A 34 year old man who fatally struck a 4 year old girl and left the scene of the accident in Staten Island is facing time in jail. The victim and her family were crossing in the middle of the road at a good distance from the corner when the man drove into them. He continued on his way and didn’t turn himself to the police until 16 hours later.
Read more in the Staten Island Advance
In NYC, auto accidents involving pedestrians or bicyclists have a higher risk of occurring when cars or other vehicles are double parked or parked on a bike lane. As part of the Vision Zero traffic initiative mandated by the New York mayor, precincts in the city are launching ticket blitzes against drivers who are double parking or parking on bike lane lanes. One started today in Washington Heights and targeted drivers parking illegally on West 181st Street. Also Today In Park Slope, Brooklyn, the 78th precinct cops who were recently targeting drivers failing to yield turned their attention to drivers illegally parked on the bike lanes. We also previously reported similar activity on the Upper West Side of Manhattan on Columbus Ave.
Marisol Martinez was fatally struck by a MTA bus making a left turn. Martinez and two of her friends were in the middle of the crosswalk when they saw the bus. The two friends were a little ahead of Martinez and ran to avoid the bus. According to them the bus didn’t yield or stop hitting and killing their friend.
Martinez is the third person to die after being hit by a MTA bus this year. In the last 12 months at least 10 people died after being struck by a MTA bus according to Streetblog.
Northern Brooklyn had one of the highest numbers of traffic deaths in 2013 and elected officials and advocates are calling for Mayor de Blasio to focus street safety resources in this area
A Brooklyn cop suffered severe personal injury after he tried to pull over a reckless ATV driver. As the officer approached the ATV driver to stop him he tried to get away. As the driver of the ATV hit the gas, the officer grabbed the quad’s handlebars. He was dragged close to 200 feet before the ATV driver knocked him off and ran over his leg and fled the scene.
Read more in the New York Daily News
Photo: Peter Gerber/New York Daily News
A methylmercury strict product liability claim against Bumble Bee will proceed. A New York federal Court refused to dismiss claims that the tuna company is strictly liable for and was negligent in failing to warn about the mercury in its products in a lawsuit alleging personal injury from excessive consumption of Bumble Bee’s tuna products which contain methylmercury. Porrazzo v. Bumble Bee Foods, LLC, No. 10-4367 (U.S. Dist. Ct., S.D.N.Y., order entered February 27, 2014).
Read more on Lexology
21 people died and 3,899 suffered personal injury in a vehicle accident in New York City last January compared to 26 deaths and 4,277 personal injuries the month before and 28 deaths and 3,993 personal injuries the same month a year ago.
Pedestrian Accidents
More than 1000 pedestrians suffered personal injury in a vehicle accident last January. The number of pedestrians who died after being struck by a vehicle was of 12 last January compared to 17 in December, 25 in November and 20 the same month a year ago. At this point it is difficult to know if this decrease is already the result of NYPD Vision Zero measures or if the bad weather kept many pedestrians inside.
Nurse understaffing by negligent hospitals can lead to medical malpractice that affect patients outcome. A recent study compared the 30 day mortality rate of more than 400,000 patients over 50 years old who underwent surgery in 300 hospitals in 9 different European countries to nurse staffing and nurse education for each hospital.
The study found that an increase in a nurses’ workload by one patient increased the likelihood of an inpatient dying within 30 days of admission by 7% , and every 10% increase in bachelor’s degree nurses was associated with a decrease in this likelihood by 7%. These associations imply that patients in hospitals in which 60% of nurses had bachelor’s degrees and nurses cared for an average of six patients would have almost 30% lower mortality than patients in hospitals in which only 30% of nurses had bachelor’s degrees and nurses cared for an average of eight patients.
Download the study
Nursing Home Neglect may have caused the death of two residents at the Suffolk Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing, a Long Island nursing home.
Thomas Bischoff died of sepsis after bedsores grew so large on his body that a human fist could fit inside some of the holes in his skin. Bedsores of that size are a sign of nursing home abuse.
A few months after Thomas died , Raymond Curiale another resident accidentally hanged himself. According to his plan care, Curiale who suffered from dementia was to be checked on every 15 minutes. After the staff forgot to check on him for 57 minutes, he was found slumped against his wheelchair, the seat belt around his neck, strangled.
Adding to the costs of potential product liability lawsuits and the costs of replacing the defective ignition switch, General Motors is now facing a fine from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The agency announced yesterday that it “opened an investigation into the timeliness of General Motors’ recall of faulty ignition switches to determine whether GM properly followed the legal processes and requirements for reporting recalls”.
Read more on Reuters.com
A heat map of personal injuries resulting from bicycle accidents in New York City reveals that a significant number of these accidents happen on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. This situation may be explained by the high number of bicyclists who are commuting everyday over the bridges between Manhattan and Brooklyn.
Read more in I Quant NY
New York Personal Injury Attorneys Blog