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Field Fisher Waterhouse £550,000 injury comp
Law Firm Press |
2008/04/03 07:39
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| pEuropean law firm, Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP, has announced the successful recovery of £550,000 in compensation for a labourer injured at work./ppIn December 2005, the labourer was instructed by his foreman to collect waste materials from a large open shed. On entering the shed, a large mechanical digger with a sharp bladed shovel drove into him. The shovel hit both legs causing a severe injury at work. As a result, he had a below knee amputation of his left leg. This has meant that while he can now walk using a prosthetic limb, he is unable to return to his former employment or any other manual labour./ppPaul McNeil, partner in the Personal Injury Group at Field Fisher Waterhouse, was given legal instruction by the client at the end of 2005. /ppAlthough the labourer’s former employer quickly accepted that they were primarily responsible for the accident, they argued that he was also partially responsible for the negligence. They alleged that he had actually gone into the shed against instructions by the foreman./ppField Fisher Waterhouse succeeded in obtaining substantial interim payments to fund medical treatment and rehabilitation. The initial case to decide the issue of fault was fixed for trial in March 2007, however a few days before this date the employers accepted that they were fully liable for the accident. /ppIn the meantime, there was a dispute between the employer and their insurer, which resulted in the insurer cancelling the policy. The meant that Field Fisher Waterhouse then had to bring proceedings against the employer directly./ppDue to a significant difference in opinion between the employer and Field Fisher Waterhouse’s valuation of the injury compensation claim, another trial needed to be fixed for December 2007 to settle the matter. Eventually after extensive negotiation, the claim was settled out of court in the sum of £550,000 plus costs./ppThe labourer received his damages in full as the case was conducted on a no win, no fee basis./ppPaul McNeil said: “I am happy that we were able to recover this compensation for our client, who was injured through no fault of his own whilst at work.”/p |
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Where Lawyer Creativity Shines
Legal Opinions |
2008/04/02 07:53
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pA new type of legal service provider emerges through innovation.
When it comes to technology, let me confess, I am definitely not an expert. Nevertheless, I am fascinated by the two types of creativity involved with technology. The most obvious is the technical creativity required to invent and develop a new product or system. But the other, less-obvious type is the client-focused creativity that innovative lawyers demonstrate in developing new products and services as the result of existing technology./ppOne recent example of this is a product developed by Nova Legal and Advisory, which is located in Sydney, Australia, and consists of both a traditional law firm and a consulting firm. The law firm specializes in commercial legal services and complex corporate transactions, while the consulting firm specializes in corporate governance and risk management. The lawyers worked with the consulting firm’s technology staff to come up with a product called Nova Solutions. As Nova Legal and Advisory describes it, the product is “an integrated online management tool for the governance infrastructure needs of organizations.”/ppLawyers and Technicians Collaborate
Basically, Nova Solutions is an online training and compliance program. The firm’s lawyers had developed an extensive understanding of client needs in human relations, compliance, governance and training. They then collaborated with the consulting group’s researchers, technical writers and technicians to convert basic systems into, as the firm summarizes it, “an Internet package tailored to each company, where users can click on a screen to see the company’s policies in relation to a range of regulatory and compliance issues.”/ppBut this product goes even further. Users can click again “to complete a training course to bring them up-to-speed on the company’s requirements in these areas.”/ppThis is at least the fourth such online training and compliance product developed by a law firm. Blake Dawson Waldron, one of Australia’s largest firms, offers Salt TM Enterprise, a fully managed, Internet-delivered service supported by the professional team at Blake Dawson Technology Pty Ltd./ppSalt TM Enterprise is quite an extensive program. In Australia, it currently offers 14 courses covering key areas of the law, including corporate governance, environmental compliance and insider trading. There is also a module for information and communication technology companies to help them benefit from Australia’s Free Trade Agreements with the United States, Singapore and Thailand./ppAnd recently Blake Dawson extended Salt TM Enterprise to New Zealand through an affiliation with Kensington Swan, a full-service commercial law firm. Among the 12 courses offered there, several are different from the courses offered in Australia, including “Consumer Guarantees,” “Money Laundering” and “Resource Management.”/ppThere are Stateside examples, too.
