Archive for August, 2009

Barrett spoke for the first time Wednesday (August 19) about being attacked by a man as he attempted to help a woman and her one-year-old granddaughter near the Wisconsin State Fair on Saturday night. The popular 55-year-old mayor suffered a shattered hand got two of his teeth knocked out and had gashes on his face and the back of his head.

Anthony J. Peters, 29, was arrested by Milwaukee police about noon Sunday near 17th and State Street after he was sought for the beating which happened as the mayor was leaving the Wisconsin State Fair at 10:45 p.m. in the 8800 block of W. Orchard St., West Allis at State Fair Park. The mayor was attending the fair with his family.

Questions arise about the mayor’s security. Should he have had a security guard with him while he visited the Wisconsin State Fair? Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle said in a radio interview Wednesday that he feels Barrett didn’t ask for security because “he just wanted a normal life,” that he should have been entitled to enjoy the fair with his family.

This leads me to something I have been thinking about. It involves people’s personal security. Sometimes bad things happen in completely unforeseen places and circumstances. But, sometimes things happen that could have been prevented because bad things have happened in those places before. And, it is predictable and foreseeable that additional criminal incidents would happen there again.

Although Mayor Barrett was attacked in what was apparently a safe public walkway, there are many privately owned businesses and commercial premises that should be looking after people’s security. And some just aren’t doing it.

Based on my experience in several recent cases, many property owners and businesses have a cavalier attitude towards their customers’ safety. Even though they are aware of unsafe conditions, they do not remedy them even after they are brought to their attention time and again. Issues like inadequate lighting or unsafe conditions, rickety stairs, unsafe tenants—even convicted arsonists allowed to live in an apartment complex without notifying the other tenants. We have seen situations where there have been repeated armed robberies, muggings and assaults in certain areas and specifically at certain addresses.  The law states that it is the property owner’s responsibility to exercise ordinary care to avoid creating an unreasonable risk of injury to a person. It is the business owner’s responsibility to provide a safe place for his/her employees and customers, including taking reasonable measures to prevent foreseeable violent incidents and deal with violent crime activity.

Of course, when it comes to trial, they argue they could not have predicted the incident. In several recent cases, I have asked our firm’s researchers to check police records and found that some businesses have an alarmingly long history of police calls. Time and again police were called to the same location and still things did not seem to improve. Some taverns, convenience stores, gas stations and partially-hidden ATM machines seem to generate an unusually high percentage of incidents.

Some businesses claimed they offered security, but when we checked into it, their security was nothing more than hiring a burly guy to stand at the door. That is not security. A good system involves a thorough security analysis, well-trained security professionals, strategic security thinking, and plans for preventing dangerous situations. We have hired experts to help us prove that inadequate, inappropriate or malfunctioning security was the cause of our clients’ injuries.

While it is unfortunate to be attacked in a place that is assumed to be safe, it is even more unfortunate to be attacked and injured in a place where the people know it is likely to happen and they did not provide adequate security.

This is the type of situation where an experienced personal injury attorney can help victims recover monetary awards or settlements for their losses and injuries. Our firm has worked with many of these types of “inadequate security” cases and we are eager to delve into the details to protect our clients’ rights.

In addition to Hausmann-McNally’s legal work for clients, we have devoted considerable resources and energy to overcoming violence in another way–checking it at the door by creating a positive counter force. In our efforts to create the Victory Over Violence Park in Milwaukee’s inner city, we transformed a rundown, littered area in one of the most violent areas of the city and turned it into a park where people can stroll, sit, listen to music, and enjoy flowers, trees and the outdoors. Hundreds of volunteer hours and the efforts of the neighborhood have helped make it bright spot for Milwaukee’s inner city.

As a lawyer, I get great satisfaction in winning court cases and settlements for my clients. As a citizen, I believe we need to do what we can to counteract the negative violent forces in our community.

The beating of Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett is in the headlines.

I don’t usually find public annual reports fascinating, but the State of Ohio has produced one of the most thorough and readable documents on highway safety that I have ever seen.

If you want to know anything about traffic safety statistics in Ohio in 2008, take a look at Ohio’s “2008 Crash Facts”.  It is not available in print and when you see the size, you will know why.

As I scanned the document, it occurred to me that traffic accidents are such a significant part of our modern human drama they merit a huge volume to document the damage and loss.  We all know someone who was injured or killed in a motor vehicle accident. Many of us have been in accidents ourselves. Automobile, motorcycle and truck accidents take an enormous toll on individuals, families and communities. The State of Ohio has taken much trouble to document many details to help fill in the details. As a personal injury attorney, my calling is to help repair the lives of the victims…by helping get them the financial settlements that address the loss and pain suffered as the result of someone else’s misdeeds.

