Category Archives: Personal Injury

A personal injury or accident can alter your life forever. You may be able to get support with expenses from a personal injury settlement by contacting an based personal injury lawyer NOW.

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So if you are facing hit and run charges or accusations

Hit and Run Lawyers: Hit and Run Charges!

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Taking Hit and Run Cases

 

If you have been involved in a hit and run traffic accident, regardless of whose fault it may have been, you may have gotten worried, and or did not know where to stop or whom to contact, and your left the scene of a collision without exchanging the pertinent information, so now what. The most important decision following a hit and run accident is that in finding an experienced hit and run defense attorney that can and will punctually help you.

Wise Laws hit and run defense attorney that represents most areas within America. We are very knowledgeable and can recognize the use of successful and winning strategies, in many circumstances, makes all attempts at resolving the matters of hit and run incidents before any criminal charges are to be filed. The aspect and route of civil options, is only open for a short amount of time, before law enforcement concludes their investigation. There are so many various reasons that a hit and run case can occur or happen. Do not make your situational circumstances worse by trying and attempting to resolve it on your own without the help of a legal hit and run professional.

Continued Arrest Hit And Run Information

The driver of any vehicle involved in an accident resulting in injury to any person, or in the death of a person, shall immediately stop the vehicle at the scene of the accident, as stated by law. When this law is violated, the violator is subject to jail time and up to $10,000 in fines. In the case of the hit and run accident resulting in death or any other serious injury, the violator is subject to prison time and hefty fines, and extensive restitution orders.

Tallahassee Hit and Run Lawyers – Orlando Hit and Run Lawyers – Dallas Hit and Run Lawyers – Fort Worth Hit and Run Lawyers – Honolulu Hit and Run Lawyers – Boise Hit and Run Lawyers – Bismarck Hit and Run Lawyers – Grafton Hit and Run Lawyers – Raleigh Hit and Run Lawyers – Durham Hit and Run Lawyers – Santa Fe Hit and Run Lawyers – Albuquerque Hit and Run Lawyers – Albany Hit and Run Lawyers – Phoenix Hit and Run Lawyers – Peoria Hit and Run Lawyers – Las Vegas Hit and Run Lawyers – Louisville Hit and Run Lawyers – Little Rock Hit and Run Lawyers – Los Angeles Hit and Run Lawyers – Miami Hit and Run Lawyers – Des Moines Hit and Run Lawyers – New Haven Hit and Run Lawyers – Indianapolis Hit and Run Lawyers – Detroit Hit and Run Lawyers – Joplin Hit and Run Lawyers – Biloxi Hit and Run Lawyers – Oklahoma City Hit and Run Lawyers – Portland Hit and Run Lawyers – Sioux Falls Hit and Run Lawyers – Nashville Hit and Run Lawyers – Memphis Hit and Run Lawyers – Houston Hit and Run Lawyers – Tacoma Hit and Run Lawyers – Minneapolis Hit and Run Lawyers – Provo Hit and Run Lawyers – Tulsa Hit and Run Lawyers – Annapolis Hit and Run Lawyers –Sacramento Hit and Run Lawyers – Denver Hit and Run Lawyers – Charlotte Hit and Run Lawyers – Boston Hit and Run Lawyers – Olympia Hit and Run Lawyers – Atlanta Hit and Run Lawyers – Santa Monica Hit and Run Lawyers – Malibu Hit and Run Lawyers – Tucson Hit and Run Lawyers – Scottsdale Hit and Run Lawyers – Beverly Hills Hit and Run Lawyers – Boca Raton Hit and Run Lawyers

Depending on the significance of a traffic accident, an accused person’s prior criminal record, and whether another person was injured physically, a hit and run charge can be filed as either a felony and or misdemeanor. Minor hit and run accidents with very little property damage and no physical injuries are typically charged as only misdemeanors. If a hit and run accident results in body injury or death, it will generally be filed as a felony charge. These Felonies hit and run cases and charges are generally punished more severely than misdemeanor violations. Possible jail time and hefty fines vary in hit and run cases, taking into consideration the specifics of each and every case.

