Wrongful Death

Drunken Driving by the Numbers: a Sobering Set of Statistics

October 11, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

The warning not to drive a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol is probably one of the highest-profile messages that we hear from law enforcement and other government agencies, public officials, and interest groups concerned with the problem. Our San Francisco automobile accident law firm often finds that the foregoing message has not been heeded by one or more of the parties in many of the cases it handles. And repeated news accounts of deadly DUI accidents as well as statistics show that this simple bit of sound advice is still lost on far too many people.

Because the advice of not driving a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol has become almost like a mantra, one would expect that this message should resonate most emphatically with the law enforcement officials who often promulgate it. However, public officials or even the peace officers who are entrusted with enforcing DUI laws can find themselves arrested for drunken driving. A unsettling example of this problem was detailed in the San Francisco Chronicle on Friday, when the newspaper reported that an off-duty San Francisco Police Department sergeant was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving and hit and run after he allegedly slammed his own vehicle into a parked car in San Francisco’s Sunset district Tuesday night. The police officer who was arrested, Sgt. Thomas Haymond, 52, is a 22-year veteran with the SFPD. A witness reported the collision, and police tracked a trail of of debris from the crash scene to Haymond’s home.

The statistics on drunken driving in the United States, unfortunately, continues to be a messy trail of facts, including these compiled by the national organization Mothers Against Drunk Driving:

Almost every 90 seconds, a person is injured in a drunken driving crash.
In 2011, 9,878 people died in drunken driving crashes, or one every 53 minutes.
Every day in the United States another 27 people die as a result of drunken driving crashes.
The typical drunken driver has driven while under the influence of alcohol 80 times before getting arrested for the first time.
Fifty to 75 percent of convicted drunken drivers continue to drive on a suspended license.
Drunken driving costs the United States $132 billion a year.

The impact of drunken driving isn’t limited to the motorists involved in automobile crashes, but also pedestrians and bicyclists. According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, in 2010 alcohol was a factor in 2,020 – or 47.2 percent – of pedestrian fatalities and 209 – or 33.8 percent – of pedal cyclist fatalities. However, the statistics on DUI-linked accidents are not all grim, as the BTS suggests that the application of so-called Zero Tolerance Laws may have been a factor in causing the number of alcohol-related fatalities in the United States to drop from 50.6 percent in 1990 to 42 percent in 2009.
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Questions Raised After Missing Patient Is Found Dead at S.F. General Hospital

October 9, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

One doesn’t normally expect to sustain personal injury when checking into a hospital or other medical facility, but unfortunately a significant number of patients are wrongly harmed or die every year while receiving medical care in the United States. And the perplexing death of one San Francisco hospital patient has left questions unanswered, including whether medical malpractice was involved.

Medical Examiner Investigating Cause of Death
As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, the body of Lynne Spalding, 57, was found by a San Francisco General Hospital employee in a stairwell about 10 a.m. Tuesday. As shocking as the discovery of the body of the mother of two and native of England was, the fact that Spalding was reported missing from the hospital more than two weeks before adds to the bizarre nature of this story. Spalding was last seen at SFGH on the morning of Sept. 21, two days after she was admitted to the hospital for complications resulting from an infection, and she disappeared from her room during a scheduled check by hospital staff on that day. Spalding’s friends have speculated that she may have been disoriented as a result of medication for her condition, and the San Francisco medical examiner’s office is attempting to determine the cause of her death.

While the exact cause of Spalding’s death remains to be determined, one thing that is certain is that SFGH had a duty of care for her and would be responsible for any incompetence on the part of hospital staff that led to her injury or death and that any such negligence would be the basis for a medical malpractice lawsuit. Typically one of the questions involved in a medical malpractice lawsuit against a hospital is whether the attending physician or physicians of the harmed patient is or are considered hospital employees or contractors, a factor that may impact the hospital’s liability.

Medical Errors Growing Problem in United States
The tragic death of Spalding stands out as grim example of when things go wrong at a hospital and may very well have been avoidable, but preventable errors at medical facilities include a wide range of never-should-have-happened phenomena, such as sponges left inside surgical patients, administration of improper medications, use of contaminated equipment and other types of mistakes. And it may come as a surprise to many, but medical errors are an increasingly deadly occurrence in the United States.
According to a recent report in Forbes magazine, 1999 statistics showed that 98,000 people were dying every year from preventable errors in American hospitals. However, the magazine goes on to say that a new study reveals that as many as 440,000 – or four times as many – people die from preventable medical errors in the United States. Putting the new numbers in perspective would mean that medical errors are now the third leading cause of death in the United States, more deadly than auto accidents or diabetes but in line behind notorious killers such as cancer and heart disease.

