So, you’re on your way home from work when somebody behind you, distracted by their cell phone, slams into the back of your car. You step out, back aching, and look over the damage. This seems pretty straight-forward. The guy who hit you is clearly at fault. So all you have to do is get his insurance information, contact your insurance agent, and his insurance company will pay for everything, right? Wrong. This is a perfect example of how something might look simple when in reality it is full of complexities. Your auto accident case might seem pretty cut-and-dry to you, but to somebody who is on the hook for money, your case is just a series of purported facts that they will try and poke holes into, thereby cheating you out of what is rightfully yours. A personal injury attorney, like those at the Law Offices of Aronberg & Aronberg, have a great deal of experience in handling auto accident cases; day in and day out that is what we do – handle personal injury cases, with the majority of them being car accidents.

Let’s start by addressing some of the common doubts about hiring an attorney:

“No lawyer is going to talk to me about my case without my having to fork over lots of money.”

Actually, many personal injury law firms, including ours, offer absolutely free consultations. That means that you can come in – or we can come to you! – and you will have the opportunity to talk with us about your case, including the relevant facts, merits, etc., at no charge to you.

“Fine. Lawyers might offer a free consultation, but they won’t actually start working on my case until I pay them lots of money.”

While many types of attorneys do charge up-front fees, most personal injury attorneys don’t – or certainly shouldn’t. You’ve suffered enough; there’s no need for you to empty your pockets again. If we take on your case, we are fairly confident that we will be able to obtain you compensation.  We will only get paid a legal fee if we get you money and we only take a predetermined percentage of the total amount of money that we recover for you. If, for some reason, we fail to recover any money for you, you owe us nothing and all of the energy and money we’ve invested your case is on us!

Now, let’s address the real reasons why it would be most beneficial for you to hire a personal injury attorney to handle your auto accident case. First, we will gather all of the evidence for you. We may need a few signatures from you here and there (which we can get from you in person from your home or via fax), but we will go around to all of the relevant parties and collect the required documentation. If you’ve just been injured in a car accident, there is no reason for you to have to worry yourself further with the nuisance of collecting tedious pieces of information. These pieces of documentation are critical in meeting all of the demands of the law, a field which we are thoroughly familiar with as it relates to your case. The simple “the other guy is obviously at fault” makes sense logically, but the law requires reason that goes far deeper; reason that gives weight to a lot of considerations, many of which you might otherwise be unaware of. We have years of experience handling all types of auto accidents and have dealt with the ins-and-outs of this process.

Finally, and perhaps more importantly, due to our knowledge of the law and our experience with handling these cases, we have acquired a true skill for dealing with insurance companies. These companies are not there to pay you if you’ve been injured in an accident caused by their insured. They are, first and foremost, a business, not a charity. They don’t make their money by paying out your claims; they make it by keeping the money and telling you that your claim is not valid.  If your claim is valid, we will fight with all that the law allows in order to secure for you what is rightfully yours. Insurance companies know how to beat up on victims of auto accidents, coercing them into signing a piece of paper that gives them a small settlement but ensures that they give up their right to future litigation. We know their tricks and we know how to prevent them. You might know that your case is entirely valid, but without an attorney who knows how to prove it, the knowledge is nearly useless.

If you or anyone you know has been injured in an auto accident due to the negligence of another, please reach out to us. Like we said earlier, you are more than welcome to schedule a free consultation with us, and if you can’t make it to us, we will come to you. For more information, please contact us at 561-266-9191 or email us at daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

On Tuesday, May 14^th, officials at the federal National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) made an informed declaration and suggestion regarding the benchmark for what should determine what counts as driving under the influence of alcohol (more informally known as D.U.I.).  According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, currently, every state in the United States, and the District of Columbia, have laws that say that if you are driving with a blood alcohol content (BAC) of over .08, you are legally driving under the influence of alcohol and can be charged and convicted with such a crime. (Note: Michigan will raise their state BAC level to .10 on October 1^st of this year).

