William D. Kickham
William D. Kickham
Construction Accident
Car Accident
Nursing Home

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A couple of events occurred recently that bring about this post and another post to follow on the subject of Massachusetts nursing home abuse. The first occurred just a couple of days ago, when a Middlesex County jury returned a verdict against a nursing home in a shocking case of patient neglect and abuse. While the amount of damages awarded in the verdict was shocking, what was even more shocking were the underlying facts that prompted the verdict against the nursing home, and the damages that were awarded to the plaintiff’s family: $14 million. This is the largest nursing home-related verdict in Massachusetts in at least ten years, according to Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly, which reports on such verdicts.

Powerfully illustrating the shocking level of patient neglect and abuse in this case, $12.5 million was for punitive damages – damages that a jury or judge awards to punish the defendant for the particular wrongdoing alleged. Of the $14 million awarded to the plaintiff’s family, $1.5 million was earmarked for compensatory damages – to compensate the victim for pain and suffering.

Who was the victim in this story? An old woman by the name of Genevieve Calandro. Of course, she was once a young woman, vibrant and in full. Perhaps beautiful; perhaps passionate; perhaps funny; perhaps witty. But not when she was a patient in the now-defunct nursing home: Radius Health Care Center, once located in Danvers. There, she was a frail, weak, vulnerable old woman. She needed the dedicated and gentle care of the “nursing home professionals” that had been paid to care for her. And what happened instead was, literally, a nightmare.

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Just about everyone who lives in suburbia has a lawnmower. It is as commonplace as a driveway. But that’s where things can get a little deceptive. What most people don’t realize is that lawnmowers are extremely dangerous. This year, more than 70,000 people will be injured due to a lawnmower accident of some kind. Yes, that beautiful summer day when you decide to manicure your lawn, under a warm sun and gentle breeze – can turn into a nightmare of the worst kind. Proven by an unexpected trip to the Emergency Room.

Here are some unbelievable statistics:

According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in 2010, more than 235,000 adults and 17,000 children in the U.S. were injured by lawn mowers. And here’s where gender counts: Boys usually have 80% of lawnmower injuries, which most often occur on their arms or their hands.

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I’ve blogged here repeatedly about the dangers of texting and driving. So today’s post isn’t so much about the inherent and obvious dangers of texting and driving – or phoning and driving – or web surfing and driving – or any form of distracted driving. For anyone who still doesn’t get it, those dangers are OBVIOUS, and I don’t need to restate them here.

No, today’s post is about arrogance and shallowness and vapidness. And of how those far-too-prevalent personality characteristics pervade this world, even outside the United States. Click here to see a video story from the Huffington Post about this type of stupidity, from as far away as Australia. Note: If you can appreciate an impression of how a vapid young woman talks, you’ll really like this.

Stunning, isn’t it? But unfortunately, not exactly unwitnessed here in the good ‘ol USA: As a Boston, Massachusetts distracted driving lawyer, I see the sad and tragic effects of distracted driving all the time. The injuries that result from Massachusetts distracted driving violations are very often extremely severe – occasionally resulting in death. Whether due to texting and driving, phoning and driving, or web surfing and driving, the effects of a ton of steel and glass hitting someone else remain the same.

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Anyone who has has been involved in – or responsible for – a Massachusetts automotive backover accident knows all too well the horror that ensues from such a terrible event. First comes the shock of knowing that you have actually backed over an adult – or a child – with your car. Then comes the emotional pain of possibly being responsible for such a terrible accident – and one that seems so highly preventable. As a Boston backover accident attorney representing injured parties, I know all about the recriminations plus the guilt and grief that responsible parties experience, in the wake of backover car accidents.

But nothing can compare to the tremendous serious personal injuries — and deaths — that affect the victims of Massachusetts backover car accidents. The devastation that vehicle backover accidents experience can be overwhelming. You can only imagine the pain, suffering and deaths that occur when tons of steel hit a human being. Children are especially vulnerable as victims of car backover accidents, as they do not understand the danger of playing near a car. In addition, their small size makes it difficult for drivers to see them in the rear-view mirror. The elderly are also vulnerable. If you were to be hit by a car – even one going only five miles per hour or less — you would suffer broken bones, possibly a broken neck or back – and in many cases, death.

The most recent statistics, from 2010, indicate that every year more than 210 people die, while 15,000 more people are injured, in car backover accidents. These figures come from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. But the NHTSA has just issued a ruling to try and reduce those statistics. The new NHTSA ruling requires all light vehicles – which includes cars, trucks, SUVs and vans — to have “rear-view visibility systems,” which essentially means that these vehicles must have backup cameras. These cameras must afford all drivers a view directly behind the vehicle, measuring 10 feet by 20 feet. This rule would become final in the next two months or so, and would begin a two-year phase in period in 2016, becoming universally effective in 2018.

