Tennessee Injury Lawyer Blog

The Tennessee Highway patrol is reporting that one person is dead after an accident involving a car and a tanker truck that closed down part of I-75 in Campbell County near the Stinking Creek exit at mile marker 144. The tanker truck reportedly rear-ended a car and then slid off of an embankment, sliding 500 to 700 feet off the interstate and killing the driver of the truck. Police have not released the driver’s name as of yet.

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According to the Montana Highway Patrol, a Tennessee man was killed last Saturday afternoon when an SUV crossed over the center line and hit his motorcycle head-on as he was riding through Glacier National Park. The victim has been identified as 58 year-old Fred Childress of Oak Ridge, TN. Mr. Childress was a co-founder and president of the Tennessee Liberty Alliance and was reportedly winding up a four-week cross-country motorcycle tour when he was involved in the wreck. Our condolences go out to Mr. Childress’s family and friends in the wake of this unfortunate tragedy.

Continue reading " Oak Ridge Man Killed in Head-On Crash " »

Lillian Michelle Clarke, of Miramar, Fla., and toddler Catherine R. Howard, of Lexington, Ky were killed Tuesday when 61 year-old Ben Edward Parrot of Jellico, Tennessee crashed the semi-truck he was driving into a Mazda in which the two aforementioned victims, along with three others who survived the crash, were sitting. A wreck earlier in the day had caused traffic to back up and come to a stand-still in the northbound lanes of I-75 around mile marker 122. For a reason that is either unknown or has yet to be released, Mr. Parrot drove into the traffic jam in his semi without stopping, obliterating the Mazda and causing it to crash into two more cars although the occupants of those cars received minimal injuries. Criminal charges are reportedly pending against the driver of the semi.

This is terrible tragedy, and prayers and condolences go out to all of the victims involved and their families.

Continue reading " Semi Slams Into Mazda, Killing Woman and Toddler " »

It usually doesn’t pay to get excited or even speculate about legislation making its way through Congress. After all, the legislative process seems to usually result in a lot of bickering among opposing politicians with nothing ever really coming to fruition. A new bill, however, is in the works (spurred by the recent series of defects that have plagued Toyota) that may prove to be huge in the field of personal injury law. Since the bill may prove so important, it may be worth discussing even if it never amounts to much.

The new bill proposes to tighten the safety standards applicable to vehicle manufacturers wishing to sell automobiles in the United States. Among other provisions, it contains proposals that would require carmakers to install systems that would give a car's brake priority over its accelerator and record data that could be used in crash or defect investigations. Both of these conventions would be noteworthy from a personal injury context. Giving a car’s brake priority over its gas could make the car drive differently, which would tend to increase the accident risk for drivers who are unfamiliar with how the car drives in such a condition. However, it would also prevent many accidents that are caused by unintended acceleration or negligent driving. Whether the pros of such a system would outweigh the cons could really only be determined after the system was put into practice.

The data recorder that would be placed in vehicles could potentially play a crucial role in many personal injury cases. Many of these cases turn on which version of two different sets of facts the jury believes. If the data recorder can clear up such disputes or support one side of the testimony, personal injury cases may settle with more frequency and may be avoided altogether when the liability of a party is clear. For anyone interested in the realm of personal injury law, this bill will be one worth watching.

Source: http://www.philly.com/philly/business/homepage/20100720_Fight_looms_in_Washington_over_proposed_auto-safety_rules.html

A Kansas jury has found an auto dealership not liable for negligence in a lawsuit brought against the business by the widow of a man who was killed when a bus apparently given away as a gift by the dealership ran into an overpass and injured some passengers who were standing on top of a modified party deck which had been built onto the bus. The widow claimed that the auto dealership sold the bus in its converted state, thereby putting a dangerous vehicle on the street, for $1,000 but the dealership claimed they never made any such modifications and gave the bus away as a gift while it was still in school-bus form. Ultimately, the jury believed the defendant and found them not liable. Several other parties were named as defendants in the suit but settled before trial and remain sealed.

Even though this case took place in Kansas, it helps to illustrate several important points regarding personal injury law in Tennessee. The first point is that there are almost always multiple parties who bear some degree of responsibility for an accident. Tennessee’s comparative fault system allows plaintiffs to recover for their injuries from other responsible parties, even if the plaintiff was also negligent to some degree. In this situation, the plaintiff was almost certainly negligent since he was apparently standing up on top of a converted school bus partying while it was in motion. The driver of the bus would also have been negligent here, because you simply cannot operate a vehicle while people are standing up on top of it and drinking alcohol, and you certainly need to make sure your vehicle isn’t over fifteen feet tall before you smash into an overpass which clearly says “Clearance: 15 feet 0 inches.” Had the jury found that the dealership converted the bus prior to sell it, the dealership too would bear some degree of liability for constructing and selling a dangerous vehicle. Several other parties would potentially be liable in such a situation including the owner of the bus, the organizers of the party, etc., but their liability would depend on the facts of the case.

In a complicated case where many different parties may be liable, it is important to know who can be held responsible and what level of responsibility they may bear. Consulting a skilled personal injury attorney can assist plaintiffs in maximizing their recovery.

Source: http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2010/jul/13/cat-tracker-fatality-case-now-lawrence-jurys-hands/

George Michael made headlines yet again when he apparently mistook a local film developing store for a parking space and drove his car straight into the storefront. Police arrived at the scene and took Michael to the police station on suspicion of DUI. Reports indicate that the vehicle caused extensive damage to the photo shop, which may have to replace its entire storefront.

