Florida Personal Injury Lawyer Blog

Spending many hours on the road each day is a fact of life for most people, and the statistics for motor vehicle accidents is alarming. If you have a multiple car accident, it is often times very difficult to determine liability. In these cases, a thorough investigation of the accident scene is very important.

In this Florida automobile accident case, the victim was a 45 year old single woman who was in good health, had a job that provided her with a good salary, and was enjoying life. Unfortunately, the victim was rear-ended by three different vehicles while stopped. These impacts were so severe that the victim suffered severe injuries and required two major surgeries.

Not only did the victim require two surgeries on her spine, but the surgeries caused additional problems and the victim was left with a screw in her vocal cord area. She was informed that if the screw migrated, she could die. No physician would agree to do her follow-up surgery to correct the problem and, in fact, a prominent orthopedic surgeon in the Palm Beach County area stated that he does not think anything can be done to help her. The victim is still attempting to locate a physician that will give her the care and treatment she needs.

This victim accumulated over $410,000.00 in medical expenses, and sustained almost as much in lost wages as a result of this accident. Of course, she will continue to lose wages in the future, since she will not be able to return to work. She was approved for Social Security Disability, which will take some of the emotional and financial strain off of her. However, she will still need surgery in the future, if she is able to find a physician who will help her.

The victim in this case sought the help of the law firm of Schuler, Halvorson and Weisser in this matter. Attorneys Steven W. Halvorson and J. Freddy Rhoads agreed to represent her in her pursuit of a case against the tortfeasors and the insurance company that provided uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage to the victim. The attorneys were successful in obtaining a settlement in this case that will assure that the victim will be able to get the care and treatment she will need in the future.

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Posted In: Automobile Accidents

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The holidays should be a joyful time, but on this particular Christmas Eve, the victim in this Florida auto accident case had been to a Christmas party with friends. On the way home, he was one of three passengers riding with his friend in the front of his friend’s pick-up truck. Unfortunately, since there were only three seat belts and four people in the front seat, no one had their seat belts on.

It was a dark night, and the winding road was wet with poor lighting. The driver of the truck lost control, the truck began spinning and flipped. The driver and our victim were ejected from the truck. Our victim was in tremendous pain and had serious trouble breathing and was taken to a trauma center in West Palm Beach, Florida by helicopter. The EMS crew reported that there was extensive damage to the front passenger compartment of the pick-up truck.

Upon physical exam by the trauma surgeon, the victim had a tender, very rigged abdomen. Based on that fact, it was felt that he had life-threatening injuries, and he was taken urgently to the operating room for an exploratory laparotomy so the surgeon could look into the abdomen to identify his injuries.

The victim received an incision from the bottom of his chest bone to just above his pubic bone. During the operation, it was noted that he had blood free in the abdomen, which meant that some organ was bleeding. The surgeon found that his spleen was seriously damaged and bleeding profusely and had to be removed. There was also a laceration to his liver, which was actively bleeding, and the bleeding had to be stopped by electrocautery. Since the spleen had to be removed, the patient now has an increased chance of infection. Post-op, he was on a ventilator, pain management and wound care and remained in a coma for 12 days.

A few days after being released from the hospital, he returned complaining of nausea, vomiting and the inability to eat. He was found to have an infection and had to have a second operation to disinfect the wound.

Continue reading "21 Year Old Suffers Severe Injuries in Martin County, Florida " »

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According to the Florida Department of Highway and Motor Vehicle Safety, in the year 2007, there were approximately 256,206 traffic crashes on Florida’s roadways. Resulting from these crashes were approximately 212,149 injuries and a reported 3,221 traffic fatalities.

These statistics don’t really mean much until you consider the personal stories contained in each of these accidents.

Our clients in this Florida automobile accident case were a 52 year old mother and her 17 year old son. In this instance, the son was driving and the mother was the front seat passenger. Our clients were traveling eastbound on Northlake Boulevard when another driver in a pick-up truck failed to stop and yield the right of way while traveling northbound on an intersecting roadway. The other vehicle entered the intersection and plowed into the passenger side of our clients’ vehicle. The impact was so severe it pushed the victims’ vehicle across the westbound lanes of traffic and onto the shoulder of Northlake Boulevard approximately 100 feet northeast of the initial impact. The resulting damage to the victims’ vehicle was so great that it was ultimately deemed a total loss.

The young son who was the driver was transported via ambulance to the emergency room at St. Mary’s Hospital with an open laceration to his scalp. This wound required several metallic staples to close and has left a permanent and unsightly scar on his head. His mother unfortunately sustained a horrific open compound fracture to her right arm that her son was forced to witness. As to be expected, this has left a negative and lasting impression on the young man.