Another disturbing fact that came to light this year concerns the record of hospital care in the San Francisco Bay Area. While Bay Area hospitals generally get high marks for keeping patients alive, at least half of all the region’s medical institutions posted worse-than-average death rates in one or more medical procedure or patient condition in 2010 and 2011, according to a recent report in the San Jose Mercury News. SFGH was among the many regional hospitals that registered worse-than-average death rates in some categories compared with the state average.
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During Peak Harvest Season, We Are Reminded of Dangers of Food-Borne Illnesses

September 18, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

September is a time of the year to take joy in the bounty of our nation’s agricultural sector. However enticing fresh-from-the-farm produce may seem this month, though, we need to be aware that food-borne illnesses can crop up just as easily in late summer and early fall as in any other time of the year, and our food safety law firm continues to call attention to the pitfalls of contaminated food as well as serve as a top advocate for the rights of those who have been sickened or who have died as a result of consuming tainted food.

Bacteria-Linked Disease Outbreaks a Major Problem in U.S.
Unfortunately, food-borne illnesses are fairly common in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, every year 48 million Americans – roughly one in six of us – will fall ill due to eating contaminated food. Furthermore, CDC data show that during the period from Jan. 1, 2009, through Dec. 31, 2010, public health departments reported 1,527 food-borne disease outbreaks, which resulted in 29,444 cases of illness, 1,184 hospitalizations and 23 deaths. Of the 790 outbreaks with a laboratory-confirmed illness, norovirus was responsible for the most reported infections, followed by salmonella, which was linked to 30 percent of outbreaks. In the most severe cases, however, listeria was the most deadly agent, as 82 percent of those sickened by the pathogen were hospitalized. Indeed, among the 23 deaths during the two-year timeframe, 22 were due to a sickness caused by a bacteria such as listeria, salmonella, E. coli, Clostridium perfringens or shigella.

Vine-stalk vegetables are a major source of food-borne illnesses and hospitalizations due to contamination from such pathogens as salmonella or listeria. Just this month, a Wyoming man refiled a wrongful death lawsuit in federal court against a Sheridan, Wyo., Walmart, claiming that his wife died after she consumed a contaminated cantaloupe that was purchased at the big-box retailer, according to the Sheridan Press.

Sicknesses Traced to Cantaloupe Have Hurt Sales of Melons
Contaminated cantaloupe has been a problem that has devastated the melon-growing sector of agriculture, especially in California, where 75 percent of all the cantaloupes consumed in the United States are grown. While neither of the two biggest cantaloupe-linked bacteria outbreaks in the country – a listeria outbreak in 2011 that sickened 147 people and killed 33 in 28 states or a salmonella outbreak last year that caused 261 people to fall ill and three to die in 24 states – were traced to melons grown in California, sales of cantaloupes from all states have dropped significantly in the U.S. And according to Food Safety News, cantaloupe growers in the Golden State decided in June to adopt a mandatory food safety plan as a measure to restore confidence among consumers of their product. The new standards will include government audits of all stages of cantaloupe production and require handlers to pass the program’s audits, which will be run by inspectors from the California Department of Food and Agriculture.
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Hit-and-Run Fatality in S.F. Park Yet Another Shocking Personal Injury Incident

September 6, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

Ask most people to offer a list of activities they would associate with leisure and it’s safe to say that an outing to one’s local park facilities, especially with family or friends, would rank among the likely candidates. It’s therefore hard to imagine that a relaxing day in the park would turn out to be the nightmare that took the life of a Daly City mother spending time with her baby and dog in San Francisco’s Holly Park on Thursday, and one that triggered not only criminal charges but also civil law questions of liability, negligence and wrongful death.

City Vehicle at Center of Tragedy
As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, Christine Svanemyr, 35, her baby girl, Isa Amalie, and the family dog were spending the afternoon lying on the lawn at Holly Park in the Bernal Heights neighborhood when a Recreation and Park Department truck ran her over and killed her shortly after 2 p.m. Svanemyr’s daughter and dog were unharmed in the incident, according to the San Francisco Police Department, and in addition to Isa Amalie, she leaves her husband, Vegar Svanemyr.

