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WASHINGTON, DC – The Large Truck Crash Causation Study (LTCCS) is is the first-ever national study to attempt to determine the critical events and associated factors that contribute to serious large truck crashes. It has been conducted by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) which are agencies under the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT).

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Gordon & Elias, truck accident attorneys. Todd Elias on the left; Steve Gordon on the rt

Truck accident lawyers, Gordon & Elias, agree with Deborah A.P. Hersman, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) that driver fatigue “is one of the most insidious issues in the transportation industry,” and more needs to be done to address this problem.

Truck accidents caused by driver fatigue have become a national problem and it is getting worse. The country’s health practitioners have been aware of an increase in persons suffering from sleep deprivation for many years. Medical problems such as sleep apnea and acid reflux, which causes constant sleep interruption, are the number one causes of driver fatigue. In addition, even drivers that are not suffering from these health problems but simply are driving more than the permissible amount of hours due to economic necessity also is a cause of driver fatigue.

The trucking industry is just now beginning to recognize it as an industry wide safety concern. However, 99% of the companies, instead of embracing the issue and trying to institute safeguards to protect the public are, instead, trying to take the position that their only responsibility is to make sure their driver has a valid medical certificate. The problem requires a much deeper and broader approach. A few trucking companies have tried to address the problem properly and they are to be commended.

In the video below, truck accident attorney, Steve Gordon, believes a truck driver is what he calls “stuck between a rock and a hard place.” The truck driver has got to make his route. He’s got to make his deliveries on time. He’s got to get from Point A to Point B, and the company expects him to do it in a certain time.

There are federal regulations about driver fatigue which govern how many hours a trucker can drive. A long haul trucker has a cab in the back and they are supposed to, after a certain amount of hours, get off duty rest and sleep. However, more times than you can even imagine, the trucker has driven more than he should causing his responses to be slow. And when that happens, there are people that are injured and worse yet killed.

Mr. Gordon goes on to say in the video that a trucker is suppose to be an expert in their field. They have a commercial driver’s license. This is the field they have chosen to do for their career. They have a duty, being an expert, to do their job right, just like a lawyer. We can’t take a case and just halfway work on it or do it a little bit, and a trucker shouldn’t either. So when a truck driver has driver fatigue and that causes an accident, the depositions of that trucker — they’re not pretty.

He states that there are driver’s logs that you can look at, and that some drivers even go as far as to falsify those logs. He goes on to say, “when that happens, that is not only a crime, but it upsets a jury very much and high awards are seen in driver falsification log issues cases.”

So you have two things. You have the trucking company making these unreasonable demands on the truck driver, and you have the truck driver instead of saying, hey wait, I cannot do it within this time frame because the law requires me to get rest. You have the truck driver making the second mistake and then you have the accident. So clearly when it’s driver fatigue issues, the trucking company and the driver are usually at fault.

For more information contact Gordon & Elias, L.L.P., Truck Accident Attorneys at Law.

Call Toll Free 1-800-773-6770

SEATTLE, Nov. 2 – After a six-day trial, a federal jury dismissed Blue Niles $60.1 million claim against  Yehuda Diamond Company. The Jury ruled against Blue Nile, acknowledging Yehuda Diamond’s right to compare the prices of its clarity enhanced diamonds to the untreated diamonds sold by online retailer Blue Nile.

Blue Nile loses 60.1 Million Claim against Yehuda Diamond Company

Yehuda Diamond, based in New York, has earned widespread industry and consumer loyalty for its successful competition with Blue Nile and other online jewelers, favoring consumers not only with lower prices but also with unsurpassed expert face-to-face service and full Federal Trade Commission-compliant disclosure.

The suit [No. C-07-2017 TSZ], brought by Blue Nile and heard last month in U.S. District Court for the  Western District of Washington, involved Blue Nile’s efforts to prevent Yehuda Diamond from comparing the  price and appearance of its clarity enhanced diamonds to those natural untreated diamonds sold by Blue Nile.

Yehuda Diamond has consistently contended, even before Blue Nile filed the lawsuit against it in December 2007, that Yehuda Diamond’s price comparisons are in the best interest of consumers.  After 4-1/2 hours of deliberations, the jury agreed, dismissing both Blue Nile’s federal and state claims that Yehuda Diamond had engaged in false or misleading advertising.