So if you are facing hit and run charges or accusations, please contact Wise Laws and our hit and run legal defense team

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Why not call the best lawyer for Hit and Run charges?

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Blog, Business Law, Civil Rights, Legal News, Personal Injury

Gawker Case Calls Attention to a Go-To Hollywood Lawyer

By MICHAEL CIEPLY

Sourced From – http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/30/business/media/gawker-case-calls-attention-to-a-go-to-hollywood-lawyer.html?_r=0

LOS ANGELES — In Hollywood, everyone knows the go-to lawyers.

For divorce, there’s Laura Wasser, now representing Johnny Depp in his split with Amber Heard.

For a potential criminal charge, think Blair Berk, who helped Caitlyn Jenner avoid one after a traffic accident in which one person died, or Thomas Mesereau, who got Michael Jackson acquitted.

And if it just seems to be a workaday violation of a famous person’s rights, like slapping Reese Witherspoon’s name on jewelry without her permission? That was the sort of case Charles J. Harder was known for — until now.

Mr. Harder and his boutique Hollywood firm, Harder, Mirell & Abrams, are suddenly in the limelight. Last week it was revealed that their legal victory for the former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, in his suit against Gawker Media over publication of a sex video, was secretly underwritten by the Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel. Hulk Hogan, whose real name is Terry Gene Bollea, was awarded $140 million.

Mr. Thiel, a PayPal founder, had a longstanding dispute with Gawker, which published an article in 2007 saying he was gay.

The case, and Mr. Thiel’s place in it, have sent a shudder through many in the news media. At issue is whether Mr. Thiel’s role in the case will motivate other wealthy and powerful people to settle scores by giving money to litigants whose causes they support.

(The Gawker case is likely to continue with appeals, and a June 10 hearing into matters that are still pending.)

A smaller question, but almost as fascinating in Los Angeles legal circles, is this: How did Mr. Harder, a 46-year-old Beverly Hills lawyer who has specialized in protecting stars from having their rights infringed upon by retailers and marketers, wind up in the middle of this free speech fight?

Mr. Harder would not comment for this article. But a close look at his résumé, and conversations with people familiar with his background, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of confidentiality strictures, suggest that Mr. Harder’s emergence as a power player happened as most things do in Hollywood. That is, through a combination of grit, talent, shrewd calculation — and knowing the right people.

Mr. Harder’s growing connections with celebrities, their representatives and well-heeled entrepreneurs was clearly rooted in a legal action filed in 2009 in state and federal courts here.

In those interrelated cases, Mr. Harder represented six famous actresses — Sandra Bullock, Michelle Pfeiffer, Cameron Diaz, Mandy Moore, Kate Hudson and Diane Keaton — against a group of computer retailers and other companies accused of a somewhat mundane violation. The actresses’ images appeared in catalogs and on websites, on the screens of various devices offered for sale.

After working its way through the courts and mediation, that dispute ended in confidential settlements and dismissal. For Mr. Harder, the outcome was successful enough to set a pattern for succeeding cases that found him and his colleagues, in quick succession, filing various privacy rights claims for a growing client list that included George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Bradley Cooper, Liam Neeson, Jude Law, Halle Berry, Tyra Banks, Clint Eastwood and Ms. Witherspoon.

The claims and the outcomes — settlements, rather than trials — were often similar. In one departure, Mr. Harder in 2011 fought all the way through trial to a $15 million verdict for the producer Vittorio Cecchi Gori in a complicated dispute with a former colleague, Gianni Nunnari, over rights in films that included “300,” “The Departed” and “Shutter Island.”

At least once before, Mr. Harder has tangled with Gawker, in 2012 on behalf of Lena Dunham. He demanded that the site take down a posting of Ms. Dunham’s book proposal, which it largely did, though it continued to display fragments and commentary.

In early October 2012, Gawker refused a demand by Mr. Bollea’s longtime lawyer, David Houston, that it remove the sex video from its site. Mr. Harder — then at the firm Wolf, Rifkin, Shapiro, Schulman & Rabkin — was retained and quickly filed suit.

