are behaving reasonably under the circumstances.

Still, when the public is placed in jeopardy as a result of these actions, there may be grounds for litigation. The U.S. Department of Transportation estimates there are approximately 250,000 high speed chases annually. Of those, between 6,000 and 8,000 end in crashes, claiming the lives of 500 people and injuring some 5,000.

Continue reading →