Chicago Injury Attorney Blog

The family of Michael A. Doyle has settled its Chicago wrongful death lawsuit with Kenard Management Corporation. Doyle, 25, died after falling from the third floor porch of a Lakeview apartment building early on January 1, 2007.

Per the Chicago premises liability complaint, Doyle was walking from the stairs to a table when he tripped and fell head first through the metal railings. At the time, Doyle was at a party with college friends.

The plaintiffs contend that six months before the Chicago fall accident, KMC’s insurance company warned it that the railing’s two feet by eight feet gap was too hazardous and should be covered with a wire mesh. Documents showed that KMC obtained bids on the project but had not taken action to remedy the safety hazard, which could have prevented Doyle’s Lakeview porch fall. The city also found that the building’s porches were in serious violation of codes and that some of the porches were attached to the building with inadequate bolts while others had rotted columns.

Chicago Porch Collapses and Falls
Porch collapses and falls from balconies and porches can result in serious Chicago personal injuries for both the people on the elevated structure and those below it. Common causes of porch collapse accidents:

• Too many people and items with a weight too great for a porch to carry
• Improper maintenance
• Poor quality materials
• Building and safety malfunctions
• Wear and tear
• Failure to repair defects and rusted or worn parts, including rotting wood

Family Gets $2.7M Settlement for Fatal Porch Collapse in Lakeview, MyFoxChicago, November 30, 2010

FFamily Gets $2.7M Settlement After Fatal Lakeview Porch Collapse, CBS, November 29, 2010

Related Web Resources:
Premises Liability, Chicago Injury Attorney Blog

The Chicago Porch Collapse Disaster

The mother of Steven Vaughn is suing Lake County Coroner Richard Keller for Illinois wrongful death. Steven, 30, died on December 3, 2008 of a drug overdose just hours after he was prescribed methadone to treat his addiction.

Keller used to serve as the methadone clinic director at the now-defunct Green Dragonfly. The clinic shut down last year after federal and state inspectors found numerous violations.

In her wrongful death lawsuit, Jill Vaughn accuses Keller, a licensed physician, of improperly prescribing methadone to her son. She contends that Keller failed to order the proper lab tests or correctly evaluate her son or his medical history.

Jill is the one who found her son’s body at home. She believes that Steven lied to Keller about having a heroin addiction so that the physician would prescribe methadone for him to take. Other health clinics had reportedly turned down her son, who was addicted to Xanax.

Lake County, Illinois Medical Malpractice
Physicians are responsible for making sure that they do what they can to protect patients from overdosing on their medication. They also must make sure that anything they prescribe will not cause a dangerous drug reaction because of health issues that the patient may have or other medications that he/she may already taking. Doctors must also be aware of the potentially deadly side effects that can result.

You may have grounds for a Lake County, Illinois medical malpractice case if negligence contributed in any way to a medication overdose or death.

Lake coroner named in wrongful death, Chicago Tribune, December 13, 2010

Lake Co. Coroner sued over methadone clinic-related death, Daily Herald, December 15, 2010

Related Web Resources:
Federal Regulation of Methadone Treatment

Outpatient Methadone Treatments, Ireta.org (PDF)

Seven months after 11-year-old Jake Schutter suffered a brain injury when he was hit on the head by a baseball, his parents are suing Easton-Bell Sports Inc. for Chicago personal injury to a minor. The company is the manufacturer and designer of the Easton BT265 bat.

According to the Chicago products liability complaint of Cheryl and Robert Schutter, Jake was injured while pitching for the Mokena Blaze in Hecht Park on May 5. A batter using the Easton bat hit a line drive into the pitcher’s mound and the baseball struck Jake on the left side of the head. He started vomiting right away. He now cannot hear out of his left ear.

The Schutters contend that their son lacked the ability and time to react before being struck by the ball. They are also claiming that Easton-Bell markets the bat for kids to use even though the exit speed of the ball off the metal bat is not a match for the perceived reaction time of a pitcher or player who is 42 to 46 feet away. They are arguing that the bat’s construction and design caused the baseball’s exit speed to be so great that their son could not react to protect himself. They blame Easton for failing to observe the known hazards and dangers that pitchers face.

The Schutters are seeking at least $75,000 in damages.

Metal Bats
There has been a debate for some time now over whether metal bats should be banned. Earlier this year, a 16-year-old high school pitcher ended up in a coma for weeks and had undergo surgery to reattach part of his skull after he was struck by a pitch hit by a metal bat. Questions have been raised over whether the “hyper-performance of high tech metal bans,” as California Assemblyman Jared Huffman put it, “has gone too far” and metal baseball bats are now posing a serious injury and death risk to kids.

Family Sues Baseball Bat Maker Over Boy’s Injury, MyFox, December 8, 2010

Bat maker sued after injury, The Herald-News, December 8, 2010

As injuries mount, debate over metal baseball bats continues, USA Today, June 30, 2010

Should metal bats be banned?, Consumer Reports, May 24, 2010

Related Web Resources:
Products Liability, Justia

Easton-Bell Sports Inc.

The University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center, a nursing agency, and Melrose Park resident George Nissen have settled his Cook County medical malpractice case for $17.7 million. Nissen, a former Stone Park police officer, suffered a brain injury while receiving treatment at the hospital. He is now a quadriplegic who cannot use his mouth to eat or speak. The hospital will pay $16.2 million of the Chicago injury settlement.

According to the 47-year-old man's Cook County medical malpractice lawyers, he developed a brain stem herniation after hospital staff failed to properly monitor his intracranial pressure while he underwent an external ventricular drain. Nissen had been admitted to UIC’s neurosurgical intensive care unit on February 23, 2005 after suffering a stroke.

After trying to drain the extra fluid from his brain, doctors told nursing staff to test the drain by clamping it, and this is when the alleged negligence occurred. In his Chicago medical malpractice complaint, Nissen contends that despite the fact that his intracranial pressure was at dangerous levels, his caregivers did not notice any changes in his condition or tell a doctor.

Also named as defendants of Nissen’s lawsuit for alleged Chicago nursing negligence were two UIC staff nurses, a healthcare staffing agency, and an agency nurse, who allegedly had no previous experience taking care of patients in the neurosurgical intensive care unit when she was assigned to him.

Chicago Medical Malpractice
Doctors, nurses, and other medical providers cannot afford to be negligent with the care that they provide to patients. Even the failure to perform what may seem like routine tasks, such as regularly a patient’s vitals, following procedures and protocols, or administering medications at the designated hours can prove catastrophic and even deadly should health complications arise.

Melrose Park man settles for $17.7 million in malpractice suit, PioneerLocal, November 22, 2010

UIC Settles Malpractice Suit For $16.2M, CBS Chicago, November 19, 2010

Related Web Resources:
University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center

Medical Malpractice, Nolo