It’s hard to explain an injury when there is no visible evidence. Despite growing awareness of concussions and mental health issues stemming from concussions, these injuries are downplayed and minimized. People can easily think you are fine.
Concussions occur when the soft tissue of the brain, cushioned by spinal fluid, is jolted or moved around in your head. A traumatic brain injury, or TBI, can cause bruising, damage to the blood vessels, and injury to the nerves. The affect of this injury on a person and their family can be devastating. TBI may affect personality, memory, and may impact family life, job, and social interactions. Symptoms may not appear until weeks after the injury. Brain injuries do not heal like other injuries and require intensive rehabilitative treatments and therapies.
Recently, a client who had suffered a mild concussion after he was jarred while riding his bicycle (without hitting his head), was later rear-ended in a car accident, and again, not actually hitting his head. The car accident caused him to be jolted back and forth resulting in two concussions in brief succession. (more…)
A drunk man crosses the street in dark clothes, in the middle of the night, is hit by a car, and at trial is awarded $400,000.
Why did a judge award $400,000 to a person crossing the street (not at a crosswalk), while intoxicated, in the dark, and wearing dark clothing?
The driver was driving on the highway at 60 miles per hour and claimed she never saw the pedestrian until after she hit him. She gave this statement to the police and to her insurance company immediately after the accident.
At first glance, it may seem to be the pedestrian’s fault for all the above reasons, however, as was argued at trial, a driver has a duty to always be paying attention to the road in front of her. If a driver does not see a 6-foot 2-inches drunk man in the middle of the street in front of her, then she is primarily at fault and the cause of the accident. This commonsense, albeit not necessarily intuitive, rule has been memorialized by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in the matter of Carney vs. SEPTA, where it stated, “a wrongdoer may not avoid liability by saying he did not see what was plainly visible to him.” (more…)
