Speculation about the increase in motorcycle injuries in Illinois and the rest of the county points to increased motorcycle sales, more powerful engines, and more older riders picking motorcycling up as a new hobby. Currently motorcycles account for about 2.4% of all registered vehicles. As a solution, the NHTSA is proposing tougher standards for helmets and more pretesting on motorcycle brakes.

Even though wearing a helmet can reduce the risk of dying in a motorcycle crash by 37%, the majority of riders are either wearing non-compliant helmets or no helmet at all. This is in part because over half of the states do not require motorcycle drivers to wear helmets. But even in the states where FMVSS 218-compliant helmets are required there are problems with counterfeit DOT decals that motorcyclists are placing on non-compliant helmets to fool law enforcement officers.

Then in 2005, Van Cleve and Maxit, his employer, agreed to a $200,000 settlement of Van Cleve's workers' compensation claim. The settlement agreement was approved by the Industrial Commission, which is the court that handles all workers' compensation claims.

However, even though they had agreed to the workers' compensation settlement, Maxit later filed a lawsuit against Van Cleve alleging that he was not entitled to the workers' compensation payment because of his earlier underinsured-motorist settlement. The trial court ruled in favor of Maxit and agreed that the earlier release barred Van Cleve from further recovery under the Workers' Compensation Act.

A recent Illinois trucking accident case ruled in favor of the defendant truck driver on summary judgment (Coole v. Central Area Recycling, 2008 WL 2955543 (4th Dist., July 28)) . The facts of the case were such that the court determined there was an 'unavoidable accident' so the defendant was not at fault.

In Coole, the truck driver was driving 5 mph over the speed limit as he approached an intersection; there was no stop light or stop signs controlling his movement. At the same time the plaintiff was also approaching the same intersection. She had a stop sign, but rolled through it and was struck by the defendant truck driver who was going over the legal speed limit. The truck driver contended that he didn't have time to stop or avoid the broadside collision with Coole's vehicle. Coole died as a result of the collision and her father brought a wrongful death lawsuit against the truck driver.

All five of the plaintiffs are Cook County, Illinois residents that are eligible for Medicaid. All were living in private nursing homes that received state and federal funding. Plaintiffs believe that they could have been living in their own personal residences if they had been given the appropriate services. The plaintiffs alleged that the state of Illinois had denied them the benefits they would have received from various community services, specifically long-term care services and support in a community setting as opposed to the long-term, nursing home settings they were currently being offered. They further allege that these sorts of services would have given them the opportunity to live somewhere other than an institutionalized setting.

The class action alleged that by failing to provide these services that Illinois officials resulted in violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the Social Security Act, and the Nursing Home Reform Act. By filing this class action, plaintiffs are hoping the court will require the defendants to:

(1) inform individuals with disabilities that they may be eligible for community-based services and have the choice of such services, (2) regularly provide assessments to determine eligibility for community-based services, and (3) promptly provide appropriate services and support to qualifying individuals in the community, creating a viable alternative to treatment in institutional settings.

For example, consider a Missouri case of Sam and his aunt Sandra [Back v. Winfield-Fire Protection Dist., No. SC 89001 (Mo. banc 2008)]. Sandra owns an automobile, but does not have a driving license, whereas her nephew, Sam, does. So when Sandra needs to go to a meeting she recruits Sam to drive her. On the way to her meeting Sam rear ended a fire truck that was partially parked in his lane with its emergency lights on.

As a result of the crash, his aunt was injured, and consequently sued her nephew and the fire protection district for negligence. Her nephew was dismissed after settling out of court with his aunt for $25,000. The case against the fire department continued on to trial, where the jury awarded $100,000 for her suffering. But because the jury found her to be 50% at fault in the accident, with the district also being 50% at fault, her damages were reduced by half.

The aunt appealed the reduction of her award by arguing that the trial court should not have instructed the jury that she could be held at fault because her nephew was negligent when he failed to keep a proper lookout. She felt that because she was a passenger she did not have a right to control it even though she owned the car.

The issue in Longnecker was whether Loyola University Medical Center was negligent when they transplanted the decedent with a severely hypertrophic replacement heart. The harvested heart was severely diseased and was only considered for transplantation because the harvesting doctors did not examine it. Despite the diseased state of the new heart, the decedent's heart surgeon went ahead with the transplant. The decedent died without ever waking up from the surgery.

