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Farmworker’s family sues over California heat-related death

July 22, 2008

Lawyers for the family of a teenage girl who died last month after working hours in a hot vineyard filed a wrongful-death lawsuit in Merced Superior Court on Wednesday.
The lawsuit alleges Merced Farm Labor and West Coast Grape Farming Inc. – the company that hired Merced to provide workers – are responsible for the death of María Isavel Vásquez Jiménez, who died in Lodi two days after collapsing in a vineyard on May 14.

Labor activists say they want the suit to send a strong message that California farm companies – not just the labor contractors they hire – should be held accountable for conditions that endanger workers.

Witnesses told state labor inspectors the girl worked more than nine hours without shade and was too intimidated to take sufficient water breaks in temperatures that exceeded 95 degrees. Witnesses also said she was not taken to a medical center for more than 90 minutes after she collapsed.

Read Article Sacbee.com

Posted By Arizona Auto Injury and Accident Attorneys

Parents file class-action lawsuit over baby bottles

Four Columbus-area parents are suing baby-bottle manufacturers whose bottles contain bisphenol A.

The synthetic chemical, commonly known as BPA, has been linked to health problems in the brain and other areas and in behavior. It also is found in some spill-resistant cups and sports bottles.

Staci Collier, Paige Engle and David and Kelly Johnson filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court against five manufacturers, arguing that they knew BPA was associated with health problems but continued to use it in their products and did not disclose the risks.

Read Article The Columbus Dispatch

Posted By Phoenix Personal Injury Attorneys

City pays victims of police barrage

The city of Oakland will pay $975,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by a man and a woman who were hit by stray bullets when police officers fired on a suspect at a car wash.

William Caldwell and Leona Savoy were wounded in 2006 when three officers fired 26 rounds at a suspect during an undercover drug operation at a self-service car wash.
Authorities say the officers had fired their weapons as police tried to arrest Patrick Nickerson after he had opened fire at a car.

Several shots hit Nickerson, but others shattered the femurs of both Caldwell, then 67 years old, and Savoy, then 31, as they were cleaning their cars.

Read Article Mercury News

Posted By Phoenix Personal Injury Attorneys

State court overturns AZ law on expert witnesses

An Arizona appellate court ruling says a state law on medical malpractice lawsuits is unconstitutional.
At issue is a law that sets qualifications required for expert witnesses in medical malpractice cases.
A three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeals says the law is unconstitutional because it violates the doctrine of separation between the branches of government.

The ruling Tuesday came in a Maricopa County case in which a trial judge dismissed a malpractice suit after ruling that a doctor that the plaintiff wanted to use as an expert witness was not qualified under the state law.

Read Article azstarnet.com

Posted By Phoenix Personal Injury Attorneys

MDs: Secret shoppers aren’t cure

While secret shoppers are commonly used to improve customer service and quality in retail stores, restaurants and hotels, members of the American Medical Association don’t want them in doctors’ offices.

That was the prevailing opinion of doctors who testified before an AMA panel at Sunday’s annual meeting of the group’s policy-making House of Delegates in Chicago. Testimony before the panel is the first step in a process that could lead to becoming policy of the AMA, the nation’s largest doctor group, representing nearly 250,000 physicians.

The secret shopper concept is not being proposed to evaluate clinical skills but the way medical professionals manage relationships with patients, from the process of making appointments to such things as explaining billing practices.

Read Article Chicago Tribune

Posted By Phoenix Personal Injury Attorneys

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