The NTSB, in their report of May 14^th, recommended that all fifty states (plus Washington, D.C.) lower their legal limit from a BAC of .08 to a BAC of .05, meaning that if you are driving with a BAC above .05, you are breaking the law, and can be charged and possibly convicted of a DUI. According to the NTSB, over 440,000 people in the last thirty years alone have died as a result of alcohol-related auto accidents. While, like many issues plaguing our nation today, there is no “silver bullet” for fixing the issue, there are certainly things that can be done to help.

In the report published by the NTSB, it was estimated by the Safety Board that lowering the legal limit to .05 will result in the saving of roughly 500-800 lives every year, meaning 500-800 fewer shattered lives, families and communities. We must consider, too, that DUI’s don’t always result in death – alcohol-induced car crashes also, and far more frequently, leave debilitating injuries, traumatic emotional damage, and a plethora of other horrible impacts.  The lower legal limit will help keep more impaired people off the road – and it will keep offenders of the new regulations off the road at a higher rate.

According to a BAC calculator, currently, if a man of 160 pounds consumes four standard alcoholic drinks in a given hour, they will be above the legal limit (at roughly .85). If the recommended legal limit were adopted, the same man would be well above the legal limit (at roughly .6) after just three drinks during that same time. A woman of 130 pounds, for example, currently, would be well above the legal limit (at .935) after consuming three drinks in one hour. However, with the .05 legal limit, that same woman would be above the limit (at .58) after just two drinks in that one hour.

A lower legal limit will mean a more aggressive response to selfish, negligent drunk driving. The past few decades, we have already seen a dramatic decrease in the amount of fatalities from drunk driving accidents. That said, instead of commending ourselves for mitigating the deadly problem, what we should be focusing is on

a) how bad the problem used to be

b) the 10,000 DUI-related deaths that still occur every year; and

c) how we might bring the current fatality rate down.

DUI death rates fell initially due to government regulation that lowered the legal limit. Thus, it is not a far reach to expect rates to drop even further if the legal limit is brought down even more.

If you have any questions relating to this matter, or any other personal injury issue, please reach out to us for a free consultation by calling 561-266-9191 or emailing daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

With the “P.I. Pulse” component of this blog, we try to keep you informed about goings-on in the world of personal injury law – specifically developments concerning the conclusions of issues: how they ended, why they ended in the way that they did, etc. Being aware of the different routes that a personal injury case can take can make you more aware of your options and prospects should you ever be in an instance similar to one described herein (or in any of our other blogs).

In this blog, we’re going to talk about a jury award benefiting the family of a girl that was killed in a scuffle with caregivers and we’re also going to delve into a lawsuit that has been filed in relation to the death of a pet. Let’s begin with the award, though. A challenged and troubled thirty-three year old woman, with a history of schizophrenia, infliction of self-harm, and developmental disabilities, was placed, by her family, in a home at which a service provided her care. One day, after having her photograph taken, the woman entered a fit of rage, necessitating forceful intervention from her caretakers to quiet her down. Quiet her they did. The woman died as a result of the struggle she had with the caretakers.

Her family subsequently sued the caretaker service, implicating them in her death. According to the lawyer for the now-deceased woman’s parents, the caretakers subdued the woman by restraining her in a face down position that caused suffocation, meaning that they were negligent in their handling of the situation and so the company was thus liable for the (albeit unintended) death. The jury in the case agreed with the attorney representing the family of the deceased woman, awarding the plaintiffs $7.7 million, 54% more than the attorney had asked for in terms of compensation for the death.

Now, we will discuss a case of medical malpractice of sorts; a lawsuit has been filed against a veterinarian in Long Island, NY. A family on the island is suing their (now former) veterinarian for a grand total of $350,000, asserting that the veterinarian killed their dog by way of giving him a drug that has a deadly side effect, without having warned the family of the deadly danger. In addition to seeking financial compensation, the family of the now-deceased dog is asking the state of New York to pass new legislation that requires veterinarians to warn pet owners of the potentially deadly side effects of drugs.

