Illinois law has method by which a court can order a civil litigant to undergo physical or mental examination. The point of the rule is to make sure that both sides have the ability to examine a party. In other words, it would not be fair for the defendant if the plaintiff got to pick all of her medical providers and the defendant could not have their own doctor examine the litigant. Illinois Supreme Court rule 215 is a procedure allowing doctors to examine patients. The doctor is supposed to prepare a report within 21 days of the examination. In Batson Read more…
Category: Springfield Injury Lawyer Blog
Permanent total disability in Illinois worker’s compensation claims means that a person is entitled to total disability for life. If someone has a permanent total disability. they are entitled to two-thirds of their average weekly wage for life. This is much like temporary total disability, but it is permanent. What is “Person as a Whole” Designation? Many people confuse total permanent disability with the designation of the “Person as A Whole”, which is 500 weeks of disability. Five-hundred weeks of disability is 9.6 years; whereas, permanent total disability lasts for an injured worker’s life. How do I get permanent total disability? Read more…
In Illinois Worker’s Compensations victims are entitled to two doctors and their referral chains. When we get cases in, often workers have already used one of their choices. We have had many people come in who have been referred to a doctor of the employer’s choice. When the employer does this they often misrepresent or suggest to the worker that they are required to go to these particular doctors. The selected doctor is often pro insurance company and not very friendly to injury victims. This selection can have a huge impact on a person’s case by the time the case Read more…
The third district court of appeals made an interesting decision concerning interspousal immunity. In Hand versus Hand, the parties were coming back from a vacation in Florida. In Indiana, they were involved in a one car accident where William was driving. Patricia, his wife got hurt. They filed suit in Illinois, where they lived. Indiana has a statute which says that a person cannot sue their spouse for personal injury involving the operation motor vehicle accident. Illinois law does not have such a law. In Illinois spouses can sue one another. This is obviously a suit to get the insurance money. Read more…
Illinois law permits a plaintiff to dismiss his or her case and refile it later. Typically, plaintiff, often because they are missing a witness or have some other fatal flaw in their case, dismisses the case without prejudice. The plaintiff then has a year to refile the case. This is especially useful if you are missing a witness who cannot be found, but the judge will not continue the case. This came up in a medical malpractice case entitled Freeman vs. Crays. In Freeman the plaintiff had hired a primary care doctor to testify that the defendant in the case should have referred Read more…
I had a great guest on the air on December 23, 2017. The podcast his here. I went to a seminar at the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association on medical malpractice to keep up my continuing legal education. One of the speakers was a former president of the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association, Pete Flowers. He is one of the name partners in Meyers and Flowers. They handle all sorts of cases, including medical neglect, and a fair amount of medical product liability, and other things. As he got up to speak he was introduced as having settled a case for $1 billion. After Read more…
The courts in Dukich vs. Illinois Worker’s Compensation Commission recently misapplied, in my opinion, the law, as it applies to falls on premises. The losses previously been that wherever there is a fall on premises, so long as it arises from a defect, like snow, or ice, that the fall is compensable. This often occurs as people are coming to and going from work. Dukich acknowledges these cases but makes a strange distinction. The worker was going to lunch when she fell in a parking lot that was wet from rain. The arbitrator awarded benefits. The Worker’s Compensation commission reversed the finding Read more…
The appellate court addressed claims splitting in Dinerstein vs. Evanston Athletic Clubs, Inc. In Dinerstein the plaintiff filed suit involving an injury at a health club. The injury occurred when plaintiff was climbing a rock-climbing wall and fell. Plaintiff filed suit alleging negligence, willful or wanton misconduct, and loss of consortium. Before climbing the wall plaintiff signed a release which indicated that plaintiff would not sue defendant for negligence. The court granted a motion to dismiss the negligence counts based on that agreement. The court then refused to allow an appeal of that particular issue pending the resolution of trial, denied the motion to Read more…
Government entities are generally allowed immunity on many torts. This makes filing suit against a county or municipal government difficult. An example of that is Monson vs. City of Danville. In Monson the plaintiff fell on property owned by the City of Danville. She had left a store in the downtown district and was walking to her car when she walked into an inch of water that had formed on the side-walk by land. As she walked to the water she felt her left shoe strike something which caused her to fall. She suffered injuries for which she sued the city. Her Read more…
HR 1215 advancing through the house, the subject of medical neglect to come up again. HR 15 would limit noneconomic damages to $250,000 on medical neglect claims throughout the country. This would affect states’ rights to decide their own law about medical liability by taking away the right to make a decision. The bill is call the Protecting Access to Care Act of 2017. Always remember, whenever you read the title of a bill, it does the opposite of what you might suggest. This bill protects medical providers from their bad actions. With the radio show a couple of weeks ago we Read more…