Blue Nile, which has brought multiple lawsuits against smaller competitors over the past decade, had petitioned the jury to award it exemplary damages of $60,161,834.64, based on alleged actual damages of $20,053,944.88.

“This is a momentous victory for all consumers and for free-market competition,” says Dror Yehuda, president of Yehuda Diamonds.

“In essence, the jury told Blue Nile that it can’t use its massive size and legal muscle to prevent consumers from learning about lower-priced, quality alternatives to Blue Nile diamonds,” explains Mr. Yehuda.  “In recent years, Blue Nile has preferred to fight its competitors in the courtroom than in the marketplace.”

Mr. Yehuda said that given the jury’s rulings in support of Yehuda Diamond, he has asked his attorneys to petition the judge in the case, the Honorable Thomas S. Zilly, to require Blue Nile to pay Yehuda Diamond’s legal fees. Yehuda Diamond is represented by Pearl Cohen Zedek Latzer LLP, a Manhattan-based law firm.

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A default judgment award of 1.26 Billion was handed down on Sept. 30 by a Wisconsin state court in a case alleging that PepsiCo stole the idea to bottle and sell purified water from two Wisconsin men. PepsiCo filed motions to vacate the order and dismiss the claims on Oct. 13, saying it wasn’t even aware of the lawsuit until Oct. 6.

Administrator mistake costs PepsiCo $1.26 Billion in default judgment

Charles Joyce and James Voigt sued PepsiCo in April plus two of its distributors, alleging they had misappropriated trade secrets from confidential discussions the plaintiffs had with the distributors in 1981 about selling purified water. The information was illicitly passed to PepsiCo, which used it to develop and sell Aquafina bottled water, the plaintiffs allege in the case filed in the Circuit Court of Jefferson County before Judge Jacqueline Erwin.

In court documents, PepsiCo argues it was improperly served with the Wisconsin lawsuit in North Carolina, but also asks the court to excuse the corporate bureaucracy that buried a legal document for weeks. While plaintiffs say they served the lawsuit in June on PepsiCo’s registered agent in North Carolina, where the company is incorporated, PepsiCo says its law department at the company’s Purchase, N.Y.-based headquarters was not notified until September.

“The bottom line is there was a defect in the process for us, but also for” the plaintiffs, said PepsiCo spokesman Joe Jacuzzi, who called the case “highly dubious.”

In seeking to dismiss the case, PepsiCo argues that the statute of limitations should preclude the lawsuit, brought 15 years after the company started selling Aquafina and more than two decades after the alleged confidential talks. Moreover, “the $1.26 billion judgment that has been entered is unprecedented in size and justice requires that PepsiCo have a chance to defend itself,” the company said.

The lead plaintiffs lawyer, David Van Dyke of Chicago-based Cassiday Schade, said Wisconsin courts have been “pretty clear that they don’t like” vacating default judgments. “There is a possibly that a judge may say we’re going to litigate the damages aspect of it,” Van Dyke said. Read full story

Maritime lawyer, Steve Gordon

Maritime injuries and accidents can occur in a myriad of situations. Depending upon the location of injury and the nature of the situation, e.g., whether it was a commercial accident or a non-commercial situation, governs whether you need a maritime lawyer or just a regular personal injury lawyer.  Clearly, injuries on a jet ski, or a party pontoon boat can be very injurious, but they do not require a maritime lawyer. A maritime injury lawyer is a specialized lawyer versed in the legal principals of General Maritime Law and the Jones Act.

General Maritime Law is a body of law developed by the federal courts through jurisprudence. The federal courts have an Admiralty “side” bestowed upon them from the United States Constitution. This Admiralty side is a court of equity as well as court of law.
The Jones Act was enacted by Congress in and around 1916. It actually is a culmination of a series of three laws passes between 1916 and 1920. The Jones act was named after its principle proponent, Senator Wesley Jones (1863-1932) from the state of Washington, urged passage of a law that would support the growing merchant marine industry of the United States. In light of this, The Jones Act became law at 46 U.S.C. §688 et seq. (re-codified in 2006 at 46 U.S.C. §30104 et seq.). The Jones Act covers maritime employees that sustain an injury while in the course and scope of employment.