Clearly, the personal injury sector of civil law covers a wide range of issues, as the entire idea of “personal injury” is no small issue. If you or a loved one are in a situation in which you feel you have suffered a loss due to the negligence of another, please reach out to us for a free consultation. You may reach us at 561-266-9191 or daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

“Wrongful death” sounds like an odd – redundant – phrase to most people (and with good reason). Why qualify the word “death” with a variant of the word “wrong?” Isn’t death always “wrong” in one way or another? Well, in the realm of the legal system, a “wrongful death” case is an instance in which damages are sought against an individual or other type of party for causing a death. Essentially, in a wrongful death case, the death was not caused by natural causes or a pure accident—nor was the result of homicide. Wrongful death cases stem from someone, or some party, acting in a negligent fashion, such negligence leading to the death of another. This type of death-causing negligence could come in the form of reckless driving, malpractice by a doctor, etc.

In the aftermath of losing a loved one, one’s entire world is altered. In the midst of putting that world back together, one of the steps – if the loved one suffered a wrongful death – is talking to a personal injury attorney, like those at the Law Offices of Aronberg and Aronberg, about seeking damages against the liable party. Will recovering financial damages from the party whose negligence led to the death of your loved one fully replace the void in your life, left by the absence of the loved one? Of course not! In no way do we – or any other rational individual – try to suggest that money – any amount of money – can ever replace the presence of a loved one. However, seeking the damages you are entitled to can certainly mitigate the amount of suffering you need to endure in the process of mourning and continuing your life after the loss of a loved one.

Damages can be recovered based on a variety of considerations, some of which may be more obvious than others. Let’s start with the more commonly recognized areas from which damages can be recovered: medical bills and funeral/burial costs. Obviously, if it is proven that someone or some party acted in such a negligent manner than their actions led to the wrongful death of another, the culpable party can be liable for covering the costs of the medical bills and the funeral/burial costs. Why should the family, who just lost a victim due to the wrongdoing of another, have to bare the brunt of the cost of the necessary expenditures associated with a relative’s death? Hospital bills, burial plots, funeral processions; all of these can take quite a toll on a checkbook, and financing the postmortem requirements of a loved one should not be something that a loved one in mourning need worry about as they grapple with their unfortunate circumstances.

Next, let’s discuss lost income. Let’s say the person who died a “wrongful death” was the primary breadwinner in the family? With that person no longer generating income for the household, the livelihood of everyone dependent on that income is jeopardized. Who will pay for the food? The mortgage? The car payments? The tuition bills? The electricity? All of these are financial nuisances and burdens that loved ones shouldn’t have to worry about – or pay for! – if their loved one was taken from them simply due to the negligence of another. With the help of a trained attorney, if your loved one was killed due to the negligence of another, you can go after damages based on the lost income to cover expenses you won’t be able to cover without the income previously generated by the now-deceased loved on. On the other hand, if the victim of the wrongful death were a young child, calculations can be performed, using mathematically-crafted formulae, to determine how much money that child would have earned over their life; education, family statistics, intelligence, etc., are taken into account to reach this figure. The family of the lost child can go after that amount of money as well, for it is expected that the child would have earned that much money were they not taken from this earth due to the negligence of another.

Last, but certainly not least: pain and suffering due to the loss of a loved one. Just as lifelong expected earnings can be calculated, so too can the financial value of loss of companionship that can lead to nearly unbearable pain and suffering. Let’s say the individual who was taken from you was your confidant? Your family member and best friend? What if you suffer emotional damage from the loss that impacts every aspect of your life? Based on the rates of clinical psychologists, psychiatrists and many other statistical factors, equations can be performed to determine the precise dollar value of your emotional suffering due to the loss of a loved one in the case of a wrongful death.