Whether Mr. Thiel had assured funding at that point is unclear. But Mr. Harder and his colleagues were confident enough of their footing to start their own firm the following January, taking Mr. Bollea and other clients with them.

During the Gawker trial, Mr. Harder, though lead counsel, played a relatively small role in the handling of witnesses, who were often questioned by others. But he currently represents clients in two additional suits against Gawker. One was filed this month in a Boston federal court by Shiva Ayyadurai, who claims he invented email, and another was filed in January in a Manhattan federal court by Ashley Terrill, a journalist. It is not known if Mr. Thiel has played any role in supporting those suits.

Harder, Mirell & Abrams currently has its offices in a small, fashionable building adjoining the Beverly Wilshire Hotel on Rodeo Drive. It is near the Century City quarters of much larger law firms like Ziffren Brittenham and Jackoway Tyerman, and talent representatives like the Creative Artists Agency.

It is also a short drive from the San Fernando Valley, where Mr. Harder grew up. He attended Montclair College Preparatory School, now closed, in Van Nuys, and did his undergraduate work at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

After receiving a law degree from Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, Mr. Harder clerked briefly for Judge A. Andrew Hauk, who was then at the United States District Court for the Central District of California in Los Angeles.

Mr. Harder then spent about a year with the Lavely & Singer law firm. The firm and its principal partners, John H. Lavely Jr. and Martin D. Singer, are known as fierce defenders of prominent celebrities like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone.

But Mr. Harder did little trial work for the firm, either then or during a second stint at Lavely & Singer. In between, he worked for a web company, Load Media Network.

In 2001, a case he was working on received attention in The New York Times. His client, Wendy Withers, was told not to report to work at a financially troubled New York ad agency after having left her previous job.

It was a modest claim, and — unlike the Hulk Hogan case, with its huge award — it was settled. Ms. Withers collected two months’ pay.

Blog, Family, Legal News, Personal Injury, Supreme Court

What are my rights & protections in a nursing home?

As a resident in a Medicare and/or Medicaid-certified nursing home, you have certain rights and protections under federal and state law that help ensure you get the care and services you need.

The nursing home must tell you about these rights and explain them in writing in a language you understand. They must also explain in writing how you should act and what you’re responsible for while you’re in the nursing home. This must be done before or at the time you’re admitted, as well as during your stay. You must acknowledge in writing that you got this information.

At a minimum, federal law specifies that a nursing home must protect and promote the rights of each resident. As a person with Medicare, you have certain guaranteed rights and protections. In addition to these rights, you also have the right to:

Be treated with respect

You have the right to be treated with dignity and respect, as well as make your own schedule and participate in the activities you choose. You have the right to decide when you go to bed, rise in the morning, and eat your meals.

Participate in activities

You have the right to participate in an activities program designed to meet your needs and the needs of the other residents.

Be free from discrimination

Nursing homes don’t have to accept all applicants, but they must comply with local, state, and federal civil rights laws.

Be free from abuse and neglect

You have the right to be free from verbal, sexual, physical, and mental abuse, as well as abuse of your money or property (called “misappropriation of property”). Nursing homes can’t keep you apart from everyone else against your will.

If you feel you’ve been mistreated (abused) or the nursing home isn’t meeting your needs (neglect), report this to the nursing home administrator. Depending on your state, the agency that investigates abuse and neglect will be Adult Protective Services and/or the State Survey Agency. The nursing home must investigate and report all suspected violations and any injuries of unknown origin within 5 working days of the incident to the proper authorities. The Long-Term Care Ombudsman can also help by being your advocate and helping you resolve your concerns.

Be free from restraints

Nursing homes can’t use any physical restraints (like side rails) or chemical restraints (like drugs) to discipline you or for the staff’s own convenience.

Make complaints

You have the right to make a complaint to the staff of the nursing home or any other person without fear of being punished. The nursing home must address the issue promptly.