Is the Jones Act the Same as Workers’ Compensation?

No. It is quite different. Workers’ Compensation is available to an employee who “suffers an injury while in the course and scope of employment”. Notice in the previous sentence there is absolutely no discussion of “fault”. That is because workers’ compensation is not based upon fault. The employee could be one hundred (100%) percent at fault for causing his injuries and still collect all of his compensation benefits. In exchange for receiving those workers’ compensation benefits, the employee gives up the common law right to sue his employer and accepts the workers compensation as the sole remedy when he starts his employment relationship.

On the other hand, to qualify under the Jones Act, one has to meet the following elements:

1)    You have to sustain an in injury
2)    While working permanently assigned;
3)    To a vessel;
4)    That is on a navigable waterway; and
5)    The injury has to be caused by the:
a.    Negligence of a fellow crewmember; and/or
b.    An “unseaworthy” condition

As you can see, there is a fault element to the Jones Act claim. When the judge or jury assesses the fault, they look at all the parties’ fault including the plaintiff. For example, if a jury finds the injured employee 100% fault but yet awards one hundred dollars, the injured employee would receive zero dollars. The Jones Act claim is a “pure comparative” type claim. That is, in most states, if the injured party makes a claim and the jury finds the injured part 50.01% negligent in causing his own injuries, he receives nothing because his percentage share of his negligence is greater than fifty percent. This is a called a modified contributory negligence bar. However, there is no such “bar” in a Jones Act claim. For example, using the example of a jury award of $100.00: (a) if the plaintiff is found 30% negligent, then he would receive $70.00; (b) if the plaintiff was held to be 70% negligent, then he would receive $30.00.

What are the Economic Differences between the Jones Act and Workers’ Compensation?

The differences can be huge. Comp is governed by a statutory scheme in the state that you work in. It is generally governed by a “Table of Injuries”, e.g., a lost foot is worth a certain amount of weeks disability; an injured back so many weeks and so on and so on.  Under comp, you give up your common law right to sue your employer when you take the job.

On the other hand, a Jones Act claim can be asserted for medical bills, lost wages, loss of earning capacity, physical suffering, mental anguish, physical disfigurement, physical impairment and other damages. It is not unusual to have a spine injury that is worth six or seven figures depending upon the earnings of the injured seaman at the time of his injury.

Is Maintenance & Cure the Same as a Jones Act Claim?

“Maintenance” is a daily payment due and payable to an injured seaman while he has not reached “maximum medical improvement”. It is similar to workers compensation in that it is regardless of fault. In other words, you can be hurt as a seaman and you may have totally caused your injuries but you are still entitled to “maintenance”. The amount of “maintenance” is governed by how much it costs to “house” and feed the injured seaman on board the vessel before the injury occurred. It has been as low as $8.00 a day and as high as $60.00 a day. Practically, $30.00 a day or $600.00 a month is usually paid.

“Cure” means medical care. When a seaman sustains an injury, he is entitled to reasonable and necessary medical care. Like “maintenance”, it too is owed by the maritime employer regardless of fault.

Both “maintenance” and “cure” are, in the law, considered “quasi-contractual” debts in nature. That is, unlike the Jones Act which sounds in tort and is only paid when fault has been established, maintenance and cure is paid because it arises out of the employment relationship between the seaman and the maritime employer.

Finally, in June, 2009, the United States Supreme Court decided the Atlantic Sounding Co., Inc. et al. v. Edgar L. Townsend case which held that punitive damages are, in fact, recoverable when the Jones Act employer unreasonably withholds payment of maintenance and/or medical cure.

What Type of Seaman is Covered & What is a Vessel?

Captains, engineers, able-bodied seaman [A/B], wipers, deckhands, roustabouts and many other types of seaman are covered. The beauty about the Jones Act is that it is the same law whether you are hurt fishing off Alaska; working on a tow boat on the Mississippi or you work in the “oil patch” of the Gulf of Mexico.

With the constant innovations of extracting oil from the sea-bed floor, what is a vessel is still being litigated. The general belief is that rule enunciated in Stuart v. Dutra that if it is capable of transporting property of persons upon water, then it is considered a vessel.

Why Do You Need a Maritime Lawyer?

