Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf is a New York Plaintiff's personal injury law firm specializing in automobile accidents, construction accidents, medical malpractice, products liability, police misconduct and all types of New York personal injury litigation.

Articles Tagged with wrongful death NYC

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Construction Accident Injuries in New York City in May 2020To reduce construction accident injuries and deaths in New York City, Local Law 196 was signed in 2017. The law requires that hard hats working on most New York City construction sites obtain a SST card in a specific deadline. To obtain this card, construction workers must complete at least 40 hours of OSHA or DOB approved safety training while their supervisors are required to complete at least 62 hours of safety training. Because of the Covid-19 situation, the deadline to obtain the SSD card was extended to March 2021.

The NYC Department of Buildings announced that as of today 100,000 nyc construction workers completed their training and obtained their SSD card

The DOT believes that the safety training led to a reduction of more than 20% of work site injuries in New York City last year.  The DOB also announced that construction companies with more than 15 employees can now file an application to receive a one-time grant to help reduce the cost related to training.

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A pedestrian and a motorist died in two separate car accidents in Queens, NYC, last night.

A woman speeding in her car killed herself after she lost control of her vehicle and crashed into a building, setting the car on fire. The accident occurred last night around 11:50 pm in Queens, NYC. 58 year old Berverlee Jackson was speeding on 11th Street in Hunter Point when she suddenly jumped the curb and crashed into a building. The impact was so intense that Beverlee was ejected from her Honda CRV SUV and then pinned under it while the vehicle spun around and ultimately caught fire. Firefighters and EMS rushed to the rescue but it was too late. Beverlee Jackson was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident. The woman lived in Flatbush, 8 miles away from the location of the accident.  Read more in the NY Daily News

A few hours later, also in Queens, another victim died in a SUV accident. The victim is a 72 year old location-of-the-second-deadly-accidentpedestrian who was struck by a car while crossing the road. His identity was not reveled by the police. The man was crossing at the intersection of the Horace Hardin Expressway, a service road  near the Long Island Expressway, and Main Street around 4:45 am.  He was in the crosswalk when a Toyota Sienna plowed into him. The pedestrian was rushed to the hospital but he could not be saved. The driver stayed at the scene of the accident and was not charged. Read more in the NY Daily News

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accident scene175 people died in auto accidents in New York City between January 1st and October 4th 2020 according to a recent article in the New York Post. Last year 169 people died during the same period of time. These numbers might seem pretty similar however the situation  in 2020 was vey different from 2019. For 3 months New Yorkers were required to quarantine and stay home in 2020.  As a result a decline in fatalities should have been expected but instead fatalities increased. The empty roads became much more dangerous than usual with road users engaging in risky behavior such as speeding.  Yesterday we blogged about the surge in bicycle accidents in the city but bicyclists are not the only category of roads users that experienced a surge in fatalities. 38 motorcyclists died so far compared to 37 for the same period of 2019 and 50 car occupants died in NYC crashes so far compared to 22 for the same period of 2019. This is more than the double. Many of the car occupant’s fatalities are related to speeding but as traffic in the city is returning back to normal, now another problem has appeared: a rise in cyclist deaths.  Sadly this doesn’t come as a surprise. Street safety activists and the media have been pointing at both issues, speeding and a rise in cyclists, for months.

Mayor de Blasio self destroyed his Vision Zero legacy

Mayor de Blasio who successfully launched Vision Zero at the beginning of 2014, not only ignored recommendations of his Surface Transportation Advisory Council to address the new challenges created by the covid-19 crisis but additionally slashed the Vision Zero budget (see previous article in New York Post).

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NYC Bicycle accidents injuries and fatalities 20197 cyclists died in accidents in New York City last September. This is the highest number of monthly bicycle accident fatalities under Mayor de Blasio’s terms.

At the beginning of his term Mayor de Blasio launched the Vision Zero program to reduce the number of pedestrian and cyclist fatalities in New York City. While the program lead to a decrease in pedestrian fatalities, cyclists fatalities reached a record high in 2019 with 24 cyclist fatalities.  So far 16 cyclists died in traffic accidents in the city in 2020.

While the mayor has been calling on New Yorkers to walk or use bicycles to go to work during the pandemic, he has not done enough to improve their safety according to street safety activists

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A 32 year-old woman died in a car accident in New York on Saturday. Jolenna Favor who lives in Far Rockaway was a passenger in a BMW driven by 35 year old Nicholas Thompson. Thompson was not supposed to be on the road driving the car as his license was previously revoked in 2011 following several drunk driving arrests. He was arrested a first time in Queens in 2008, then in Nassau County in 2011 when his license was taken away from him. He was caught drunk driving again in 2015 despite his license being revoked.

On Saturday a little bit before 7 pm, Thompson was drunk driving again. He was speeding down Rockaway Boulevard near Nassau County Boulevard with his friend Jolenna Favor in the passenger seat. At one point, just before the accident, an unmarked NYPD car had to swerve to avoid him then he lost control of his car and crashed into a fence in the middle of the trees.

When EMS arrived they found Jolenna dead in the passenger seat. She died from severe head and body trauma. Thompson survived. The two undercover cops that he almost hit saw him getting out of his car and alleged that his breath smelled of alcohol and that his eyes were bloodshot and watery. He refused a blood test but admitted that he was drunk driving.

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accident sceneA man who was drunk behind the wheels crashed his car into a telephone pole. His son who was in the car with him was critically injured  and rushed to the hospital where he died five days later. The man refused to surrender and the police had to track him down, He was arrested two weeks later and charged in an 18-count indictment including manslaughter.

