Justia Lawyer Rating for Robert D. Kreisman

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On Oct. 10, 2013, Scott Gilman’s car ran over the left foot of Sweta Karn while the car was making a left turn on a street. Karn was a pedestrian at the time; she suffered severe and permanent injury to her foot. She filed a lawsuit against Gilman and his employer, Aspen Commercial Painting Inc.

Aspen and Gilman filed affirmative defenses sounding in contributory negligence and Karn’s failure to mitigate her damages.

At the jury trial, Aspen focused on a video that was taken that purported to show Karn walking, post incident, without a limp or any sign of her alleged permanent injuries. Karn, on seeing the video, denied that she was depicted in the video.

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Tyrone Lawson, 17, was the son of the plaintiff, Pamela Wright-Young, when he  was fatally shot outside a high school basketball game.  As the administrator of her son’s estate, his mother brought this wrongful death and survival action lawsuit against the Board of Education of the City of Chicago (Board) and the Chief of Police and Student Services for Chicago State University. The university’s Jones Convocation Center was the venue in which the basketball game was held.

Throughout the pendency of this case, the trial court rejected various statutory immunities asserted by the Board. The case was tried and a jury concluded that the Board was liable, but the Chief of Police of Chicago State University was not. The jury signed a general verdict in favor of Wright-Young for damages in the amount of $3.5 million. The Board appealed.

The Illinois Appellate Court concluded that the trial court erroneously rejected the Board’s claim of absolute immunity with respect to most of the theories of liability presented at trial, as those theories all related to the Board’s choosing not to provide adequate police protection services.

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Paul Oleksiuk’s legacy included an intricate probate puzzle. His 2012 will revoked his 2011 will.  He died in 2014 before finalizing a revision to a 2012 will. However, on June 9, 2017, a Cook County judge ruled that the 2012 will didn’t qualify for admission to probate because it wasn’t notarized.

Inasmuch as the petitioners, Oleksiuk’s sister and nephew, could not find an original copy of the 2011 will, they tried again, petitioning for admission of a copy of the 2011 will.

Attacking the second petition, with a combined motion to dismiss based on Sections 2-615 and 2-619 of the Illinois Code of Civil Procedure, his widow, Irena Oleksiuk, argued that the revocation clause in the defective 2012 will blocked the petitioners from rebutting the presumption that he intended to revoke the missing 2011 will.

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Deborah Amling, personally and as personal representative for the Estate of Robert N. Amling, brought this lawsuit for the wrongful death of her husband against Harrow Industries LLC and others.

Amling and her husband, Robert, sued Harrow Industries and other businesses in Illinois state court for causing Robert to develop mesothelioma by exposing him to asbestos. Two years later, the Amlings sued Harrow again, this time in federal court, seeking a declaratory judgment on the meaning of an asset-purchase agreement between Harrow and another company, Nexus, also a defendant in the Amlings’ Illinois state lawsuit.

The federal district court judge thought the declaratory judgment action unripe and dismissed it. Even if it were ripe, the judge ruled in the alternative, she would decline to exercise jurisdiction over it. The Amlings appealed. Unfortunately, Robert died while this appeal was pending. Deborah now brings these state and federal lawsuits in her own right and as a representative of Robert’s estate.

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Marilyn Adams had a long history of hip pain. In September 2010, she was diagnosed with advanced degenerative arthritis.

Her orthopedic surgeon recommended a total hip replacement. She was told that the Zimmer hip device implanted in January 2011 could be expected to last 15-20 years.

However, in late 2012, Adams started experiencing severe hip pain. The cause was not clear.  Her February 2015 revision hip surgery revealed the Zimmer implant had been discharging excessive and potentially toxic metal debris into Adams’s hip.

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The 7th Circuit United States Court of Appeals in Chicago affirmed a verdict by the U.S. District Court as to the injuries suffered by Donald and Mary Timm in July 2013.  During that time period, the Timms set off on a cross-country motorcycle trip on their Harley-Davidson motorcycle. The Timms’ route began at their home in Dyer, Ind., with a final destination at Salt Lake City, Utah.

While crossing through the state of Nebraska, the Timms suffered a catastrophic accident when their motorcycle’s rear tire sustained a puncture and rapidly deflated causing Donald Timm to lose control of the motorcycle and crash into a concrete median barrier.