The mother was transported to the emergency room at St. Mary’s Hospital via Trauma Hawk. She sustained severe injuries to her right arm which included a combined Montegia fracture, a dislocation of the elbow, and a mid-shaft radius and ulna fracture. Upon her arrival at the emergency room she was evaluated and immediately transferred to the operating room where she underwent extensive surgical procedures.

This family sought the assistance of Attorney Richard D. Schuler, who did an in depth investigation into the cause of this accident and filed suit against the driver of the pick-up truck and, since he was working at the time of this accident, he also sued his employer, one of the sugar corporations in Palm Beach County, Florida.

Unfortunately, the mother in this case sustained a permanent injury and permanent dysfunction as a result of this accident. Her treating orthopedic surgeon assigned a 33% permanent impairment to the body as a whole. According to her physician, she continues to suffer from “severe loss of rotation at the elbow and wrist with almost no functional supination and significant loss of extension at the elbow.” Further, her physician stated that she has suffered one of the most severe fracture dislocations and combined forearm
fractures that one can have. In addition to the aforementioned problems, she is left with severe permanent scaring to her right forearm due to the open fractures and invasive surgical procedures.

Mr. Schuler was successful in settling this case without the necessity of a trial for several hundred thousand dollars for this mother and son.

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Rear-end collisions are one of the most common types of collisions. According to statistics, there were 1.8 million of them in 2006, or approximately 29% of all injury crashes in the United States. These rear-end crashes accounted for more than 2,000 deaths and 800,000 injuries.

As in most rear-end collisions, the victim in this Florida automobile accident case had no idea another driver was about to carelessly plow into the rear of her vehicle as she was attempting to make a right turn into the church parking lot one Saturday. The other driver was found to be 100% at fault in this incident and fortunately, the victim was wearing her seatbelt when the accident occurred. Unfortunately for our victim, she had already been involved in a prior automobile accident wherein she sustained a significant neck injury (including surgery), which was seriously aggravated due to this accident. In fact, he victim’s medical bills in this case totaled over $97,000.00.

The victim was taken via ambulance to the emergency room at Bethesda Memorial Hospital in Boynton Beach, Florida. She complained of pain in the neck and back and was concerned about the effect of the accident on her prior injuries/neck surgery. Eventually, after undergoing numerous tests and diagnostic studies, she was released with instructions to follow up with a physician.

Subsequently, the victim in this case came under the care of an orthopedic surgeon who found her neck and back in a very fragile condition and that she was a patient in severe pain with constant soreness and stiffness. She underwent MRI’s of the lumbar, cervical and thoracic spine which revealed two herniations of the neck at C3-4 and C4-5 levels, a large central and right paracentral disc herniation with effacement of the ventral spinal cord at the C4-6 level and a C6-7 disc bulge and central herniation with effacement of the ventral spinal cord. In addition, a lumbar spine MRI revealed two disc bulges at the L2-3 and L5-S1 levels. Finally, the thoracic MRI revealed that the victim is now suffering from a T1-2 broad based posterior herniation, a T2-3 posterior herniation with cord displacement and possible cord flattening and a T6-7 right-sided disc herniation.

The orthopedic surgeon referred the victim to a pain management specialist, who began a process of lumbar facet injections under fluoroscopic guidance.

This collision victim contacted the offices of Schuler, Halvorson & Weisser, P.A. and requested that Attorney Jason D. Weisser assist her in pursuing a claim against the at fault driver in this matter. Since the at fault driver’s insurance coverage was not even enough to pay this victim’s medical expenses, Mr. Weisser also pursued a claim against the underinsured motorist carrier and was successful in obtaining a settlement of several hundred thousand dollars from these two insurers without the necessity of a trial to help in this client’s recovery and future medical expenses.

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In rear-end collisions, injuries to the occupants of the vehicles are usually much worse for the impacted car, because occupants of the following vehicle can see the imminent impact and brace against it. Generally, impacting into another car is the equivalent of impacting a wall at half of the speed. This means that rear-ending a stopped car while traveling at 40 miles per hour would be the same in terms of mechanical damage and injury to passengers, to impacting a wall at 20 miles per hour. This is true if the vehicles have roughly the same mass. However, if one vehicle is much larger than the other, the smaller vehicle suffers most of the damage.

Our victim in this Florida automobile accident case, a U. S. postal employee in her early 50’s, was stopped, waiting for a Palm Beach County Deputy Sheriff’s vehicle in front of her to make a left turn. While waiting, she was struck from behind by another vehicle, and the impact was severe enough that it pushed her about 10 feet into the deputy sheriff’s vehicle. There was no way for our victim to take any evasive action in this rear-end collision, and she sustained a severe injury to her lower back.

