Month: July 2011

A little girl developed cerebral palsy as a direct result of negligence on the part of the doctor delivering her. The jury found for the plaintiff in the case.

“This is a disturbing case in which the clear signs and symptoms of a baby being in distress were not acted on promptly, with devastating results,” said Robert Webb, an Atlanta personal injury lawyer with Webb & D’Orazio, a law firm specializing in personal injury, malpractice, criminal defense, and business law.

This story began when the expectant mother-to-be went for one of her regular checkups. The results of her non-stress test showed her baby had a low heart rate, at which point the doctor suggested labor be induced. On the doctor’s advice, the parents agreed to go ahead with an emergency C-section. “The problems began after the doctor induced labor. He decided to not do the C-section. This is the point where the baby’s life changed forever, because she was not getting the oxygen she needed to her brain, which caused cerebral palsy,” Webb said.

At trial, an expert witness for the parents pointed out that the baby also suffered additional injuries, compounded by the fact that labor had been induced, and then a vacuum applied for extraction. Of interest was the fact that the doctor who performed the delivery said she did not consider doing a C-section, because she saw no signs that there was anything wrong with the baby. The personal injury lawsuit filed suggested that had a C-section been performed as originally planned, she would not have been born with cerebral palsy.

“Cases like these are difficult and exceedingly complex, largely because of the medical issues involved, and the type of testimony required to persuade a jury. Most medical malpractice cases need expert witnesses to testify that what a doctor did was not up to the accepted standards of the profession. Getting a case like this to court takes a long time to mount a solid case, and needs experienced counsel at the helm to present the evidence,” Webb said.

For families that feel they have been the victim of medical malpractice, make the first call for advice to a competent and experienced Atlanta personal injury lawyer. The first consultation is free and may cover what a medical malpractice case involves, how one is put together, what to expect in court and what to expect in terms of a possible jury award.

“If you think you have been the victim of medical malpractice, feel free to give my office a call. That’s my job, to answer your questions and help you understand what you may be facing, should you have a case,” Webb said.

To learn more, visit http://www.webbdorazio.com.

In an interesting turn of events, a Harvard law professor suggests it’s about time lawyers did something about how they are perceived. Too much time is spent protecting jurisdictions instead of solving problems.

Unfortunately, there is a prevailing myth that lawyers are ambulance chasers and take frivolous cases to court to get paid big bucks. There are a number of things wrong with that thought. First, most lawyers do not chase ambulance for business. Most of them have more than they can handle at any given time. Secondly, while there may be some cases that seem questionable on first blush in terms of being successful in court, typically, a lawyer takes a case because there appears to be merit in it and/or a point of law.

As for making big bucks, that is not the case. Many lawyers get a portion of a settlement on winning for a client; a portion that goes right back into the firm to help it represent other clients who need them. Granted big cases sometimes have big wins, but it should be remembered that a big firm with a big case and a big track record for winning, will also have big office overhead.

But back to the concept that lawyers need to change how they are perceived. There may well be some truth in that observation. The law professor went on to point out that not much time is spent preventing problems in the justice system, because everyone is too busy protecting their behinds. How does that impact on lawyers? If you want the justice system to work in any given state, the money to do that has to come from the legislature. If the legislature perceives lawyers as money-grubbing talking heads out just for fame and fortune, state courts will continue to face underfunding and staggering case loads.

Justice is needed at all levels of the legal system, but as it exists right now, the middle class are slammed between a rock and a hard place when it comes to medical malpractice lawsuits. In many states, there has been med mal caps implemented that are designed to cap damages for victims of medical negligence. For those plaintiffs who are so severely injured that they need care for the rest of their lives, capping medical malpractice damages is an outrageous travesty of justice.

What is even more frightening is that there are also some states that are currently contemplating bringing in a loser pays law. Think about that for a minute. The seriously injured victim goes to court with a medical malpractice case and for some reason, the case is lost. The loser pays approach would mean the victim would pay the price, twice. Once as a victim of medical negligence and for the second time as a severely injured victim who lost a court case. And the victim gets huge sums of money from where?

What is happening here is that these kinds of restrictive laws are trying to scare victims away; victims that don’t have the ability to access money to pursue a valid claim in court. What does that say about the justice system?

Robert Webb is an Atlanta personal injury lawyer with Webb & D’Orazio, a law firm specializing in Atlanta personal injury, malpractice, criminal defense, and business law. Learn more at Webbdorazio.com.

You do not realize how important business law is until you have a contract dispute. Business is the backbone of America.

If you stop to think about it, one of the main things that keeps society functioning and on track is business law, especially business transactions, contracts, agreements, the building of new companies, corporations, etc. Governing all this commerce is business law; call it overseeing the world of business if you will.

Without business law in place, the world would be a much tougher place to regulate and run because there would be no contracts and no one to uphold contracts and hold people to their word. It would mean business would run without any repercussions or consequences for those who did not live up to their promises. Unfortunately, even though a lot of people would follow through on their promises, they are just as many more who would rip the system and others off. This is why you need business law.

You may know business law as commercial law. Its usual definition is that it governs business and commercial transaction and is a branch of civil law, handling issues in the public and private sectors. Under this umbrella you will find an enormous range of legal issues and lawyers that deal with things like white-collar crimes (a criminal issue, not civil) and insider trading.

On the other side of the business/commercial law fence you would have corporate contracts, hiring practices and the manufacture/sales of consumer goods, etc.  When dealing with contract law, unarguably the largest arena in business law, you would typically be writing contracts, supervising their signing, ensuring they are worded correctly and filing a lawsuit if there is a breach of the contract. Just about everything we do today involves a contract of some sort, whether it’s buying a house to renting a carpet cleaner.

When it comes to hiring, this is one of the trickier areas of law, particularly if a business has to let an employee go. In situations like this, if you do not have a carefully worded hiring/firing policy, you could be open to a lawsuit for wrongful dismissal. Even with a handbook in place, you may still have legal issues. This is why you need the advice and counsel of a skilled Atlanta business lawyer.

Then, consider the world of manufacturing. It is not just the company that makes the product that has a part in the chain of commerce; there is also the designer, the shipper and the seller. Each link in the chain has contracts with the other links in the chain, and so it goes. Although they are largely invisible, those contracts are what glues everything together; keeping industry and commerce running smoothly and accountably.

Robert Webb is an Atlanta personal injury lawyer with Webb & D’Orazio, a law firm specializing in Atlanta personal injury, malpractice, criminal defense, and business law. Learn more at Webbdorazio.com.