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Over the past few days, a lot of people have asked me about “What’s going on with all these automotive safety recalls?” There’s been a lot of media buzz about this subject, so let me give you a quick explainer.

Both GM and Toyota have been the subject of government and consumer organization investigations into deaths and injuries caused by defects in its motor vehicles. The defects in GM’s motor vehicles surround ignition switches, and with Toyota the defect involved driver’s side floor mats that caused a sudden acceleration in the vehicles. These types of product safety defects are legally known as defective product cases or product liability litigation. The deaths and injuries that were caused by these defects have occurred in several states. What makes this such a big deal, you might ask? Do manufacturing mistakes not happen, innocently? No large manufacturing organization is perfect, is it? Yes, innocent mistakes do happen, to everyone. And true, no corporation is perfect. But it’s not those points that are making the news with GM and Toyota.

No, it’s the same-old, same-old: Big business trying to cover up its mistakes, while unknowing consumers who buy the products that the company knows are defective, become injured or worse. You see, it’s become apparent, so far at least, that both GM and Toyota separately knew about the respective defects in certain of its cars, yet said and did nothing. Why? Why did Ford say nothing in the 1970’s when it knew that its now-famous Pinto model was a rolling time-bomb, with a defectively designed and shockingly unsafe gas tank? Why did the tobacco companies say nothing when they knew they were manufacturing a dangerously unsafe product with their addictive cigarettes? While many words can answer this question, one word strikes to the heart of it: Profit. These huge corporations quietly conduct their own cost-benefit analyses, and they determine that if they go public and release information about the defect, they will suffer more revenue losses in decreased sales, than they will if they’re sued here and there. So they say and do nothing.

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As if we here in Massachusetts haven’t spent the past 11 months being inundated with the media’s (especially The Boston Globe’s) nonstop dead-horse-beating of last year’s April 2013 Marathon bombings, the media here is now gearing up to re-hype the whole thing all over again. Talk about both sickening and pathetic …

When this happened last year, the first thing I thought of was the direct victims of this event. However, the second thing I thought of, being a Boston injury lawyer, was the liability insurance claims that would follow the event, from affected businesses and individuals. The claims I’m referring to aren’t injury claims, but instead property/casualty claims. They’re filed by businesses and individuals that suffered both physical property damage to stores and facilities, as well as economic losses from the events of that day. Claims submitted to insurers for economic losses generally arise from loss of revenues due to the fact that the businesses could not operate for several days or weeks after the bombing events. That type of claim is made pursuant to a special type of coverage known as “Business Interruption Insurance.”

Within all this renewed news media “coverage,” a little factoid has made its way out: I know this will come as a shock to many readers of this blog, but guess what? Many business in the Boylston Street, Dartmouth Street and Newbury Street areas of the Back Bay, are still fighting with their insurance companies because their coverage claims have been denied. Yes, even almost one year later. According to the Massachusetts Division of Insurance, the state’s largest property /casualty insurers have paid a total of $1.9 million in bombing-related claims. First of all, as an attorney who works with liability insurance companies all the time, I can say that’s not a very high figure, given the number of businesses involved. Second, according to reports from The Boston Globe, insurers have rejected nearly half of all bombing-related claims connected to losses from business interruption. Third, insurers have also rejected payment for just fewer than 50% of claims for commercial property damage.

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Rick James & Eddie Murphy used to have a hit song in the mid-1980’s called “Party All The Time.” Sometimes, I think it was written for the lifestyle I used to live in my 20’s. I remember backpacking through Europe one summer in my 20’s, and my friend and I would drink all night, sleep for 5 or 6 hours, get up and hike all day with a full backpack – no problem. But I’m not in my 20’s anymore, and I’ve known for a long time that I can’t drink and party the way I used to (in fact, those skills left a long time ago.)

The problem is, a lot of drivers who have “graduated,” shall we say, from those earlier days, don’t quite get that they can’t drink like they used to, and still drive responsibly. Too many people think that unless they feel a definite buzz, or feel “drunk,” they’re okay to drive. Not true, at all. In fact, it’s been shown that if you’re a driver who’s 55 years of age or older, a single glass of wine can render you a dangerous driver. No six packs needed.

A study published in the journal Psychopharmacology a couple of weeks ago, pointed out that for people aged 55 and older, the effects of even minor amounts of alcohol are drastically different from what they are for younger drinkers.