Most times we think of medical negligence cases as those caused by doctors or medical personnel individually. But a hospital or institution is held to the same standard of care as a doctor or a physician. So when evaluating a case for institutional negligence one asks what a reasonably careful hospital would and should do under similar circumstances. Illinois Pattern Jury Instructions, Civil, No. 105.03.01 (1995). Jones v. Chicago HMO Limited of Illinois, 191 Ill. 2d 278 (2000).

Even though I reside in Illinois I decided to serve in Dayton, Ohio on Election Day. Given the voter difficulties in recent presidential elections, particularly in the states of Florida and Ohio, I felt that I would be most useful in Ohio. I was assigned to the Dixon Wellness Worship Center, the polling place for Dayton's Precinct 14-I. My job was to work outside of the polling place and answer any voting questions.

On Election Day I arrived an hour before the polls opened. Overall, my experience was very positive and had very few conflicts. The polling officials were seasoned and knowledgeable in dealing with the large turnout and ensured that the voting was orderly and well run. Several people showed up to the polling place unsure whether they were in the correct place. The polling officials and I were able to determine if they were in fact eligible to vote in this precinct, and if not, then where they should be voting.

At the end of the day I headed home feeling that I had contributed to our election process. As a lawyer I am in the unique position of making sure that the rights of others are not violated and can help those who can not stand up for themselves. While I didn't witness any gross voter right violations in my precinct, I believe that it is important to take preventive measures to ensure that this remains the case nationwide.

The bassinet allegedly has design flaws. Federal regulators warned consumers that the bassinet caused the death of two infants. The bassinets are equipped with sides that drop down for easy access to the baby. Unfortunately the design creates a gap that the baby can slide through. The two infants that died did slide through and hung to death.

SFCA is not taking responsibility regarding the product liability claim for the defective bassinet, which is manufactured and marketed through Simplicity, Inc., a subsidiary company of SFCA, Inc. SFCA maintains that it wasn’t responsible for the items produced by Simplicity because it only just bought the Simplicity brand in August 2008. Yet closer examination reveals that SFCA bought the Simplicity brand bassinets, but then shipped them from its own facility using the same design of the products that killed the 2 infants.

However, not all Americans have such an easy voting experience. For example, in Duval County, Florida, many early voters worry about whether their votes will really be counted. In the 2000 election, approximately 26,000 ballots were discarded in this predominantly Democratic area around Jacksonville. In that 2000 election, voting machine irregularities accounted for thousands of votes being discarded in predominantly black populated areas.

Then there are other states where voters have been stricken by the thousands from voting because of state rolls in supposed violation of federal law. Yet further review of the records of these stricken voters shows that they may be mistakenly denied from voting. According to the states in question these mass removals are their attempts to adhere to the Help America Vote Act of 2002 by removing the names of voters who should no longer be listed.

The majority of the questions regarding improper striking of voters centers around the key swing states of Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Nevada and Colorado. These states have been accused of an improper usage of voters' Social Security information to verify their application status. They could be in further violation of federal law by removing voters from their rolls within the 90 days preceding the federal election. A voter may only be removed during that time frame if they have died, been declared unfit to vote, or informed authorities that they moved out of the state.

The majority of newly approved medical devices undergo a 501(k) review. Under this review process the manufacturer needs to prove that their device is substantially similar to another device that has already been approved for the market. Once they have done that, the manufacturer just needs to show that the device does what it claims. Yet in the field of medicine, just performing a function is different than guaranteeing the supposed outcome.

For example, let's suppose that Elaine, an Illinois woman, was trying to decide between which type of radiation she should get to treat her breast cancer. Her options range from conventional radiation, which would irradiate her whole breast five times per week for a total of five weeks, to a newly-FDA approved radiation therapy method called MammoSite brachytherapy. This new method only requires radiation for five days and uses radioactive 'seeds' to treat the cancer.

All things being equal, the MammoSite option is much more appealing because it gets the job done in a fraction of the time and is Elaine's first choice. Her doctor recommends it and she decides to go with the newer treatment option. However, what Elaine doesn't know is that even though MammoSite is FDA-approved, the long-term effectiveness of the treatment is not yet proven. While early studies have come back with promising results, it will be years before there is enough data to determine whether it is as effective as conventional radiation. Yet many of the women undergoing this form of treatment are unaware that it is still in an experimental state and are trusting the FDA-approval and their doctors' recommendation.