A cover letter from the Henry Guzman, Director of the Ohio Department of Public Safety, reports both good news and bad news in crash statistics:

“In 2008, Ohio continued to make improvements in highway safety. The traffic crash fatality rate continued to go down, to a near-historic low of 1,191 fatalities. Alcohol related fatalities and the number of people who died unbelted on Ohio’s roads also declined.

“One of our biggest concerns is a continuing increase in motorcycle fatalities. Motorcycle fatalities have increased on Ohio’s roads by 35 percent over the past three years. In the past year they jumped dramatically, from 190 in 2007 to 213 in 2008.”

The detailed report highlights many factors that cause and contribute to motor vehicle accidents and goes into granular detail. It even lists which stationary objects were most often hit by cars. (Trees are #1on the list!)
As an attorney who has spent his professional life defending the rights of accident victims, I find the statistics chilling. For Ohio in 2008, they report:

• Approximately 3.0 fatal crashes each day.
• Approximately 3.3 persons were killed each day.
• One person was killed every 7.4 hours.
• There were 307.1 persons injured every day.
• One person was injured every 4.7 minutes.
• Of drivers involved in crashes, 53.7 % are males, 42.2 % are females, and 4.1 % are gender not stated.
• Alcohol impaired drivers were involved in 4.45 % of all crashes.
• Alcohol impaired drivers were involved in 37.70 % of all fatalities.
• 75.9 % of all alcohol impaired drivers involved in crashes were males.
• 63.8 % of all crashes occurred during the daylight.
• Motor vehicle crashes killed 48.0 children and injured 9,025.

This tells me that number of lives lost through wrongful death on the highway is still far too prevalent. Preventative measures like improved highway condition and design, better law enforcement, consistently good driver education and tough drunk driving laws all demand our attention. Motorcycle accidents are now a major concern. One is that in a distressed economy, more people may be riding their motorcycles  for economical reasons. Training and safety programs are sometimes cut when budgets are tight. And, highway drivers need to be constantly reminded to be on the lookout for motorcycles, which can seem to come from nowhere.

The answers for people injured or who have lost loved ones in a highway wrongful death often lie in getting competent legal assistance in order to receive compensation for the pain and loss. While the accidents are a personal tragedy, the personal injury attorney is the person you want in your corner if you were injured in a automobile, truck or motorcycle accident or if you are the survivor of someone who died in a highway-related wrongful death.

The tragic case of Dr. Mark Benson, a Milwaukee-area orthopedic surgeon turned drug abuser turned highway killer has unfolded before our eyes for several months. Much has been written about the April 2008 tragedy by Milwaukee-area news outlets. Popular teacher and Associate Principal Jennifer Bukosky, her unborn child and her 10-year-old daughter were struck and killed by Benson. Two other children were injured. Benson was high on drugs at the time of the crash. And his problems with drugs had been evident to himself and others since 1993.

Reams have been written about this as people try to understand how this happened. But there is another side to the drama. We have read about the criminal court drama that resulted in Benson being sentenced to 30 years in prison, but there is another aspect to the case, the civil trial that is separate from his criminal conviction. This is where the law makes it possible for the victims and their families to receive a monetary settlement for the pain, loss, injury and injustice suffered.

All through this process, personal injury lawyers have been working to help the survivors obtain financial justice from the orthopedic surgeon who likely has considerable assets. It was discovered that he planned to hide assets before the victims could get their hands on them.

Benson apparently made a phone call after he was apprehended that was overheard. He reportedly told his wife that he was going to divest of his financial assets before the victims’ family could get a hold of them. He was going to squirm out of his financial responsibility to the victims.

Smart personal injury attorneys realized this would mean an injustice to their clients and froze his assets before he could hide them. While he has been found guilty in criminal court, he is yet to stand trial in civil court. That is where the survivors will be able to recover money for their pain and loss. It will be interesting to see how much money was “rescued” by this quick action.

No one and no amount of money can make the injured victims or the surviving husband and family whole , but it is also important to note that the law clearly states that victims are entitled to monetary compensation.

According to a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel article, Benson has had a drug problem since 1993 and had numerous convictions and warnings, he even lost his license to practice medicine for a time. The fact that he tried to hide assets to somehow keep the victims from getting at his money is reprehensible. And, the fact that a smart personal injury attorney was able to prevent that demonstrates why personal injury attorneys are the people who you want on your team at these difficult, awkward, even tragic times following a serious traffic accident.