Trial

Published on: May 21, 2012

Pre-Impact Fright: Fear of an Impending Collision is Compensable in Maryland

Skid Marks.JPG The 1998 Court of Appeals decision in Beynon v. Montgomery Cablevision ruled that pre-impact fright is compensable in Maryland auto accidents. We all know what pre-impact fright is–those brief moments before an impending collision when you realize that another car is going to hit you. This is the moment that causes you to freeze, to shut your eyes, to pray, to hold your breath. It’s that moment that the adrenaline shoots through your system.

The old rule was that damages could be recovered for injuries like fright only with physical impact, but that rule was done away with in 1909. For the run of the mill auto case though, a better case is made with some element physical impact or injury–a close call doesn’t usuallycut it. The Beynon case was about whether pre-impact fright was compensable in a wrongful death case where the driver was killed in the collision. In that tractor-trailer collision, a driver collided into the rear of a truck. The allegations against the truck driver were that the truck did not have proper lighting in the rear, making it difficult to see. Leading to the point of impact were over 71 feet of skid marks–a clear indication that the driver knew what was coming. He died on impact. The trial jury decided that $1,000,000.00 in pre-impact fright damages were sufficient (according to Maryland law applicable at the time, that figure was reduced to $350,000.00).

A primary concern of the court was to prevent fabricated and speculative claims. Particularly in wrongful death cases, the family could claim that there was pre-impact fright, but it can be a difficult thing to prove. Unless you have over 71 feet of skid marks.

Published on: May 11, 2012

Using iPad to Wirelessly Present Your Case At Trial

By Posner & Cord, LLC

iPad Jobs.jpg The iPad is great–you know it, I know it. It’s slick. It’s refined. It just oozes “cool.” Lawyers are now starting to use the iPad for work. Many use it to complement their laptops. Some use it now instead of a laptop. It’s even making the rounds at depositions, used to hold thousands of pages of documents and potential exhibits.

When it comes to trial, though, most attorneys ruin the cool. They have an iPad. They have a projector. The iPad is connected to the projector, by ugly wires (an iPad to HDMI adapter, and HDMI cables). They are tethered to the projector, by ugly wires. At that point, it doesn’t look nearly as sophisticated.

Lawyers: there is one way to present your case, and to maintain the ability to walk anywhere you want in the courtroom, with your iPad in hand. The jury will marvel at your grace, and will respect your technological sophistication. Especially compared to the defense lawyer who is using a foam-core blow-up and a slide rule.

Published on: February 24, 2012

Bus and Taxi Accidents in Maryland

By Posner & Cord, LLC

Maryland Bus Accident.png I’ve learned to not take things for granted at trial. I had a case once where a witness was going to testify about something, the defense lawyer objected, and the judge sustained (agreed with) that objection. I explained the the judge the objection was improper, that the evidence was allowed under Maryland law, and that my client should have been allowed to testify. He didn’t even spend a second reconsidering, but denied my request.

[It’s not important for the purpose of the story, but the judge ruled that the witness could not testify about what she heard an employee of the defendant corporation say immediately after an accident on company property. The judge ruled that the employee was not the corporation, so the statement did not qualify as an admission by party-opponent. Therefore, it was hearsay and forbidden. This is dead-wrong on the law].

So, I’ve learned that judges are people, too. They don’t always have all of the answers. It must be hard to be a judge–they have to know a little about the law for criminal cases, family/domestic cases, and civil cases. Of course they will get things wrong from time-to-time. I was caught off-guard because I thought the evidence rule was a basic one that everyone knew. I never made that mistake again.

Published on: February 20, 2012

Proving The Other Driver Was At Fault In A Maryland Auto Accident

By Posner & Cord, LLC

Maryland Car Accident Lane Signs.png Maryland automobile injury lawsuits come in three types:

One driver was clearly at fault (for example, the average rear-end collision);
It’s uncertain which driver was at fault, but the rules are clear (for example, a “lane change” case where one driver, we don’t have any outside evidence, merged into the other driver); and
Someone is at fault, but it’s hard to know who.

Let’s talk about No. 3, today. The auto accident rules of the road are usually pretty easy–most of them are “common sense” acquired by most of us drivers over the years. Many rules on the “standard of care” owed by drivers to one another have been lovingly written by the Maryland legislature, mostly in the Transportation Code.

But sometimes, a client comes in and tells you what happened. It might sound okay, but some of the details are fuzzy. Technology is a wonderful thing, so I frequently visit Google Earth for a bird’s eye view and street view of the accident.

Unfortunately, not all rules are laid out in the Maryland Transportation Code. Sure, there is some discussion of traffic control devices, flashing signals and the like (see here). But what about the actual rules regarding when you can cross a double yellow line? There are a lot of road signs and other marking rules, and they are not always obvious.

Published on: February 14, 2012

Punishing Drunk Drivers For Maryland Car Accidents

By Posner & Cord, LLC

I'm Just a Bill, Part 2 In the spirit of our most recent post on raising the insurance coverage in Maryland for certain MAIF claims, let’s talk about another proposed bill before the Maryland legislature, one seeking to impose punitive damages on some drunk drivers.

First, you should know that punitive damages in Maryland are nearly impossible to get in car accident lawsuits. By nearly impossible, I mean impossible. By impossible, I mean it pretty much has to be intentional murder. Lawyers have tried, but even the driver who has been arrested three times for drunk driving, has been in two accidents while driving drunk, and finally kills an entire family, does not get punitive damages.

Punitive damages are damages unrelated to the actual injuries in a case. In most cases, judges and juries pronounce a verdict of compensatory damages, which is meant to replace losses suffered in a Maryland car accident–medical expenses, lost wages, mental anguish, inconvenience, and the like. Punitive damages are linked directly to the person who caused the harm–the worse the behavior of that person, the more punitive damages a judge or jury could impose. Punitives are meant to punish the wrongdoer.

Published on: January 12, 2012

Proving Your Maryland Auto Accident Case

By Posner & Cord, LLC

burden of proof scales.jpg Because of television legal dramas, most people know about the burden of proof. For criminal cases, the burden of proof is usually “beyond a reasonable doubt.” In civil cases, like car accidents, truck accidents and medical malpractice, the standard is “more likely than not.”

Lawyers often use the “scales of justice” example. If you have a scale in perfect balance, and you place all of the victim’s evidence on the left, and all of the defendant’s evidence on the right, a victim wins if her side is ever so slightly heavier than the other side. 50.0000001% is a plaintiff victory. In a criminal case, the prosecution’s evidence must be much “heavier”–basically, they have to be pushing it down to the ground.

That’s all very abstract. Let’s use a common scenario. Say you provide evidence at trial (say, your own testimony and testimony of an independent witness) that you are stopped at a red light for 30 seconds. You also provide evidence that the defendant crashed into the back of your car. Unless the defendant can provide some evidence that, for example, you backed into him, he will lose because your evidence indicates that it is more likely that he crashed into you. This is one reason why most rear-end collisions result in a plaintiff’s verdict.