As a result of the above rear-end collision, our client had persistent and ongoing pain and symptomatology resulting from her low back injuries which necessitated surgery with a fusion at the lumbar L4, L5 level, with implant of a prosthetic device and a partial vertebral corpectomy.

Subsequent to her release from the hospital for surgical recuperation, she developed significant leg pain on the right side. Unfortunately, she failed to respond to medication and was readmitted to the hospital approximately ten days later for diagnostic work-up. At that time, x-rays were performed of the lumbar spine which showed collapse of the L5 vertebral body with anterior migration of the cages. She was taken to surgery a second time and underwent a release and decompression of the nerve roots at L5.

She was unable to return to her work in the post office as a mail sorter and continues to have difficulties with her routine daily living needs. Her husband had to assist her in and out of the shower, she could not perform the household chores, and has trouble even trying to dress herself. Sadly, this couple was forced to sell their home due to her inability to work and their reduced income.

Continue reading "Rear-End Collision in Palm Beach County, Florida Dramatically Alters Lifestyle of Couple" »

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More than 8,084 pedestrians were involved in auto accidents in 2004. Out of that number, 504 were killed and 7,551 were injured. And, these numbers are only increasing as each year passes.

In this auto accident case, the victim was a 74 year old grandmother taking a walk one beautiful Saturday morning in Boynton Beach, Florida. As she was passing by a McDonald’s, a bizarre accident occurred.

An 83 year old gentleman was pulling out on to Federal Highway from the McDonald’s driveway and making a right-hand turn with the flow of traffic. According to witnesses, this elderly driver pulled out in front of a pick-up truck traveling down Federal Highway. The pick-up truck hit the elderly man’s car on the left rear panel, spinning the car around 180 degrees, where it struck the median and then continued to accelerate in the opposite direction back toward the sidewalk, where the victim was walking. As the car was accelerating, it hit the sidewalk curb and ran over the victim, then flattened a “Do Not Enter” sign and some bushes, before dragging the victim over a grassy berm and back down the berm’s embankment back toward the McDonald’s building. Glass shattered and metal frames bent as the car crumbled the building’s door and window while literally crushing the victim.

The victim in this case had been married to her husband for 54 years at the time of this accident. Her husband had gone golfing this particular morning and when he returned, he was surprised that his wife had not yet returned from her morning walk. As time passed, he grew concerned and went first to the nearby McDonald’s where she sometimes stopped. The owner of the McDonald’s knew the couple and immediately sat the husband down and informed him what had happened to his wife and that she had been taken to nearby Delray Medical Center.

The victim’s husband was taken to the hospital by police, but his wife was already in surgery and he was informed that she could not be saved, as she had died approximately five hours after she had been crushed.

This auto accident was a case that involved the loss of a love relationship that had existed for decades - a loss so sudden and tragic that the details of it will never be erased from the minds of this victim’s family. This lovely lady was a wife, mother, grandmother and sister. She will be missed and grieved by her entire family.

Thankfully, Richard D. Schuler was able to settle this case with all defendants for the total amount of $1,837,500.00.

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Even though there have been many programs instituted to raise awareness about DUI for years, thousands of people continue to die each year from DUI related car accidents and many, many more continue to suffer serious injuries caused by these accidents, such as: spinal cord injuries, brain injuries, and many other debilitating injuries which require months of recovery or cause permanent injuries.

Statistics show that in 2007, an estimated 12,998 people died in alcohol-impaired traffic crashes.

In February of 2007, this 43 year old mother of two children, ages 12 and 14, had just dropped her son off at school, was on her way to work, and had stopped her vehicle facing northbound on Military Trail in Palm Beach Gardens, when she was rear-ended at a high rate of speed by another vehicle. The force of this impact was severe enough that it pushed this victim’s vehicle into the vehicle immediately in front, and two more vehicles in front of that car were also involved.

It has been estimated that the driver of the vehicle that struck the rear of this victim’s automobile was traveling between 60 and 70 miles an hour at the time he struck her vehicle, and the tests performed on this driver proved that he was intoxicated. In fact, the force of this impact was so great that, even though the victim was wearing her seat belt, her head apparently struck the windshield and her seat had bent backwards in a reclining position.

As a result of this automobile accident, this victim was transported by ambulance to Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center and stabilized, and then transferred to the trauma unit at St. Mary’s Medical Center shortly thereafter.

Unfortunately, even though heroic efforts were made to save this victim through surgery, she remained in a coma from the time of the accident until her death in May of 2007.

Sadly, the children have lost the guidance and nurturing of their mother, and now the grandmother of these two children will be left with the responsibility of raising them on her own, while grieving herself for the daughter she has lost.

On December 11, 2008, Richard D. Schuler was successful in obtaining a $2,708,000.00 verdict in this case for these two children.

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