Get proper medical care

You have these rights regarding your medical care:

  • To be fully informed about your total health status in a language you understand.
  • To be fully informed about your medical condition, prescription and over-the-counter drugs, vitamins, and supplements.
  • To be involved in the choice of your doctor.
  • To participate in the decisions that affect your care.
  • To take part in developing your care plan. By law, nursing homes must develop a care plan for each resident. You have the right to take part in this process. Family members can also help with your care plan with your permission.
  • To access all your records and reports, including clinical records (medical records and reports) promptly during weekdays. Your legal guardian has the right to look at all your medical records and make important decisions on your behalf.
  • To express any complaints (also called “grievances”) you have about your care or treatment.
  • To create advance directives in accordance with state law.
  • To refuse to participate in experimental treatment.
  • Have your representative notified. The nursing home must notify your doctor and, if known, your legal representative or an interested family member when:
    • You’re injured in an accident and/or need to see a doctor.
    • Your physical, mental, or psychosocial status starts to get worse.
    • You have a life threatening condition.
    • You have medical complications.
    • Your treatment needs to change significantly.
    • The nursing home decides to transfer or discharge you from the nursing home.
  • Get information on services and fees. You have the right to be told in writing about all nursing home services and fees (those that are charged and not charged to you) before you move into the nursing home and at any time when services and fees change. In addition:
    • The nursing home can’t require a minimum entrance fee if your care is paid for by Medicare or Medicaid.
    • For people seeking admission to the nursing home, the nursing home must tell you (both orally and in writing) and display written information about how to apply for and use Medicare and Medicaidbenefits.
    • The nursing home must also provide information on how to get a refund if you paid for an item or service, but because of Medicare and Medicaid eligibility rules, it’s now considered covered.
  • Manage your money. You have the right to manage your own money or choose someone you trust to do this for you. In addition:
    • If you deposit your money with the nursing home or ask them to hold or account for your money, you must sign a written statement saying you want them to do this.
    • The nursing home must allow you access to your bank accounts, cash, and other financial records.
    • The nursing home must have a system that ensures full accounting for your funds and can’t combine your funds with the nursing home’s funds.
    • The nursing home must protect your funds from any loss by providing an acceptable protection, like buying a surety bond.
    • If a resident with a fund passes away, the nursing home must return the funds with a final accounting to the person or court handling the resident’s estate within 30 days.
  • Get proper privacy, property, and living arrangements. You have these rights:
    • Keep and use your personal belongings and property as long as they don’t interfere with the rights, health, or safety of others.
    • Have private visits.
    • Make and get private phone calls.
    • Have privacy in sending and getting mail and email.
    • Have the nursing home protect your property from theft.
    • Share a room with your spouse if you both live in the same nursing home (if you both agree to do so).
    • Be notified by the nursing home before your room or your roommate is changed. They should take your preferences into account.
    • Review the nursing home’s health and fire safety inspection results.
  • Spend time with visitors. You have these rights:
    • Spend private time with visitors.
    • Have visitors at any time, as long as you wish to see them, and as long as the visit doesn’t interfere with the provision of care and privacy rights of other residents.
    • See any person who gives you help with your health, social, legal, or other services at any time. This includes your doctor, a representative from the health department, and your Long-Term Care Ombudsman, among others.
  • Get social services. The nursing home must provide you with any needed social services, including:
    • Counseling.
    • Help solving problems with other residents.
    • Help in contacting legal and financial professionals.
    • Discharge planning.
  • Leave the nursing home:
    • Leaving for visits:
      • If your health allows, and your doctor agrees, you can spend time away from the nursing home visiting family or friends during the day or overnight, called a “leave of absence.” Talk to the nursing home staff a few days ahead of time so the staff has time to prepare your medicines and write your instructions.
      • Caution: if your nursing home care is covered by certain health insurance, you may not be able to leave for visits without losing your coverage.
    • Moving out:
      • Nursing homes may have a policy that requires you to tell them before you plan to leave. If you don’t, you may have to pay an extra fee.
  • Have protections against unfair transfer or discharge:
    • You can’t be sent to another nursing home or made to leave the nursing home, unless any of these are true:
      • It’s necessary for the welfare, health, or safety of you or others.
      • Your health has improved to the point that nursing home care is no longer necessary.
      • The nursing home hasn’t been paid for services you got.
      • The nursing home closes.
    • You have these rights:
      • You have the right to appeal a transfer or discharge.
      • The nursing home can’t make you leave if you’re waiting to get Medicaid.
      • Except in emergencies, nursing homes must give a 30-day written notice of their plan and reason to discharge or transfer you.
      • The nursing home has to safely and orderly transfer or discharge you and give you proper notice of bed-hold and readmission requirements.
  • Form or participate in resident groups:
    • You have a right to form or participate in a resident group to discuss issues and concerns about the nursing home’s policies and operations. Most homes have such groups, often called “resident councils.” The home must give you meeting space and must listen to and act upon grievances and recommendations of the group.
  • Have your family and friends involved:
    • Family and friends can help make sure you get good quality care. They can visit and get to know the staff and the nursing home’s rules. Family members and legal guardians may meet with the families of other residents and may participate in family councils, if one exists. With your permission, family members can help with your care plan. If a family member or friend is your legal guardian, he or she has the right to look at all medical records about you and make important decisions on your behalf.