“Down Under” law firms aren’t the only ones that offer online training and compliance programs. Holland amp; Hart offers the Holland amp; Hart Compliance Management System (HHCMS). Developed in collaboration with My Learning Advantage, Inc., an e-learning software provider, HHCMS is offered as a “fully hosted,” customizable and continually updated service. Its design utilizes a multimedia approach, with video segments at the beginning and end of each course./ppA similar training program, but without the compliance component, has been developed by the multi-office law firm Howrey in the form of its Howrey Virtual University, which is a system designed for a group of internal clients—the firm’s associates. Located on the firm’s intranet, this program
allows associates to manage their
training individually, on their own
time schedules. /ppApplying Preventive Legal Medicine
The point here isn’t the technical creativity. The underlying technology already existed. What is noteworthy is the client-focused creativity employed by the lawyers in these firms. They took an existing system and, with the assistance of technology experts, developed it into a product that not only provides clients with information and knowledge 24-7, but also provides the ability to anticipate and resolve issues that otherwise could grow into major legal problems./ppIn other words, just like many doctors do with their patients, these firms don’t just “cure” their clients-—they try to keep them healthy by providing preventive legal medicine. And in the process, by applying creativity to technology, they have created a new type of legal service provider. To me, that is really fascinating. /p |
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Expert Testimony Issues on the Rise
Legal Line News |
2008/04/01 08:05
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| The Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in United States v. Nacchio has recently reversed an insider trading conviction in the high profile criminal case, finding, in short, that the trial court improperly denied the defendant an opportunity to call an expert witness. The Court ordered a new trial. The Court based its holding on the improper exclusion of expert testimony, specifically, an economic analysis of Nacchio's stock trading patterns, says Joseph Martini, a partner with Wiggin amp; Dana LLP and a member of the firm's White-Collar Litigation and Appellate Practice Groups. From a review of the cases, it appears that issues concerning the introduction of expert testimony are coming up in more and more white collar criminal cases, he observes. Wiggin and Dana partner James Glasser also notes that during his tenure as former Chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office in Connecticut, defense counsel in white collar cases often argued against federal charges by pointing to experts opinions on such issues as the application of complex accounting principles. These issues are now coming up at trial, says Glasser. Martini and Glasser are available to write or comment on expert testimony issues in white-collar criminal cases including the Nacchio trial. |
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Paxil Teen Suicide Case Trumped by Michigan Law
Law Firm News |
2008/04/01 07:53
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pThe parents of a Michigan teenager who killed herself while on the antidepressant Paxil cannot sue the drug's manufacturer because a state law grants immunity to the maker of any drug approved by the Food and Drug Administration. /ppU.S. District Judge Paul L. Maloney of the Western District of Michigan said FDA approval of Paxil use by adults was enough to shield manufacturer SmithKline Beecham Corp., even though the agency never approved the drug's use by teens./pp
He therefore dismissed Nadine White and David B. McCullough's lawsuit against SKB over their 16-year-old daughter Moriah's 2001 suicide after taking Paxil for three months./ppMichigan is the only state with a law providing drugmakers immunity from state tort suits if the FDA has certified their products as safe and effective. The only exceptions to the statute are for fraud on the FDA or bribery of an agency official. /ppIn this case, White and McCullough filed a negligence and strict-liability suit against SKB in a Pennsylvania federal court because the company is located in that state. /ppThe drugmaker won a change of venue to the Western District of Michigan because the plaintiffs are residents of that state. It then filed a motion to dismiss./ppIn their opposition to the motion the plaintiffs argued that their suit is a failure-to-warn case because SKB never warned doctors not to prescribe Paxil to teens or children and, in fact, conducted a secret campaign to promote such off-label use. /ppMoreover, since the company never applied to the FDA for marketing approval to prescribe the drug to teens and children, it cannot argue that it has immunity under the Michigan statute, they said. /ppJudge Maloney rejected that argument, saying the Michigan Legislature provided immunity to drug manufacturers for FDA-approved products and that it is uncontested that Paxil was approved by the agency for use in adults./ppThe statute does not limit the protection to situations when the drug is used for approved purposes, he said. Should the Legislature wish to limit the protection available to off-label uses of the drug, it may do so. /p |
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