Justia Lawyer Rating for Robert D. Kreisman

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Jeffrey Andrews was working as a cement finisher for F.H. Paschen S.N. Nielsen and Associates, LLC (“Paschen”) on a project for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago (“Water Reclamation District” or “district”), a governmental entity. He fell 29 feet from a ladder to the bottom of a water chamber where he was applying sealant.

The worksite was muddy that day, and the chamber in which he fell had three feet of standing water in it. The other workers, along with Andrews, were required to use a ladder made by the construction crew for part of the descent before “pivoting” by stepping over onto a commercial fiberglass ladder for the remainder of the trip.

There was no platform between the two ladders. Andrews slipped while attempting to transfer between the two ladders landing on a co-worker, breaking multiple bones and suffering “severe, career-ending head injuries.”
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The day before Eugene Lay died from lung cancer in January 2016, he allegedly signed a will that revoked his 1979 will. The new will left all of his assets to Delbert Miller. However, when Beverly Kelton, a legatee under the earlier 1979 will, challenged the 2016 testament, a  judge in Kankakee County, Ill., granted Delbert Miller’s motion to dismiss based on alleged lack of statutory standing under Section 1-2.11 of the Illinois Probate Act.

Section 8-1(a) of the Illinois Probate Act authorizes attacks on the validity of a will by any “interested person,” as defined in Section 1-2.11. Failure to qualify as an “interested person” for a will contest amounts to a lack of standing that can be presented as an affirmative defense in a motion under Section 2-619(a)(9) of the Illinois Code of Civil Procedure.

Miller argued that Kelton was obligated to prove that she had standing because the 2016 will contained a revocation clause. Miller relied on the dicta in the Illinois Supreme Court case of Estate of Schlenker, 209 Ill.2d 456 (2004). In granting Miller’s motion to dismiss, the trial court also cited the Estate of Koziol, 366 Ill.App.3d 171 (2006), which involved the presumption that a missing will was revoked.

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The issue in this case was whether there was insurance coverage for South Shore Iron Works under the $1 million auto policy GD Carriers purchased from National Casualty Co. This involved the injuries suffered by Julio Delgado, a GD employee, who fell from a parked flatbed trailer owned by South Shore Iron Works.

Delgado hooked GD’s tractor to South Shore’s trailer while it was being loaded with steel beams. He was scheduled to transport the beams to a construction project in Rochelle, Ill.

The tractor was covered under National Casualty’s insurance policy. The incident occurred allegedly because of South Shore’s negligence in positioning the beams. Apparently the beams were not secured when Delgado climbed onto the trailer to secure the load.

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Johnny Williams, 67, was operating his tractor on a roadway when a dump truck driven by Rubin Harvey for Oxford Construction Co. rear-ended his tractor at a high speed. The impact caused Williams to be thrown off the tractor and into a ditch. He suffered a traumatic brain injury, multiple fractures and other injuries.

Williams spent six weeks in a hospital before being transferred to a rehabilitation facility. He now requires 24-hour care and suffers from memory loss and seizures.

He had earned approximately $15,000 per year and incurred $1.2 million in medical expenses.

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Yadvinder Singh, a 30-year-old truck driver, was hired by Destination Anywhere Inc. to haul aggregate materials from Granite Construction Company‘s facility to a construction site. He drove his dump truck to Granite Construction, where an employee loaded it with washed sand.  As Singh drove the truck toward his destination, its right front tire blew out. That caused his truck to leave the road and overturn. Singh was severely injured, taken to a nearby hospital and died that evening. He was survived by his wife and two minor children. He had been earning approximately $50,000 per year.

Singh’s family sued Destination Anywhere claiming it chose not to perform a mandatory safety check on the dump truck two days before the incident. It was alleged that had this inspection been done, it would have been discovered that the front tire’s tread depth was significantly below the limit. The lawsuit also alleged that Granite Construction’s employee was negligent in overloading the truck.

The defendant argued that Singh had routinely instructed aggregate suppliers to load his truck fully. The defendant also argued that maintaining the truck, which Singh had leased from Destination Anywhere, was his responsibility and duty.

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Thomas Neuhengen was injured in a forklift accident allegedly caused by Frederick Neirinckx, a Global Experience Specialists employee. The judgment was entered in the amount of $12,228,068 in compensatory damages and $3 million in punitive damages for Neuhengen. Global Experience appealed from that judgment.

Global Experience argued that the trial judge erred in refusing to dismiss Count III of the plaintiff’s complaint, which provided the predicate for the exemplary award for alleging willful and wanton conduct in hiring and training Neirinckx because Global Experience stipulated, before trial, that it would be vicariously liable for any negligent or careless conduct by Neirinckx.

In the appeal, Global Experience relied on the case of Neff v. Davenport Packing Co., 131 Ill.App.2d 791 (1971). In cases in which a complaint alleges negligence by an employee along with vicarious liability for that negligence against the employer, Neff calls for dismissing the negligence claims against the corporation if it admits liability for the employee’s conduct.

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Reflection Window Co. filed in an attempt to limit its contribution liability to Power Construction Co. for an incident that injured Timothy Cooley who was an employee of Reflection Window. The incident occurred at a construction site where Power Construction was a general contractor.

Reflection Window had insisted that the judge was wrong in also ruling that it waived its lien under Section 5(b) of the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act. Reflection Window had conceded that the Cook County judge was correct in striking the affirmative defense it filed under Kotecki v. Cyclops Welding Corp., 146 Ill.2d 155 (1991).

Power Construction sued Reflection Window for contribution after Cooley sued the general contractor for negligence.

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Bronson Ganka was a maintenance worker for Apartments Downtown Inc.,  a private company that builds apartments in Iowa City, Iowa. Iowa City is a college town where the University of Iowa is located. Ganka was 40 at the time.

While he was drilling holes into a building he was working on, he fell off a ladder and hit the ground 12 feet below.

Ganka suffered head injuries and died several days later. He was survived by his wife, a minor child and two adult children.

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Mary Lewis, Tashwan Banks and Kathleen O’Sullivan filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of themselves and others similarly situated against Atlantic Richfield Co., ConAgra Grocery Products Inc., NL Industries Inc. and Sherwin-Williams Co. claiming that these entities engaged in civil conspiracy.

In addition, the plaintiff class consisted of parents or legal guardians who incurred expenses, allegations of liabilities in testing their children.

The children, between Aug. 18, 1995 and Feb. 19, 2008, were between six months and six years old. They lived in zip codes identified by the Illinois Department of Public Health as “high risk” areas for lead toxicity.

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Steven Campbell testified at trial that in early July 2012 he was working for UPS when the defendant’s dog lunged at him and pushed him backward. As a result, Campbell injured his back and was not able to continue to work that day. He sought medical treatment and took some time off from work to recover.

He returned to work the next month. However, when he did return to UPS, he was unable to complete all of his normal employment responsibilities.

Just two months after Campbell’s July 2012 injury, he returned to the clinic where he had previously been treated. In November of that year, he consulted with a board-certified neurosurgeon regarding his ongoing back pain. This doctor, Dr. Kennedy, prescribed physical therapy and epidural injections. Campbell told the jury that he followed Dr. Kennedy’s advice.

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