- Steve Klearman | March 31, 2006 9:13 AM |
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MiscellaneousThe Reno Gazette Journal reports today that dioceses and religious institutions paid almost $400 million in settlements for claims in 2005, according to a survey released Thursday by Roman Catholic officials. The latest nationwide figures were released by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Office of Child and Youth Protection. The figures came from its third annual audit of dioceses...
- Steve Klearman | March 31, 2006 8:49 AM |
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MiscellaneousNevada laws recognize that insurers owe special duties to their insureds and protections are set forth, both in Nevada statutes and in Nevada regulations, to protect insureds from their insurance companies. Nevada law allows for punitive damages to be awarded against an insurer that breaches certain obligations to its insured. While numerous claims against an insurance company are possible in...
- Steve Klearman | March 24, 2006 7:46 AM |
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Medical MalpracticeMedical malpractice insurance companies pushed hard on tort reform after they lost money (along with everyone else) in the stock market a few years back.Jordan Margolis, a Chicago personal injury lawyer, recently reported on his blog, that new studies show that we are not in a medical malpractice insurance crisis now.Magolis notes: Just as consumer rights organizations predicted, the so-called...
- Steve Klearman | March 24, 2006 7:25 AM |
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Medical MalpracticeI like to tell my injury clients that their doctors are the most important witnesses in their cases.When a case is large or complex, I tell my clients that we can hire expert doctors, but treating doctors tend to have greater credibility with a jury since they 1) are not paid to provide opinions (even though most demand payment to testify); and 2) have actual "hands-on" contact with the...
- Steve Klearman | March 22, 2006 12:39 PM |
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Medical MalpracticeWho would have thought it? The insurance companies lobbied ferociously and spent millions lying to voters about the necessity of medical malpractice reform (the so-called "Keep Out Doctors in Nevada" initiative), and over a year later, medical malpractice premiums have not gone down in any meaningful way.In a story two weeks ago by the Reno-Gazette Journal and other newspapers, we learned what...
- Steve Klearman | March 22, 2006 12:10 PM |
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Automobile Accidentshttp://nashville.injuryboard.com/motor-vehicle-accidents/google-earth-for-auto-accidents.phpMy fellow personal injury law blogger, Ray Runyon, in Nashville, Tennessee, provides a great idea for personal injury attorneys (and their clients) in his blog today. Google Earth http://earth.google.com/ allows a user to input an address anywhere in the world and then "zoom in" to get a closer view and...
- Steve Klearman | March 20, 2006 5:25 PM |
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Automobile AccidentsThe subject of collateral source evidence arises in every medical malpractice lawsuit. Basically, and in this context, collateral source evidence relates to any payment made for medical bills (or any bills) by someone other than the person who brings the suit. The most common type of collateral source payment is that made by an insurance company. Attorneys throughout the country like to argue...
- Steve Klearman | March 17, 2006 10:24 AM |
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Medical MalpracticeThe issue of informed consent frequently arises in the context of medical malpractice cases.I'm used to sitting in depositions in which a medical malpractice defense attorney will hand my client's informed consent over to my client and then proceed with a series of questions intended to confuse. Malpractice victims obviously do not consent to allow a doctor to commit malpractice, but defense...
- Steve Klearman | March 17, 2006 8:30 AM |
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Automobile AccidentsThe Reno Gazette Journal http://rgj.com reports today that residents are encouraged by our local government to go out and tie one on for St. Patrick's Day.Well, more specifically, and with good intent: the Northern Nevada DUI Task Force and the Regional Transportation Commission are sponsoring free rides on Citifare to help reduce alcohol-related traffic accidents among St. Patrick's Day...
- Steve Klearman | March 16, 2006 3:56 PM |
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Defective & Dangerous ProductsFlorida attorney Bob Carroll notes that a Florida newspaper recently posed questions to consider in the context of whether to impose damage caps:How much is the lifetime use of a right arm worth? What is fair compensation for spending 60 years blind because of a doctor's error? If a surgeon makes a mistake and cuts a nerve during routine surgery, forcing you to eat and drink through a tube for...
- Steve Klearman | March 16, 2006 2:31 PM |
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MiscellaneousI am an injury lawyer. Areas of law overlap, though, and I try to make it a habit to understand, generally, employment law in Nevada. Nevada has always been an employer-oriented state in the view of the Nevada Supreme Court. This held true once again in a noteworthy case that arose from a disgruntled professor's denial of tenure.There, the Court held that tenure is a multidimensional,...
- Steve Klearman | March 09, 2006 2:08 PM |
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Medical MalpracticeA district court judge mentioned to me yesterday that our Supreme Court was asking for statistics on how quickly medical malpractice cases were taking to get to trial.Here are a few personal observations.First, the Vegas backlog is not the Reno backlog. There is not a court-caused backlog in Reno (or in Northern Nevada) of which I am aware.We do have a related problem, though, and that has to...
- Steve Klearman | March 09, 2006 1:40 PM |
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Defective & Dangerous ProductsMuch of litigation in Nevada is governed by the Nevada Rules of Civil Procedure.On January 1, 2005 major amendments to the rules became effective. It's difficult to teach old lawyers (and judges) new tricks, though, and many district courts here are only now requiring compliance. The new rules track the Federal Rules in numerous respects and require parties to think about and organize cases...
- Steve Klearman | March 08, 2006 2:29 PM |
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Automobile AccidentsDid you know that many insurance companies use computers to evaluate your pain and suffering after an auto accident?That's right: insurance adjusters review your medical records for various key pieces of information (information that they think is key) and plug that information into a computer program that calculates the value of your injuries. While the distastefulness of this can be expounded...