In late March 2008, Fortino Fonseca was working for RG Drywall, a subcontractor hired by Clark Construction Group, LLC. While Fonseca was carrying a 100-pound sheet of drywall, he tripped over an electrical pipe that was on a hallway floor. Fonseca fell and the drywall broke on top of him.…
On May 20, 2008, Timothy Balota, 31, was driving southbound on Interstate 55 in Collinsville, Ill., when traffic came to a stop approaching a construction zone near Route 157. Collinsville is a near east side suburb of St. Louis. A truck was stopped behind the plaintiff’s car when the semi-tractor-trailer…
It is sometimes overlooked in trial practice or not given enough emphasis that the conduct of a defendant must be proved to have proximately caused the injuries or damages claimed in the pleadings. Also, expert testimony must meet the rules of scientific reliability. For example, Gary McCann, an engineer for…
For as long as I have been practicing law, now 37 years, the question an expert must always be asked is whether his or her opinion is to a reasonable degree of certainty. Once that question is answered in the affirmative, the burden for the offering expert is whether the opinion…
John Baugh sustained a severe brain injury when the Cuprum ladder that he was using to clean his gutters buckled and collapsed. Baugh’s wife Sharon filed a lawsuit on his behalf against Cuprum S.A.de C.V. claiming that the defective design and the manufacturer’s negligence was the cause of her husband’s injuries. …
A district court judge in Chicago granted the motion of defendant Ryobi Technologies Inc. to exclude an expert witness as unreliable and irrelevant. Purportedly, it would have cost Ryobi $50 to $150 to install an automatic braking system on the table saw that sliced off Brandon Stollings’s index finger and portions of…
On May 8, 2010, James Choragwicki was driving southeast on Willow Springs Road in Willow Springs, Ill., when the defendant, Marek Szkodon, was traveling southwest in his car on Archer Avenue and went through a red light. This resulted in a T-bone collision with the front of the plaintiff’s vehicle striking…
A recent Illinois Appellate Court decision provided additional clarification regarding the admissibility of photographic evidence. At issue was whether or not a judge had correctly allowed photographs taken at the scene of an accident to be admitted into evidence during a Cook County personal injury trial. The appellate court ruled…