The accident occurred on August 26th around 6:50 am. 34 year old Victor Mitchell from Central Avenue in Albany, was driving his Honda with his son in Far Rockaway when he crashed his car into a telephone pole. His 8 year old son, Sincere, was on board. When the police arrive they found that Mitchell had a blood alcohol content of .118. He also tested positive for Marijuana.

Tragic death

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protected bike lane saves livesWhile bicycle accidents injuries in New York City went down by 3.6% during the last 3 months compared to the same period last year, bicycle accident injuries in the Bronx increased by 35 %. Bicyclist activist organization, Transportation Alternatives has been asking the city to install more bike lanes in the Bronx but instead the DOT is planning to use more police enforcement.

At the beginning of the summer the NYPD organized a four-weeks enforcement blitz to tame down speeding and failure to yield at Bronx high crash corridors such as Bruckner Boulevard and is planning to organize another one soon.

However while the blitz was  effective in preventing pedestrian accidents, it didn’t curb the soaring number of bicycle accidents in the Bronx this summer. On June 11th, a 24 year old cyclist died from his injuries  after being hit by a car on on Willis Avenue and E. 138th Street. The same day, a 38 year old cyclist was fatally struck by a truck on Park Avenue near 138th Street. Then, on June 20, a 43 year old man riding a e-bike in Pelham Bay Park died after being struck by a vehicle. Last week a cyclist who was hit by a car near East 175th street on August 5th and fought for his life for almost a month, died from his injuries. As mentioned above the number of bicycle accidents injuries is also soaring in the Bronx and a police blitz will have little effect on changing this dangerous trend. In an article in StreetBlog, Edwin Figueroa, a senior organizer at Transportation Alternatives, is asking for permanent measures allowing cyclists to be safe when commuting in the Bronx. “What cyclists from all over the city, but especially in the Bronx, need from this administration is more protected bike-lane infrastructure. The Bronx needs redesigned streets that are self-enforcing, not streets that are reliant on NYPD enforcement to ensure safeness,” he said.

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Auto Accident NYC Injuries Deaths June 2020During the Covid-19 lock-down, NYC car accident deaths and motorcyclist deaths related to reckless behavior, mostly speeding, increased. City officials were expecting fatalities to go down as the city was getting more active again but statistics show that instead traffic accident fatalities surged after the lock-down.

As a result the DOT announced yesterday that it was lowering the city speed limit from 30 mph to 25 mph on the most dangerous roads of the 5 New York City boroughs on:

  • Riverside  Drive from 165th street to 181st street in Manhattan
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construction workersTo prevent and reduce construction accidents injuries and deaths in New York City, Local Law 196 requires that most construction workers receive 40 hours of safety training and that their supervisor receive 62 hours of training.  Local Law 196 was passed in 2017 after construction accidents fatalities recorded by the DOB went from 3 in 2013 to 8 in 2014, 12 in 2015, 12 in 2016 and 12 again in 2017. The original deadline for workers to receive their 40 hours of training was September 1 2020 but because much of the “in-person training” was cancelled or postponed because of the covid-19 crisis, the Department of Buildings extended the deadline to March 1 2021. The classes can be taken in person or online.  Online classes are available in multiple languages.

Most construction workers and their supervisors must comply with Local law 196 to be able to work at their construction site

The only construction workers who are exempted from getting safety training are DCA-licensed Home Improvement Contractors and workers at job sites that only involve minor alterations as well as workers building a new 1, 2 or 3-family home. Workers who are not sure if their sites require safety training can consult the interactive site safety construction map.  Personal on these specific sites that do not require safety training are the site owners, the projects managers, the professional engineers, the architects, the developers, the delivery people, the construction managers, the flag persons, the general contractors, the people taking care of the concrete testing, the filing representatives, the security officers, the special inspectors, the service technicians and the consultants. All other construction workers at the sites including demolition workers, construction superintendents, site safety coordinators, site safety managers, forepersons, journey men, employees of DOB licensees or registrants must comply with Local Law 196.  Those who need to take classes can use the DOB”s map of approved course providers or go to the OSHA website to locate a course provider or take an online class.

 

 

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location of the fatal truck accidentA female panhandler was fatally struck by a tractor trailer in New York City yesterday. The accident occurred at the intersection of Linden Boulevard and Fountain Avenue in East New York, Brooklyn, NYC. The 40 year old woman was a local character. Her first name was Dona but local residents nicknamed her “loca”. The woman who was squatting near the intersection would come out of her house with a long gown and approach cars for change.  If drivers didn’t give her money she would scream and curse at them. Locals would always keep an eye out for her.  A man who witnessed the accident told the NY Daily News that he regularly gave her money and that he would always warn her to be careful about the traffic and she would just laugh at him.  Sadly the worst happened yesterday morning. The driver stayed at the scene of the accident and was not charged.

In Brooklyn, young adults are the most at risk of getting injured or killed in a large truck accidents

According to statistics from the New York DMV, there are between 3,500 and 4,000 large truck accidents in Kings County every year. While the DMV is still working on the 2020 numbers, it reported 8 fatalities and 523 personal injuries in 2019 preliminary statistics compared to 7 fatalities and 502 personal injuries in 2018.  Among the 3,442 large truck accidents reported in 2019 preliminary statistics, 82 involved pedestrians (4 fatalities and 35 personal injuries), 42 involved cyclists (2 fatalities and 23 personal injuries) and 15 involved motorcyclists (no fatalities and 7 personal injuries).  Among the 523 personal injuries reported in 2019 in Kings County, 24 were serious, 41 were moderate, 414 minor and 21 of them were reported as level of severity unknown. More than a quarter of the injured victims were in their 30ies, around 20% were in their 20ies and another 20% were in their 40ies. Among the 8 people killed half of them were between 21 and 29 year old, 2 of them between 60 and 69 year old, one was in his fifties and another one was a teenager.