Money isn’t everything, and it certainly can’t fill the gap in your life that can be left by the early departure of a loved one. Still, if your family member was unjustly taken from you by way of a wrongful death, you should seek compensation to ease your suffering. If you feel you are in such a situation, please reach out to us for a free consultation at 561-266-9191 or daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

Lawyers as a class are the recipients of a disproportionate amount of unfavorable commentary. We are the subjects of countless jokes and derogatory phrases and we are constantly being referred to as people who try to make a buck off someone else’s misery. Our type of law in particular, personal injury, always seems to be in the hot seat, whether we’re the butt of an anecdote or being disparagingly referenced in a proposed piece of legislation. Personal injury lawyers—often degradingly and misleadingly referred to as “ambulance chasers”—fight hard to protect the rights of those who have been wronged by helping to ensure that victims get what they deserve.

At the crux of our practice of law is the question of whether somebody has sustained damages due because of the actions of another (individual, corporation, organization, etc.). The answer to this question tells us whether or not a lawsuit is viable or illegitimate. While personal injury law is a serious subsection of civil law, there is certainly a difference between legitimate and illegitimate lawsuits; in other words, not every lawsuit filed in a US court is legitimate, and, furthermore, just because flawed lawsuits are filed does not mean that personal injury lawyers in general are responsible for that type of frivolousness. In this blog, we’re going to give an example of an illegitimate lawsuit as well as some examples of a legitimate lawsuits in order to help explain the difference and highlight the separation between the legitimate practice of personal injury law and the illegitimate.

Let’s start with a timely illegitimate lawsuit. As you may or may not know, the star player on the Chicago Bulls, Derrick Rose, has been out of commission for a year with an ACL injury. In April of this year, after roughly 12 months without Rose in uniform during a game, a Bulls fan filed a lawsuit against Rose for displaying negligent behavior by not getting back onto the basketball court. Let alone the fact that it might have been medically negligent to get back on the court, what are the damages the man filing the lawsuit claims? The 25-year-old man who filed the lawsuit said that Rose’s “negligent” absence has caused the lawsuit-filer mental and emotional distress, culminating in multiple mental breakdowns and leading to incredible weight gain. This lawsuit is a clear example of a negligent lawsuit. Aside from the fact that it should take no legal expert to tell you that this case is ridiculous, it is entirely illegitimate in that it ties a man’s emotional, mental and physical damages to the (purported) negligence of someone who is so far removed from the purported victim that to infer a cause-and-effect relationship due to active negligence would be preposterous.

Now, let’s look at a couple examples of incidents that would lead to a legitimate lawsuit. First, let’s say you’re driving down the highway and you see the cars in front of you slowing down. An attentive driver, you place your foot on the brake to try to slow down, but the break doesn’t work! Your car keeps flying forward, paying no mind to the fact that you’re trying to slow down. Suddenly, realizing that you are about to slam into the cars in front of you, you swerve out of the way and hit a tree. Who is at fault here and thus responsible for the damage to you, your car, and the property you hit? You, for not getting your car to stop? Your car for not stopping? Well, it can’t be you because you tried to stop the car and weren’t acting negligently. It also can’t be your car because a car itself can’t be sued in court. Let’s say, after the accident, you take your car to the shop and the mechanic determines that the brakes were faulty. Chances, are, the auto-manufacturer is liable for the damage the car crash caused, because they sold you a faulty product—a car with breaks that don’t work! Now, you filing a lawsuit against a major auto corporation, in this instance, is not frivolous because a) you suffered damage and b) the damage you suffered was a direct result of the faulty product negligently assembled and sold to you by the auto manufacturer.

One more example of an incident that could yield a legitimate lawsuit: you’re in the grocery store, minding your own business, in the vegetable aisle, when you take a step forward, slip on a puddle of water, fall down and injure yourself. Who is at fault? You, for being a sloppy walker? The carrots, for dripping water onto the ground causing your slip? Well, assuming you walk like a normal human being, you weren’t being negligent or dangerous, so you cant’ be at fault. And, just as a car can’t be sued in court, neither can a carrot. So, it might very well be that the owner of the grocery store—whose duty it was to ensure that the floor was free from slippery substances or that a warning sign had been in place—can be held liable. Thus, suing the owner of the grocery store to recover damages based on the slip and fall for which the owner was responsible would be entirely legitimate.