Making a Jones Act claim is quite different from a workers’ compensation claim. The Jones Act employer is usually insured by maritime insurers that have been insuring in the maritime industry for at least a hundred years. When an injury occurs, they have investigators that immediately go out to take statements to build a case against you. Their goal is to show that the injury is the fault of the injured employee and the injured employee is not that hurt.

An injured seaman needs an experienced  maritime lawyer to get him to a doctor so that all of his injuries can be documented properly; to get his maintenance and cure started and to build his negligence and/or “unseaworthiness” claim. This would be impossible for a seaman to effectively and successfully try to “go it alone”. Most Jones Act lawyers work on a contingency fee. That is, the seaman pays nothing to the lawyer unless he recovers money. Fee percentages range from 33 1/3% to 45%.

Finally, making a claim takes time and you will need money to pay your bills while the maritime litigation is pending. Maintenance is usually insufficient to pay the bills. Some Jones Act attorneys, depending upon the state they practice in, are ethically permitted to advance funds to their client so they do not have to go back early to work and when they are not medically ready to go back to work.

According to a legal action filed yesterday in New York, Bernie Madoff’s  prison associates are quite cast of characters. Right now Madoff shares a jail cell with a 21-year-old drug dealer and hangs out with a former crime boss and an Israeli spy.

Complaint lodged against Bernie Madoff in New York Supreme Court by California Law Firm

Attorneys who interviewed Madoff in jail in July used information obtained from him to file a series of claims against major banks and accountancy firms, in an action that also throws light on Madoff’s life behind bars.

The 272-page complaint was lodged with the New York Supreme Court by the Californian law firm Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy.

According to the document submitted to the court: “Madoff now shares a cell with a 21-year-old inmate convicted of drug crimes. Madoff sleeps in the lower bunk and he eats pizza cooked by an inmate convicted of child molestation.”

The document describes how Madoff’s recreation time “consists of walking around the prison track at night”.

“He now spends time with former Colombo crime family boss Carmine Persico and Jonathan Pollard, who was convicted of spying for Israel,” the complaint said. “Most of his fellow inmates are in prison for drug crimes or sex crimes and Madoff will spend the rest of his life in prison with them.”

The legal action was brought by Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy on behalf of Jay Wexler, a New York resident who invested in Rye Select Broad Market Prime Fund, a fund managed by Tremont Group, the hedge fund business of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance.

Atlanta truck accident lawyer, Steve Gordon of the Law Firm of Gordon & Elias, has launched an educational video explaining how driver fatigue kills.

“Driver fatigue is a pet issue of mine because I believe a truck driver is caught between a rock and a hard place”, says Steve Gordon,  a well respected authority and renowned nationwide truck accident lawyer.

“He has got to make his route and make his deliveries on time. He’s got to get from point A to point B.”

Steve goes on to say in the video that the company expects the truck driver to do it in a certain amount of time. There are federal regulations that govern how much time a trucker can drive. A long haul trucker has a cab in the back and they’re suppose to after so many hours get off duty and sleep.

More times than you can imagine, the trucker has driven more than he should and that it’s fatigue that has caused his responses to be slow. When that happens there are people who get injured and worse yet killed.

A trucker is suppose to be an expert. They have a commerical driver’s license and this is the field they have chosen to be their career. They have a duty being an expert to do their job right just like a lawyer.

“We can’t just take a case and halfway work on it or do it a little. And a trucker shouldn’t either”, Gordon goes on to say. ” So when a driver has driver fatique and if that causes an accident, then the depositions of that trucker are not pretty.

Atlanta Truck accident lawyers explain how driver fatigue kills. Watch video

There are driver logs that we can look at and some drivers even go as far as to falsify those logs. When that happens, not only is that a crime, but it upsets a jury very much and high awards are seen in driver falsification log issue cases.

There are two things:
1. The trucking company making unreasonable demands on the truck driver
2. The truck driver gives in to the demand of the trucking company instead of following the law by getting proper rest.

Therefore accidents occur, many times resulting in critcal injuries and often times death.

When this happens. both the truck company and the truck driver are at fault.

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Pfizer found guity of criminal fraud

Pfizer pleaded guilty to a felony crime for “…for misbranding Bextra with the intent to defraud or mislead.”  Read more from the actual DOJ documents.

