Miscellaneous | InjuryBoard Austin

The Tillinghast Insurance Consulting practice of Towers Perrin (a large consulting firm) has just released its 2007 Update on US Tort Costs, their 11th study on the subject. This study, which has traditionally been criticized for being pro-insurance, concluded that tort costs went down 5.5% in 2006. Compare that with an annual increase in the US Gross Domestic Product as growing at 6.1% in...

Continue article

A Philadelphia area lawyer was charged this week with allegedly having associates fake personal injury accidents and make claims based on those fake accidents. That this is wrong, illegal, and a blight on the profession goes without saying. But I'm just curious how this could happen in today's world. We keep track of how various insurance companies, and even adjusters, treat cases, and I...

Continue article

Last August, the Texas Supreme Court handed down a ruling in a case involving an on-the-job accident. In the case, a property owner hired a company to perform maintenance and construction services on the plant located on the property. The owner also bought workers' compensation insurance to cover the company's employees. After one of the company's employees was injured in a worksite accident,...

Continue article

A new, scholarly study from two law and economics professors at Emory University finds that tort reform discriminates against women, children and the elderly:The results from our empirical analysis are consistent with our theoretical predictions. We find that the impact of tort reform varies substantially among demographic groups. When we consider the net effect of all the reforms in our study...

Continue article

The Dallas Morning News has an enlightening article that discusses lawyers' grilling of Texas Supreme Court justices about potential biases. The article states:Texas' Supreme Court justices aren't in the habit of defending their judicial records, much less from lawyers grilling them as they would an uncooperative witness. But that's just what happened in September at a continuing education...

Continue article

Many personal injury victims have health insurance. And most health insurance policies have a subrogation clause. The clause typically says that if the company pays medical expenses that are caused by a third party's negligence or other conduct, then the health insurance company is entitled to be reimbursed for the expenses it pays in any resulting settlement or lawsuit. While the notion...

Continue article

The Consumer Product Safety Commission has once again issued their Halloween safety tips. Among other items, the CPSC has the following safety tips:Carry flashlights.Use reflective tape on your treat bag.Make sure masks or other parts of costumes don't obstruct your child's view.Watch out for candles and Jack O' Lanterns when approaching front doors.Warn children not to eat any candy until it...

Continue article

Injury Prevention magazine published a startling study about bicycle related injuries. The study, conducted by researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital, estimates that 10,700 children are hospitalized each year for bicycle-related injuries. One-third of those were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries (many of which could have been prevented...

Continue article

The Texas Progress Council has just posted a short new video on YouTube. We encourage anyone interested in personal injury and civil justice issues to take a couple of minutes to watch.

Continue article

Anchorage, Alaska personal injury lawyer Michael Schneider has a great post today featuring a story about a client who lost a personal injury case because the client spoke to the insurance adjuster, trusted the adjuster, and apparently followed the adjuster's bad advice, which ended up hurting the claim.Mr. Schneider doesn't have specifics but only says that at trial the client couldn't explain...

Continue article

The firm was virtually closed today so that most of us could attend the Austin City Limits Music Festival, but even there we couldn't escape personal injury news. Unfortunately, one of the big news stories of the day was an explosion and fire that broke out around 2:30. The fire was quickly contained, but there were still four people that suffered severe burn injuries and were taken to the...

Continue article

At least four people were killed in a flash flood that took place in north Texas, and many more people are still missing. Among the dead was a 4 year-old girl from Fort Worth and a 5 year-old girl and her grandmother from Gainesville. The 5 year-old's sister is still missing. Another women was confirmed dead after her car stalled and she was swept away by the water.The damages to homes,...

Continue article

Proponents of tort-reform would have you believe the debate is about frivolous lawsuits. It's really about corporate responsibility and who, if anyone, will be held accountable when consumers are defrauded, injured or killed as a result of someone else's negligence.Big businesses continue to finance a massive public relations effort lobbying legislators for more tort-reform measures....

Continue article

On June 22, 2006, the US House of Representatives approved H.R. 5638, the Permanent Estate Tax Relief Act of 2006 by a vote of 269-156. If enacted, the bill would increase the estate tax exemption to $5 million and lower the tax rate to 15% for estates between $5 million and $25 million and to 30% for estates greater than $25 million. The Senate has not yet taken up this bill.

Continue article

In this strange case, former Playboy Playmate, Anna Nicole Smith, alleged that her stepson, E. Pierce Marshall, Jr. ("Pierce") had interfered with her inheritance rights. Having already lost her claim that her dead husband, J. Howard Marshall, II had promised to leave her half of his estimated $1.2 Billion estate, in probate court, Ms. Smith then pursued this claim against Pierce. The...

Continue article