Not all aspects of the law are as cut and clean as these examples in this blog have been. If you have any questions about any situation you think might constitute a personal injury case, please reach out to us at the Law Offices of Aronberg and Aronberg for a free consultation by calling 561-266-9191 or emailing daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

As the country reels from the Boston Marathon attacks of Monday, April 15^th, all of us at the Law Offices of Aronberg and Aronberg would like to offer our heartfelt condolences to the victims of the attacks, their families, loved ones and friends; we would also like to extend our appreciation to all of the first responders who heroically mitigated the impact of the bombings.

It’s hard to get more American than the city of Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Boston has always played an especially crucial role in the definition of patriotism in this country, since the very beginning states of the U.S. In the late 1760s, American colonists protested in the streets of Boston against unfair economic burdens imposed by the King of Great Britain. In 1770, British troops fired on a civilian crowd in the city in what became known as the Boston Massacre. Three years later, the infamous Boston Tea Party took place in Boston Harbor in which patriotic colonists boarded the ships of the East India Company in an effort to demonstrate against further economic burdens. Boston has been—throughout the history of this country—such an important city that, once a year, Patriots’ Day is observed to remember the Battles of Lexington and Concord on the third Monday in April 15^th. Additionally, the Boston Marathon is always run on Patriots’ Day.

This year, the third Monday in April was April 15^th. At roughly 2:50 P.M. on that day, two bombs exploded on Boylston Street, killing three and injuring nearly 200. The three killed included a young boy, a grown woman, and a foreign graduate student. The injured included moms, dads, sons, daughters, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends, many of who suffered injuries so terrible that their only chances of survival hinged on amputation. Within the days following the horrific blasts, two key suspects were named—brothers of Chechen descent named Tamerlan, 26, and Dzokhar, 19, Tsarnaev. After the massive manhunt ensued, Tamerlan died in a shoot-out with police on the Thursday just after the bombings, and Dzokhar was arrested—after a shootout with police—and taken to a hospital in custody.

So, of the two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings, only one remains alive. Why, then, don’t we just throw him in prison and toss away the keys for the heinous crimes he allegedly committed against the good people of Boston and thus the U.S. in general? We can’t—and shouldn’t—do that because of something even more American than Boston: the Constitution of the United States. The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution ensures that “in all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right … to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defen[s]e.” That Amendment, coupled with numerous Supreme Court rulings, have ensured that an individual accused and prosecuted for having committed a crime shall have the right to a defense attorney—and, if the criminal can’t afford to hire one on his own, the state will appoint a defense attorney to the defendant, in this case Tsarnaev, at no cost to the defendant.

As far as legal issues pertaining to Tsarnaev are concerned, there has been a lot of talk about the Miranda Rights of the defendant. As you may know, he was not read his Miranda Rights immediately upon arrest, as is required by law, except where authorities may utilize a safety exemption. The Miranda Rights essentially tell the arrested individual that whatever they tell authorities might be used against them in their criminal case and also that they have the right to an attorney. By not reading Tsarnaev his Miranda Rights, the authorities gave Tsarnaev the right to divulge information to the authorities without fear that what he says might be used against him. The authorities in this instance chose to invoke the exemption because they thought there was a chance that he might know of other impending attacks on the U.S. and they didn’t want him to withhold such important information simply out of fear that it might come back to bite him.

Now, Dzokhar Tsarnaev—a recently naturalized American citizen—has been charged at the federal level as a criminal and will be tried, in front of a jury (as is also ensured via the Sixth Amendment), in federal court (as opposed to military court or any international war court). He has been supplied an attorney and can now defend himself, as the legal system of this country allows, against the charges he will face.

Terrorism finds us vulnerable from time to time. Innocent blood is shed despite our best efforts to prevent senseless murder. Just as we try to protect our civilians and our way of life, we must fight to protect the adherence to the documents on which this nation was founded—and that includes extending the rights guaranteed in the Constitution to those determined to retain the rights, no matter how much we may despise them for what they’re accused of doing.