The feds relied heavily on evidence from a half-dozen whistleblowers  who give testimony that eventually proved  Pfizer fraudulently marketed Bextra.  This settlement is  the largest health fraud settlement in U.S. history.

What Pfizer did was ask the FDA for the approval of Bextra to be used for several diseases and conditions, but the FDA refused those approvals. Pfizer then went ahead anyway and off-label marketed the drugs for those diseases and conditions.

The key whistleblower was  West Point grad John Kopchinski, who was hired by Pfizer as a sales rep when he left the Army in 1992. Kopchinski, 45,  was fired by the company in 2003.

Kopchinsk was talking with lawyers by then about evidence he had accumulated on how Pfizer was marketing  Bextra, a painkiller withdrawn from the market in 2005 amid safety concerns.

When Kopchinski was asked about blowing the whistle he said,  “You have to live with yourself when you look at yourself in the mirror,” he told us in a telephone interview.

According to the DOJ following statement:

Pfizer has agreed to pay $1 billion to resolve allegations under the civil False Claims Act that the company illegally promoted four drugs — Bextra; Geodon, an anti-psychotic drug; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug — and caused false claims to be submitted to government health care programs for uses that were not medically accepted indications and therefore not covered by those programs. The civil settlement also resolves allegations that Pfizer paid kickbacks to health care providers to induce them to prescribe these, as well as other, drugs. The federal share of the civil settlement is $668,514,830 and the state Medicaid share of the civil settlement is $331,485,170. This is the largest civil fraud settlement in history against a pharmaceutical company.

“Six whistleblowers will receive payments totaling more than $102 million from the federal share of the civil recovery,” says the DOJ.

Along with this admission of guilt for committing a felony crime, Pfizer is paying well over $1 billion in criminal fines, plus another $1 billion or so to resolve civil allegations against its fraudulent marketing practices. In all, the multi-billion dollar health fraud settlement is the largest in the history of the DOJ.

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White House May Obtain Power Over Internet

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, along with his aides, have spent months behind closed doors drafting a revised U.S. Senate bill that proposes giving the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.

CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency.

The new version would allow the president to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” relating to “non-governmental” computer networks and do what’s necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a federal certification program for “cybersecurity professionals,” and a requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been awarded that license.

“I think the redraft, while improved, remains troubling due to its vagueness,” said Larry Clinton, president of the Internet Security Alliance, which counts representatives of Verizon, Verisign, Nortel, and Carnegie Mellon University on its board. “It is unclear what authority Sen. Rockefeller thinks is necessary over the private sector. Unless this is clarified, we cannot properly analyze, let alone support the bill.”  Read full story here

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Tivo Logo

TiVo Inc. has sued AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. for patent infringement, regarding the ability to pause and rewind live TV.

TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO) today filed complaints in the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas against AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications, Inc. for infringement of the following three TiVo patents U.S. Patent Nos. 6,233,389 B1 (”Multimedia Time Warping System”), 7,529,465 B2 (”System for Time Shifting Multimedia Content Streams”), and 7,493,015 B1 (”Automatic Playback Overshoot Correction System”). The complaints seek damages for past infringement and a permanent injunction, similar to that issued by the United States District Court, Eastern District of Texas against DISH/EchoStar.

TiVo CEO Tom Rogers said, “There are multichannel operators who compete with us through the unauthorized use of our intellectual property,” He added that while there were talks, “business agreements have not been reached.”

AT&T declined to comment. Verizon said it hasn’t seen the lawsuit yet and can’t comment.

TiVo received a setback Wednesday in a similar patent lawsuit against Dish Network Corp. and sister firm EchoStar Corp. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ruled that the re-examination of TiVo’s patent that’s the subject of litigation may continue.

TiVo had asked the agency to vacate Dish’s request to look anew at the patents.

TiVo sued Dish in 2004, alleging that Dish infringed on its DVR technology. Dish lost. While the case was on appeal, Dish designed a modified software that it downloaded to customers’ DVRs. But TiVo said the workaround software still infringed on its patent and asked the district court for a permanent injunction. TiVo prevailed but Dish appealed the ruling.

Find patent attorneys and information at Locate a Lawyer.