Atlanta Injury Attorney Blog

Abraham Lincoln was a trial lawyer and he tried personal injury cases, much the same as we do now, although I would wager he was a good bit more eloquent. Lincoln is more legend than fact for most people these days. His legacy is overshadowed by the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation, and rightfully so. It is easy to forget that he was an active trial lawyer who handled personal injury cases in addition to his major practice areas of debt collection and real estate law.

The Project’s research shows that Lincoln filed five cases involving injuries on stagecoaches and railroads, two dealing with trip and falls and two medical malpractice cases. The case of McCready v. City of Alton, Illinois is particularly interesting and the link is here. Lincoln sued on behalf of a woman injured when she fell in a pothole on a badly maintained sidewalk. He sought $20,000 in damages but only ended up with a verdict for $300 for the medical bills. Apparently the City was allowed to argue that they did not have enough money to fix the sidewalk. Thankfully times have changed for plaintiffs.
According to “The Lincoln Legal Papers Project” (supported by the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum), Lincoln filed at least nine personal injury cases during his career. Keep in mind that in the mid 1800’s, injury cases were extremely rare, so the number is significant.

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Many have by now heard of the unsettling news of a Texas judge who chose to only sentence 16 year old Ethan Couch to probation after he drove drunk and killed 4 people, paralyzed another and hurt still more. The Texas Attorney General has announced there is nothing they can do to correct the sentence which could have sent Couch away for a 20 year sentence with at least 2 years before parole eligibility. The families of the victims have now filed wrongful death and personal injury lawsuits, seeking to have the civil justice system strip the family of the wealth to provide punishment where the criminal system failed.

Although the sentence would be considered light in any courtroom given that in Georgia, DUI manslaughter defendants regularly get 3-8 years in jail, the source of much of the outcry is the defense strategy. The Defendant is wealthy and hired a psychologist to present a defense based on “affluenza.” This is a conjured condition not found in any medical text that argues that the boy’s parents so neglected him that he should not be as criminally culpable as any other teen. Many in the public suspect that had the teen been poor, he would be behind bars.

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Stay safe and warm this holiday season!
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The current law in Georgia says that if you are injured by someone else, the at fault driver and their insurance company cannot blame you for your injuries just because you are not wearing a seatbelt. The idea is 1) that unfairly lets the reckless driver off the hook and 2) juries are not qualified to determine to what extent the lack of a seatbelt had to do with the severity of the injury.

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At least once a year I get into a lengthy debate with friends about the merits of various tort reform measures including these repeated calls for a “loser pays” system in Georgia. Having just returned from London, I became interested in how the English Rule, “loser pays”, is working for them specifically with regard to car accident injury cases.

First, lets discuss the English Rule. In England, the losing party or the party who dismisses their case and gives up has to pay the other side’s legal fees. This is true in personal injury law as well as all other types. Imagine that a business has been wronged by

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I realize the entire word of medical bills and health insurance is going to change drastically next year. For the time being it is a total clusterfuck for the uninsured and only slightly better for the insured.

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I had a call from a nice lady from Dalton the other day and the reason she called is that Allstate declared that they were assigning 30% of the blame for a crash to her. This is a crash where the Allstate driver left a stop sign and pulled in front of the lady and there was a bad crash that totaled both cars. The lady was interviewed by Allstate and she said she was going 30 in a 25 when the other driver pulled out from the stop sign without looking. Allstate took this lady’s honest statement that she was 5 mph above the speed limit and threw it in her face to refuse to pay for the car in full and to deny $6,000 in medical bills from the hospital.

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When a client is injured in a crash where the other driver leaves the scene, the fleeing driver is liable for punitive damages when they can be identified. We see examples of egregious roadway behavior on a regular basis, and the incidence of Georgia drivers fleeing the scene is on the rise.

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When a driver fails to stop for a collision to render assistance to a person that has been injured, the injured person’s lawyer can explain how to recover punitive damages and get a jury charge on negligence per se for those actions. Cheevers v. Clark 214 Ga.App. 866 (1994).

Perhaps you have read the story of the family in New York that has a filed an $83 million dollar lawsuit against the makers of Red Bull for the death of a 30 year old father on a basketball court. Being a lawyer who regularly files these cases in legitimate cases, I was curious as to what the evidence is. Unfortunately, the case appears to be a total farce and the lawyer will once again do damage to the my profession.

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On Monday we mediated a fascinating case for a client to a successful conclusion. I cannot get into the details because the other half of the case is still to be litigated but the case brought up some novel issues that I thought I would share.

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