If you have any questions, please reach out to us at the Law Offices of Aronberg and Aronberg at 561-266-9191 or daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

Forgery is a dirty word.  Forgery is defined as the action of “forging” – or producing – a copy of a document, signature, banknote, or work of art.  The word “producing” can be misleading.  Someone can produce their own work, and thus it isn’t a forgery, as per common law.  Perhaps the word “replicate” is better to use than “produce” when trying to understanding “forgery.”  Most commonly, forgery is understood as the illegitimate replication of a signature on a bank check, deed to a house, title to a car, court document, business contract, etc.  Forgery is a serious crime and can carry serious penalties if the felon (yes, that’s right, felon) is caught committing the felony of forgery.

Florida state law minces no words when articulating what forgery is and how it is to be handled by the long arm of the law.  According to Chapter 831.01 of the most recent set of Florida state statutes, anyone who commits forgery, i.e., “falsely makes, alters, forges or counterfeits,” any document with legal standing, or who utters, passes or tenders fake banknotes, is thereby guilty of having committed a third degree felony.  These third degree felonies are punishable by up to 5 years in prison and carry a fine of up to $5,000.  If you forge something, you are a felon.  Be aware, though, that the above penalties only have to do with Florida.  If you forge someone’s signature on something like a bank check, business contract or car deed, and the piece of paper that you sign travels out of state or is involved with business across state lines, you are in for a treat known as federal punishment.

Furthermore, the penalties for forgery are contingent on how much money was to be gained through the forgery.  For example, if you sign your name on a friend’s check and make the check out to yourself for $20, your penalty won’t be as severe as if you forge a business partner’s name on a business promissory note that would guarantee you ownership of a million-dollar bank account in a different state.  In the second circumstance, you would be penalized more severely because you would be attempting to gain $1 million (as opposed to $20).  Also, because the bank account in question is registered in another state than the one the document was forged in, you would be crossing state lines, and via the Interstate Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, the federal government would have the ability to penalize you (in addition to the state penalizing you).

In addition to the fines and penalties associated with forgery, the guilty party is typically expected to repay the victim the amount of money that the victim lost as a result of the forgery.  If the guilty party does not have the available funds on hand, often times their property will be seized and sold to repay the stolen money.  This process of repaying the victim their lost money is known as restitution.  The legal consequences of forgery extend past the prosecutor’s office.  Civil lawsuits play an important role in determining what the guilty party owes the victim.  The victim clearly would have endured damages as a result of the forgery, and therefore a personal injury attorney can represent the victim in an effort to recover damages for them which may cover financial losses, emotional distress, marital discourse, etc., all which may occur as a result of the forgery.

Forgery is a serious issue—and a serious crime.  While many of us were at one point guilty of innocent, childlike wrongdoings like forging a parent’s signature on an early dismissal note in high school, the forgery discussed in this blog is much more unsettling and carries a much higher risk.  This blog was intended to make you aware of the penalties associated with forgery and the rights you have as a victim of the crime.

If you feel that you have been a victim of forgery, please contact one of the attorneys at the Law Offices of Aronberg & Aronberg by calling us at 561-266-9191 or emailing us at daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

Let’s start with the largest award we will be discussing in this blog. A certain HMO (which is an acronym for “health maintenance organization”) had been sued by patients that had been infected by hepatitis C as part of an outbreak at a string of colonoscopy clinics, which were operated by a doctor who failed to meet procedural standards (i.e., the doctor reused syringes and cut other regulatory corners). Hepatitis C—currently incurable—is a disease that attacks the liver, an organ in the body that serves primarily to detoxify and engage in protein synthesis. Two women contracted the awful disease after undergoing routine endoscopic procedures at one of the clinics. The discovery of the disease in these two women initiated a scare that led to upward of 50,000 patients needing to be checked for the disease. The women who had contracted the disease sued the HMO, a subsidiary of United Healthcare, a giant in the world of American medical insurance, for failing to protect the patients against dangerous doctors.