The driver of the Recreation and Park vehicle, Thomas Burnowski, 57, was arrested on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter and felony hit-and-run. It’s not clear whether Burnowski was the gardener several neighborhood residents recall driving recklessly at the park, but the SFPD said an investigation into Svanemyr’s death is continuing. The Recreation and Park Department has placed Burnowski on administrative leave without pay pending the investigation.

A spokeswoman for the Recreation and Park Department stated that the department’s vehicle policy is that employees are not allowed to drive on park pathways, sidewalks, closed roads or the actual park area “merely for convenience purposes.”
“If work requirements necessitate operating a city vehicle on a park-scape or other surface not designed for vehicle operation, utilize a staff person outside the vehicle to serve as a safety watch or otherwise guide vehicle movement,” the Recreation and Park Department policy reads.

Driver Faces Multiple Felony Charges
Whether Burnowski violated Recreation and Park Department policy while driving his vehicle on park land is definitely one issue to consider, but one thing is certain, according to the SFPD: the parks department employee took off from Holly Park after hitting Svanemyr and was detained several blocks away and then arrested – and both manslaughter and hit-and-run is are serious felonies.

Unfortunately, Svanemyr is far from the only American to die as a result of a motor vehicle striking a pedestrian or other nonmotorist, as 5,307 such people died in the United States in 2011, according to the National Traffic and Highway Safety Administration. The NTHSA figure in that category has been creeping up since 2009 after generally falling off since the mid-1970s. The majority of pedestrian deaths as a result of being struck by a motor vehicle in an urban area in 2011 occurred on roads with speed limits or 40 mph or less, according to the NTHSA.
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Safety Reminders Following Death of a Toddler in an Oakland Parking Lot Accident

September 6, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

In the course of a day, we can visit several and we rarely think about the time spent in them. They are an in-between place, a necessity that we often rush through on the way to our destination. They are also one of the most dangerous places, posing a particular danger to our community’s youngest members. Parking lot accidents are all too common and parking lot fatalities are all too tragic. As an Oakland parking lot accident lawyer, Attorney Brod recognizes the potential dangers or parking lots and the risk of child fatalities in this under-looked danger zone.

Two Year-Old Hit and Killed By Vehicle Pulling Into Parking Lot

A tragic accident took the life of a toddler in an Oakland parking lot on Wednesday. The Contra Costa Times identified the young victim as Rafael Perez. Two year-old Rafael was playing in the waterfront-area parking lot while his mother sold fruit. According to police, the driver of a pick-up truck was pulling slowly into the lot when he struck and killed the toddler at around 4:15 P.M. The unidentified driver is cooperating with the authorities and neither drugs nor alcohol appear to be involved. The lot is on the 600 block of Embarcadero and situated adjacent to an abandoned furniture warehouse.

On Labor Day San Francisco Personal Injury Lawyer Reflects on Workers’ Compensation, Workplace Safety

September 2, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

There are multiple reasons for workers in California to be somewhat pleased this Labor Day. For one thing, the number of Californians in nonfarm and salaried employment continues to grow while the state’s unemployment figure remains well below its double-digit recession high, according to statistics compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The BLS numbers also show sustained growth in employment in key sectors of the Golden State’s economy, including construction, trade, transportation, utilities, finance, professional and business services, education, health care, and leisure and hospitality.

Workplace Deaths Down in California
While the employment landscape has improved in California, one might think that the opportunities for workplace injury or death would increase. However, according to a report in the Orange County Register, the opposite trend has occurred in the state, at least with respect to workplace fatalities. In 2012 there were 339 workers who died on the job in California, down 13 percent from the 2011 total of 390, and well below the recent high of 537 workplace deaths set in 2006. The improving numbers have been recorded in California despite the fact that one in three workers in the state continue to be employed in construction, manufacturing, and trade and transportation, three often dangerous industries.