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The rapidly growing population of people afflicted with Alzheimer’s Disease, has, both fortunately and unfortunately, given rise to a new sub-industry of the broader nursing home industry: “Alzheimer’s Care Centers,” and “Alzheimer’s Specialty Facilities.” With names like these (and similar,) the public has been led to believe that these facilities possess some type of “specialty” designation or certification, isolated medical credentialing, or particular and highly –focused training. For years, families have placed their trust in these nursing homes and care centers, believing they had specialized skills and insights that a “regular” Massachusetts nursing home wouldn’t have.

In most instances, those beliefs were induced by nothing more than slick marketing language, targeting an ever-growing medical market for this ever-growing patient population. The reality behind the marketing? Aside from the advertising, most of these facilities possessed little more substantive knowledge or nursing home patient care skills than the “average” nursing home. That’s the ‘unfortunate’ part of this growing industry: It capitalizes on an exploding market with claims of “unique” skills and “specialized patient care” for dementia and Alzheimer’s patients – when in reality most of them neither possess nor practice any more substantive care regimens or skill sets than “ordinary” nursing homes.

Thankfully, a great step forward was taken today, when the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (Mass. DPH) finalized new regulations for the care of dementia patients. The standards were originally proposed in August 2013 by the Massachusetts DPH. Those standards were finalized today by the Massachusetts Public Health Council, which is a state-appointed group of academic and public health experts that sets policy standards in areas of public health. The impetus for these new standards was a bill passed by the Massachusetts Legislature almost two years ago, requiring minimum training and qualification standards for specialized dementia care units. As part of the new regulations, facilities will be required to have at least one “therapeutic activities director” dedicated to the dementia unit, to ensure meaningful and appropriate activities for residents.

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We’ve all been there. You’re driving your car after a significant snowfall. Roads are plowed. Ice is melting. Traffic is flowing. You’re humming to a tune on the radio. And then suddenly, out of the blue, a totally unexpected chunk of snow or “ice missile” smashes into your car windshield.

Where the heck did that come from? From the vehicle in front of yours – most likely the roof, or possibly the hood or trunk lid. That driver cleared all the snow off his car – except for the snow on the roof of his vehicle. What happens when a large amount of snow or ice is left on top of a vehicle that’s moving at any speed faster than 10 MPH? That snow comes off the vehicle – either in a blinding cloud of snow, or a huge chunk of snow. Airborne, it will crash into someone else’s windshield, obstructing that driver’s view of the road and creating significant danger.

The result? You’re startled. You slam on the brakes, swerve into the other lane, lose control of your vehicle and crash into another vehicle, likely resulting in serious injuries. If your car is struck by snow or ice due to another driver’s failure to remove that snow from the roof, hood or trunk of his vehicle, and you are injured in a resulting motor vehicle accident, you’re going to need an experienced Boston, Massachusetts car accident lawyer. You may be entitled to significant financial compensation for your injuries, based on the negligence of the other driver.

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The lunacy of people using their smartphones while they drive, continues unabated. This problem has become far more than a “bad habit” – it’s almost as serious a problem as drunk driving. In fact, it’s very similar: A drunk or drugged driver is mentally, neurologically, and physically impaired. Someone using a smartphone is little different: Their mental acuity is reduced due to their concentrating on whatever phone conversation is taking place, or whatever other function or application they are using on the phone. Neurologically, their response and reaction times are reduced due to their focus being taken off the road, and physically, one hand is almost always either holding the phone or using it in some manner.

Yet, Massachusetts drivers go on with this dangerous, even deadly practice. The law that was passed here a few years ago has barely any enforcement teeth in it at all. Worse, the schizophrenic approach to the statute makes the same activity a crime for a juvenile, but not for an adult. I’ve blogged about this before. Recently, another state is taking some added measures to further penalize this conduct, and I think it makes sense. The Wisconsin state legislature is considering a bill that would prohibit drivers from using their smart phones while in a construction zone. That includes phoning, or texting. The ban would apply when workers are present in construction zones, the focus being protection of road crews. Drivers could still make 911 calls in those zones. Wisconsin law currently bans texting while driving, and bans new drivers who are on a probationary license from making calls on their phones.

As a Boston, Massachusetts cell phone accident lawyer, I think that such a measure should be passed here I Massachusetts. In fact, I think that all smartphone use while driving should be banned entirely, unless the phone call were made to 911, or the text involved an emergency. Unfortunately, I don’t think a near-complete ban on smartphone use in Massachusetts is likely, but it ought to be enacted. When will people “get it,” that driving a ton of steel and glass at speeds over 5 MPH, while talking on a smartphone, texting or searching the internet, is a prescription for disaster? Answer: When they are the ones who are seriously hurt.

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