The jury awarded the victims $24 million for their damages. An attorney for the patients, however, urged the jury to consider awarding punitive damages—damages that serve a punitive role in that they might dissuade the company from engaging in further risky behavior. The attorney compared the HMO to Lindsay Lohan, the troubled starlet who repeatedly receives mild slaps on the wrist yet continues to engage in reckless behavior. Ostensibly, the attorneys for the patients deemed the $24 million award a mere slap on the wrist, considering United Healthcare is valued at tens of billions of dollars. The jury, convinced of the argument and the HMO’s negligence, awarded an additional $500 million in punitive damages.

Next, we are going to discuss a case that is, if nothing else, an example of justice being served in an atypical, yet not insignificant, case. Meet our victim: a man from Italy who had a childhood traumatizing experience that involved frogs, during which a neighbor angrily chased after the later victim while carrying bullfrogs. Apparently, the traumatic experience has led to a lifelong fear of frogs. Recently, a developer of a nearby subdivision began draining water onto the later victim’s property—this draining of the water was, as the later victim knew, an ideal breeding ground for frogs. Frogs began to infest the victim’s property, covering his lawn and driveway, forcing him to remain inside for fear of the amphibians. Eventually, the victim sued the township as well as the development company. The victim told members of the jury that during the winter he is fine, but during the warmer parts of the year he feels like a prisoner trapped in his home, unable to go outside. Based on the evidence in the case, the jury awarded the victim $1.6 million.

This blog has discussed justice served; one instance of an award punishing a behemoth medical insurance corporation, and the other punishing a small town over a frog infestation. There is no case too big or too small that can prevent justice from being sought and served. If you have been injured by the wrongdoing of another, please contact us at the Law Offices of Aronberg & Aronberg for a free consultation at 561-266-9191 or daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

So, what is a statute of limitations? A statute of limitation is a statute—an enactment in the legal system—that determines the maximum amount of time that can pass after an incident before legal proceedings based on the incident must commence. Statutes of limitations apply to both civil law (the type of law we handle) and criminal law (the type of law the government executes). There are some instances in which there are no applicable statutes of limitations. For example, in the United States, what are deemed to be “heinous crimes” carry no associated statute of limitations. Thus, as a general rule, there is no statute of limitations on murder. This means that if you committed a murder 10, 20, 30, even 40 years ago, you can still be prosecuted for that crime today. (The caveat is that many judges will not hear murder cases decades old because many believe that such a delay violates the accused individual’s right to a speedy trial, as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution).

As noted above, in our legal practice we concern ourselves with civil law—specifically tort law—and, because we are based in Florida, this blog will discuss and explicate statutes of limitations related to tort law here in the Sunshine State.

Let’s start with medical malpractice cases—cases in which the victim, a patient, has suffered injury or death due to the negligence of a medical practitioner, healthcare provider, etc. In Florida, the statute of limitations for medical malpractice cases is 2 years. That means that after the negligent incident in question—botched surgery, faulty diagnosis, negligent prescription, etc.—the patient has only two years, or 24 months, before then must initiate legal proceedings against the negligent party. If the patient and their attorney fail to act in a timely manner, the negligent party will be excused from facing charges and the victim may never have the chance to seek justice in the given case.

Next: negligence resulting in personal injury (in the form of auto accidents, boating accidents, slip and falls, etc). For personal injury cases stemming from the aforementioned incidents, and many others that result in personal injury, the statute of limitation is 4 years. Thus, from the day of the incident that caused you personal injury, you have no more than four years—48 months—before you must initiate legal proceedings against the negligent party or forever surrender your right to seeking justice. There is one exception to the 4-year rule: cases in which your claim is for uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage. This type of case—even though the issue emanates from a car accident—is considered a contract issue rather than an issue of negligence, and in these instances, the statute of limitations is 5 years.