The first thing any reader should take away from this situation is that there indeed are still people in this world who do not use digital cameras and there are even shops that still develop film. The second is that situations such as the one described above happen daily around the world, including in Tennessee, and it is important to know, both as a victim and as the responsible party, what liability may be placed upon the responsible party when such accidents occur. Assuming Mr. Michael was intoxicated at the time of the accident, Tennessee law would label him as negligent per se. This essentially means that in a personal injury suit there would be no need for the plaintiff to prove anything other than the fact that Mr. Michael was intoxicated in order for him to be held responsible for all of the foreseeable damages that flowed from his actions.

In a situation like this one where an intoxicated driver causes the destruction of someone else’s property, damages can accumulate in a hurry. The driver in a similar situation to this one will be responsible not only for the damage that he caused to the store but also for the cost of repairing the storefront and restoring the shop to the condition it was in before he decided to turn the store into a literal drive-in. He would also be responsible for the destruction of the property of customers that occurred as a result of his actions. In this situation, such damage is likely to be minimal but the possibility for larger damages will exist in different situations. Whether you are the responsible party or the victim in such cases, it is important to know who can be held responsible for what damages. Consulting an experienced personal injury attorney can help parties on either side determine the best course of action.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2010/07/06/george-michael-arrested-driving-car-storefront/

Strict liability is a concept that has implications for various aspects of personal injury law. Simply put, strict liability will attach to a defendant whenever they engage in some sort of abnormally dangerous activity (it also attaches in other areas such as products liability which will not be discussed in this blog) such as transporting toxic chemicals or starting a tiger breeding farm in the middle of a neighborhood. The basic principle behind strict liability is that the defendant is engaged in an activity that is so abnormally dangerous that he or she should be held responsible for any foreseeable damages regardless of how careful he or she is.

For example, say Bernard starts a tiger breeding farm in the middle of his neighborhood which has extremely lax zoning restrictions. Bernard is out walking one of his tigers while being as careful as possible. Wendy comes by and notices that Bernard is walking a jungle cat down the street, becomes terrified and tries to run away, running straight into the path of an oncoming car which hits Wendy and causes her severe injuries. Wendy will be able to recover for those injuries from Bernard because he was engaged in an activity so dangerous that his level of care is irrelevant. It is foreseeable that someone would see him walking a tiger, become frightened, and try to run away. Thus, he is liable for all of the consequences that flow from that.

The above example was pretty rudimentary and strict liability cases are often more complex than that. It is also highly unlikely you will come across many people walking tigers in your neighborhood. However, you or someone you know may become injured in a situation where strict liability should apply. Consult a knowledgeable personal injury attorney to determine what type of case you have and how to best recover for your injuries.

Every year, people gather in large crowds to watch fireworks and every year some mishap happens with fireworks that injures a decent number of spectators. Given the fact that fireworks are inherently dangerous due to the fact that they literally operate via an explosion of gunpowder plus the unfortunate reality that many people who operate fireworks are not experienced at doing so or particularly careful in how they go about it, and you have a perfect recipe for disaster. For a good example of how a fireworks show can go wrong, read the below-cited article regarding a fireworks show that malfunctioned in Pennsylvania and injured almost a dozen spectators.

Like any dangerous instrumentality, fireworks have a tendency to injure people when they are used or manufactured in a negligent or defective manner. The likelihood of such injury occurring is multiplied many times over when the fireworks and crowds watching them get bigger. That is not to say, however, that fireworks incidents cannot happen in more intimate settings. In fact, many fireworks-related injuries happen in smaller, more private settings where people tend to behave in a less cautious manner by throwing firecrackers or shooting bottle rockets at each other. To put it plainly, fireworks are dangerous and negligent use of them can cause injury regardless of the setting.

Tennesseans are injured every year by negligent use of fireworks. Victims of firework-related negligence may have to file a personal injury suit in order to recover for their losses. Using an experienced personal injury attorney will allow victims to maximize their chances for recovery while avoiding much of the stress that accompanies trying to recover for their damages on their own.

Source: http://www.fox6now.com/news/nationworld/sns-viral-fireworks-display-story,0,129394.htmlstory

Foreseeability is a concept that can greatly affect the outcome of any personal injury suit. The basic gist of the concept is that for a person to be found liable to a particular victim for negligence, it must be foreseeable that his or her negligence would impact or harm that victim. For example, assume a bus driver is texting while driving and negligently drives onto the sidewalk, causing a cyclist to swerve into a valuable statue that is sitting in the yard of a homeowner and ruing the statue. Since it was foreseeable that the driver’s negligence would affect persons on the sidewalk and potentially cause them to react to get out of the way, the homeowner will probably be able to recover from the bus driver (and his employer) to recover the amount of the real and personal property damage caused by the driver’s negligent actions. By that same token if the cyclist had swerved into the statue which had then fallen onto a shotgun, causing it to discharge and kill a cat sleeping in the window of the house next door, it is likely the damage caused by the loss of the cat would be recoverable against the bus driver since it is not really foreseeable that the bus driver’s negligence would affect the cat sleeping in the window some distance from where the negligence actually occurred.

Concepts like this one can make a substantial difference in exactly who a party can recover from, which may affect that party’s ability to be fully compensated for his or her injuries. In this situation, knowing that the bus driver and thus the bus company can be held liable will often prove much more favorable to the plaintiff than trying to recover damages from a random cyclist, especially if the amount of damages is large. Such situations show why it is often advantageous to hire an experienced personal injury attorney who can make sure that the plaintiff holds all possible parties responsible and can maximize the plaintiff’s recovery.