Sourced From – https://www.medicare.gov/what-medicare-covers/part-a/rights-in-nursing-home.html

Blog, Business Law, Legal News, Personal Injury

Personal Injury Lawyers Target Snapchat as Reason for Potential Car Crash Suits

POSTED 5:56 PM, APRIL 30, 2016, BY , UPDATED AT 05:54PM, APRIL 30, 2016

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Personal injury lawyers across the country have been asking people if they’ve been in a car accident that may have involved Snapchat.

Attorneys have set up websites to explain local laws on distracted driving, sent out press releases about Snapchat’s potential involvement in certain accidents, and written blog posts about the dangers of the app.

At issue are the app’s “speed filter” feature that tracks how fast someone is traveling while they take a selfie. Because Snapchat photos and videos disappear after viewing, they demand more concentration, one lawyer argues.

“If they are behind the wheel of a car and they want to view a Snapchat picture, 100% of their attention has been removed from the road,” California litigation attorney David Azizi writes on his blog.

Some lawyers make a more direct plea for potential clients.

“If you have been injured by a distracted driver, someone who was texting or playing with Snapchat or other social media apps call us today for a free consultation,” writes Steers and Associates, a California firm.

“Is Snapchat causing car accident deaths?” Wolff and Wolff Trial Lawyers in St. Louis ask on a dedicated page.

Earlier this week, Georgia resident Wentworth Maynard sued Snapchat and a young driver for a car crash that left him with serious brain injuries.

The suit alleges that the driver, a young woman, was using Snapchat while she was speeding at over 100 mph because she was using the speed filter feature.

While she was distracted, her car crashed into a Mitsubishi that Maynard was driving, according to the complaint. He suffered serious brain trauma as a result.

Jay Peavy, a general litigator from Atlanta, is co-consul with one of the Wentworth’s attorneys on another case.

He told CNNMoney on Friday that Clayton County, where the accident took place last year, is a blue collar area where most drivers only have the minimum insurance coverage of $25,000.

Peavy suspects that the woman being sued had the minimum liability insurance, which is probably not enough to cover the medical expenses that Wentworth is seeking.

“Any good plantiff’s lawyers [are] looking to see if they can get good deep pockets,” he said.

Snapchat is not commenting on the suit, but has issued this statement: “No Snap is more important than someone’s safety. We actively discourage our community from using the speed filter while driving, including by displaying a ‘Do NOT Snap and Drive’ warning message in the app itself.”

Snapchat isn’t the only app that’s been targeted by personal injury lawyers for new cases lately.

Steers & Associates, for example, also describe ways to deal with accidents involving Uber and Lyft.

Sourced From     – http://fox40.com/2016/04/30/personal-injury-lawyers-target-snapchat-as-reason-for-potential-car-crash-suits/