Representative Kirk, the Republican incumbent, said he was pro-choice, pro-environment and pro-education. He said that the Washington Post voted him the eighth most independent member of Congress. Kirk said that he opposed President Bush 59% of the time according to the Congressional Quarterly.

Dan Seals, Democrat, is making his second attempt to unseat his opponent. Seals repeatedly linked Kirk with President George W. Bush, citing that Kirk voted with the Bush Administration 90% of the time. Seals attacked Kirk for voting against the equal pay for woman in the workplace bill, also known as the Paycheck Fairness Act.

The heated debaters traded barbs regarding woman’s rights, the Bush administration, and their positions on other social issues. Even though the candidates had a few moments of agreement, the debate was acrimonious, fueled by the crowd eager to wildly cheer or boo either of the candidates.

In Illinois, the “intentional destruction, mutilation, alteration or concealment of evidence” is called spoliation of evidence. If medical records were to be destroyed or altered, the Illinois Supreme Court can impose a sanction upon any party who unreasonably refuses to comply with any discovery rule or order entered pursuant to the Illinois Supreme Court Rules. The court has the power to stay the proceedings pending compliance; default the case, barring further pleading related to the issue; dismiss a claim or counterclaim related to that issue; exclude testimony related to the issue; to strike any relevant portion of the offending party’s pleadings and enter judgment on the issue; and to enter a default judgment or dismissal against the offending party.

In 1995, the Illinois Supreme Court recognized a separate cause of action for negligent spoliation of evidence. So if your medical records in a medical malpractice case were altered by the medical staff, then you could file a separate lawsuit regarding the altered evidence. And because adequate remedies for the destruction of evidence already exists under Illinois Supreme Court Rule 219, a new tort wasn't created. Instead, the Supreme Court held that an action for negligent spoliation could be brought under existing negligence law.

Each year more than 28,000 infants under one year-old die in the United States. Two-thirds of these infant deaths are preterm babies. In 2006, 6.71 infants died in the United States for every 1,000 live births. In 2006, Illinois was well above the national average with 7.2 infants deaths for every 1,000 births. Illinois's death rate seems even more startling when compared with that of other countries. In 2004, twenty-two countries had infant mortality rates below 5.0 infant deaths for 1,000 live births, and many Scandinavian and Asian countries posting rates below 3.5.

The infant death rate is important because it is used as an international indicator of a nation's health and quality of medical care. So even though individuals in the United States spend a much larger portion of its income on health care than those in other industrialized nations, we continue to fall short of the international standard. In 1960 the United States had the 12th lowest rates of infant mortality in the world. But by 2004 we had dropped to 29th lowest, the same rank as Slovakia and Poland.

If we are spending so much more than these other countries, why are we falling further and further behind the world-wide standard? Some look towards recent trends in preterm births, Cesarean deliveries, and other types of birth injury as the source of this problem. Others feel the problem is due to cultural issues, like drug use and obesity. And yet another group feels that the decentralization of our health care system is to blame.

In a recent Illinois case, baby Tanisha Ruffin’s shoulder became impacted on her mother’s pelvic bone during delivery, which put stress on Tanisha's shoulders. In order to free up her shoulders from her mother’s pelvic bone, the defendant obstetrician testified that he used a vacuum extractor cup and a gentle traction on the baby’s head to manipulate her out. Nonetheless, Tanisha was born with Erb’s palsy because of the damage to the brachial plexus nerve network in her shoulder area.

The big issue at trial was whether the Illinois birth injury was caused by excessive traction with the extractor cup, or by the natural propulsive forces of labor.

In one of our cases, a treating radiologist viewing an MRI scan noted certain changes in her lumbar spine. But later, this same patient was re-examined by another orthopedic surgeon who ordered new scans. And this time around the radiology report found none of those subtle changes. The meaning of all of that is that the treatment plan laid out by our client's first treating physician relied on scans that were flawed. The images seen were different on the second set of MRI scans.

Did the radiologist make a mistake? Not really, according the second doctor. But the scans themselves can be different. What's sobering to know is that some MRI scans and other scans, X-Ray and CT can appear different because of the quality of the images. Even academic radiologists say that different scans of the same part of the body can reveal very different findings.