Mary Timm flew off the motorcycle while Donald remained attached to the bike as it slid across the highway. Although both riders were wearing helmets, each sustained serious head injuries.  Donald sustained a traumatic brain injury as well as facial fractures and a cervical spine injury.

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The Illinois Appellate Court has affirmed the decisions of two Cook County judges related to the suit filed by SFG Capital LLC. The suit was filed against Patrick W. Kane in 2010; it was alleged that Kane defaulted on a loan. Following a consent agreement, the trial court entered a $783,000 judgment against Kane payable to SFG. In an attempt to satisfy the judgment, SFG initiated a citation to discover assets proceedings to identify available assets that Kane might have owned.

In 2012, William Platt, an estranged business partner of Kane, signed a promissory note for $1.2 million payable to Kane. The trial court ordered all rights, title and interest in the Platt note to be transferred to SFG on April 14, 2016, with instructions that SFG “may take such further action as necessary to enforce payment on the . . . note.”

Access Realty Group, the plaintiff in this case, acquired the SFG judgment by way of an assignment on April 14, 2017, and became the successor in interest to SFG. Platt is the sole shareholder of Access, as well as its president, secretary and registered agent.
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These consolidated appeals arise from an important issue facing professional athletics and contemporary culture as a whole. Former professional football players are developing significant neurological disorders after sustaining repeated concussions while playing football. Evolving scientific and medical research has uncovered a link between repeated blows to the head and developing Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy and other neurological impairments.

The plaintiffs in these cases are former professional football players who have sustained numerous concussions and are suffering the attendant neurological impairments. They have already sued the National Football League in a federal class action case and have entered into a settlement with the NFL to address their grievances. The same former players, however, now seek relief from the defendants — the manufacturers and designers of the helmets they wore while playing football.  These plaintiffs alleged that the helmet manufacturers have long known about the dangers and the harmful effects of repeated concussive and sub-concussive traumas, but they never warned the users of their helmets about the dangers; instead, they represented that their helmets were protecting these players.

The defendant-helmet manufacturers moved to dismiss these cases on the ground that the cases are barred by the two-year statute of limitations covering personal injury actions in Illinois. In response, the plaintiffs argued that the cases were not time barred because the lawsuits were filed within two years of the players learning about the injuries for which they seek relief. The trial court found that, because the players had already sued the NFL more than two years before filing these cases, the players knew about their injuries and, therefore, could have sued the helmet manufacturers at the same time – more than two years before filing these lawsuits. Plaintiffs appealed the dismissal of their claims. The Illinois Appellate Court affirmed the plaintiffs’ claims were indeed untimely and upheld the dismissal.

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The issue in this case was whether there was a material breach under Illinois contract law as to American Guardian Holdings or AGH. AGH claimed it was excused from having to pay the final installments totaling $11 million for Steven Freedman’s shares in AGH because it was alleged that Freedman breached restrictive covenants in a settlement agreement.

When AGH agreed to redeem Freedman’s shares in AGH, it insisted on non-competition, non-solicitation and non-interference covenants to block Freedman, his son Max and any of their businesses from competing against AGH in selling “vehicle service contracts” or “extended warranties” through auto dealers.

Freedman’s other businesses included a brokerage that provided policies to owners of recreational vehicles, plus a personal-and-commercial-lines insurance agency called American Integrity Insurance Solutions, or AIIS, which was run by Freedman’s son, Max.

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The Third District Appellate Court, in its written order issued on Oct. 16, 2019, affirmed a Tazewell County judge’s decision to grant summary judgment in favor of Pottsie’s Place. The appeals court ruled that the plaintiff, Jeffrey Smith, did not present any evidence showing the bar had a duty to take additional steps to prevent customers from being injured by a heater.

The premises liability case was brought against the bar, Pottsie’s, alleging that the bar chose not to take action to protect its patrons from potential injury when its employees placed a written warning above an outdoor heater.

“Requiring Pottsie’s to take further steps in addition to the clear and prominent warning it provided would essentially render Pottsie’s an insurer of its invitees’ safety, which would be unduly burdensome and contrary to the law,” according to the opinion written by Justice William E. Holdridge.

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