Like the statute of limitations for personal injury cases like those mentioned above, the statute of limitations on product liability cases in four years. This means that you only have (at most) 4 years from the date that you discovered the injury—or from the date that you reasonably should have discovered the injury—to initiate legal proceedings against the responsible party. So, if you discovered the injury the day after use of the product on, for example, May 1^st, 2013, you have until that date in 2017 to file a lawsuit against the responsible party.

Statute of limitations are designed to expedite proceedings in the legal system, to encourage speedy legal maneuverings and to protect a defendant—the third point is based on the assumption that if there were a solid foundation for a lawsuit, the suit would have been filed in a timely manner, not a decade later. This statute of limitations should not be seen as necessary “limiting” from a plaintiff’s point of view. In fact, is can be seen as encouragement to seek justice in a swift, expedient manner.

If you or anyone you know has a personal injury issue at hand, or questions about anything discussed in this blog, please contact us at the Law Offices of Aronberg and Aronberg for a free consultation by calling 561-266-9191 or emailing daronberg@aronberglaw.com.

In our office—and thus in our blog—we frequently deal with the fall-out from auto accidents, which account for a majority of the personal injury cases that we deal with. The aftermath of car accidents require a great deal of work and attention in answering many questions: Were there damages? Who was at fault? Was negligence involved? Will insurance cover this? How are medical bills going to be paid? How do we ensure the victim receives the compensation they deserve? While we certainly look at the causes of the accident in order to prove negligence on the part of the negligent driver, many causes of auto accidents in general are overlooked.

Auto accidents constitute a serious— and deadly—problem in this country. For every auto accident that ends up as a case file in a law firm, there are countless other dangerous drivers plaguing the highways and back roads of states all over the country, minutes and mere feet away from causing horrible accidents. In this sense, it is clear that the cases we—and attorneys in our field—deal with represent just a tiny, miniscule fraction of potential accidents that exist all over the countries, waiting to happen. Let’s take a look at some of the facts and causes surrounding auto accidents and dangerous driving—incidents we hear about and those we don’t.

Below are some startling statistics from the U.S. Center for Disease Control.

• More people ages 5-34 die from car crashes than from any other single cause in the U.S.
• Every 15 minutes, somebody dies in the U.S. in a car crash.
• Every single day, eight teenagers die in a car crash in the U.S.

These statistics are enough to make anyone queasy. Getting behind the wheel can be deadly and, for that reason, doing so is a tremendous responsibility that should be done with the utmost caution. The top cause of a car crash is distracted driving. This includes:

• texting, using Twitter, using Facebook, using Instagram while driving
• taking a sip of a beverage or taking a bite of food while driving
• looking at something out the side window for an extended period of time (the guy who got pulled over for speeding, a hot dog stand, a billboard, etc.) while  driving

Another top cause of car crashes is speeding. In fact, the majority of drivers speed. Yes, going even 5 mph over the speed limit is speeding! Posted speed limits are not arbitrary numbers—these numbers are carefully calculated by physicists in order to make sure that drivers travel at a speed at which they have ample time to slow down without crashing into the car ahead of them.

Additionally, drunk driving is a major problem! Driving while intoxicated means impaired vision, severely reduced reaction times, reduced ability to concentrate, feeling drowsy, difficulty multitasking, and many, many more devastatingly dangerous factors.

Not every driver who engages in distracted driving, speeding or drunk driving is going to get into a car accident. Still, the statistics prove, time and time again, that if you don’t engage in those dangerous, reckless and negligent activities, you are far less likely to get into a (perhaps fatal) auto accident. Engaging in reckless behavior seriously increases the likelihood that you will get into a car crash and injure somebody else—or yourself.

Driving is a privilege and a responsibility, not a right. With tens of thousands of deaths every year from car accidents, the issue is a serious one. Car safety—and education surrounding car safety—is a vital component of keeping our streets safer and thus our society healthier. We hope you’re safe out there on the roads!

If you have any questions about this article, or if you or anyone you know have been the victim of a motor vehicle crash, please contact us at the Law Offices of Aronberg & Aronberg for a free consultation by calling 561-266-9191 or emailing daronberg@aronberglaw.com.