California’s relatively strict workplace safety regulations may very well have played a role in reining in the number of deaths of workers on the job and allowing the state to record a lower than national average per-worker death rate. The Golden State’s figures stand in stark contrast to states with a relatively laissez-faire attitude toward businesses. Indeed in 2012, Texas – a state with few business regulations – once again held the dubious distinction of reporting the nation’s highest number of workplace deaths at 531, a figure that was 23 percent higher than the year before and one that gave the Lone Star State a per-worker death rate more than double that of California.

Workers Face Array of Potential Sources of Harm
In California, as in most states, workers who are injured or killed due to incidents that transpire during the course and scope of their employment are covered for their injuries by workers’ compensation. As a form of strict liability, workers’ compensation essentially is a no-fault system established by the state in which contributory negligence is not a factor – a legitimate workers’ compensation claim must be covered. And the gamut of injuries suffered on the job is a wide one, including all manner of construction accidents, accidents involving motorized equipment, slip-and-fall injuries, chemical burns, lung damage from inhalation of chemical vapors, hearing loss from loud noises or vibrations, carpal tunnel syndrome, etc.

While workers’ compensation laws have largely precluded lawsuits between injured employees and their employers, a worker who has been hurt on the job may still be able to file a lawsuit against a third party who may have caused or contributed to the worker’s injury. These third-party actions usually involve firms whose services have created unsafe working conditions or those that manufactured a defective product that was instrumental in the worker’s injury.
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As Public Access to New Bay Bridge Fast Approaches, Legacy of Old Span Will Include Wrongful Death Chapter

August 30, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

Bay Area residents are anxiously awaiting the scheduled opening of the Bay Bridge shortly after the Labor Day weekend. The dismantlement of the old eastern span has begun in earnest as workers put the finishing touches on its gleaming new replacement. But as the region’s anticipation builds for the public use of the new bridge, a recently settled wrongful death lawsuit suggests an ill-advised design, poor communication and haste may have been behind an accident-prone temporary stretch of the old eastern span.

S-Curve Quickly Earned Perilous Reputation
As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, documents from the lawsuit reveal that Caltrans managers never green-lighted the dangerous design of the Bay Bridge’s S-Curve, a stopgap section of the old eastern span with tricky sharp turns that was the scene of a fatal accident on Nov. 9, 2009, in which a Hayward truck driver fell 200 feet to his death after his big rig swerved and heaved over the railing, plunging to Yerba Buena Island below. The documents from the lawsuit filed on behalf of the family of the deceased truck driver went on to say that Caltrans officials approved the use of movable concrete rails in spite of a known risk that vehicles could go over the side of the rails. Motor vehicle crashes on the S-curve spiked in the weeks after it was completed for public use, and Caltrans sought to mitigate the perilous nature of the S-curve by imposing a slower speed limit and then installing “rumble” strips.

Lawsuit’s Documents Recount Quick Adoption of Shaky Standards for Temporary Bridge Passage
The lawsuit accused Caltrans of negligence in setting up a “concealed trap” by requiring motorists to negotiate the very sharp, unbanked turn of the S-curve while driving over a roadway with narrow lanes and shoulders as well as a substandard railing. The lawsuit’s documents also show that the S-curve, which was designed in 2003, fell short of freeway standards set by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO). Caltrans had hitherto heeded guidelines set by the AASHTO, but proceeded with construction of the S-curve after waiving the organization’s restrictions and subsequently tightening up the curve’s turns. However, plans for tightening the S-curve were not blueprinted by the curve project’s original engineer, but instead by a different Caltrans engineer who, a deposition from the lawsuit states, never discussed the changes with the original engineer. The S-curve’s tightening is at the heart of what senior Caltrans officials said they never approved. Perhaps the most disheartening narrative to emerge from from the lawsuit documents, though, was the one strongly implying that Caltrans officials hastily proceeded with installation of the S-curve – in spite of its apparent shortcomings – because the agency was motivated by a desire to save money and time.
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Advent of School Season Reminder of Perils Younger Bicyclists Face

August 27, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

The August 14 fatal collision between a bicycle and a truck in San Francisco that resulted in the bicyclist’s death is still fresh in the minds of Bay Area residents as well as in the thoughts of San Francisco bicycle accident attorney Greg Brod. However, with the back-to-school season upon us, the region is entering a potentially dangerous period for younger bicyclists, who are among the most vulnerable members of our society.

The tragic crash at the intersection of Sixth and Folsom streets in San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood took the life of 24-year-old Amelie Le Moullac, who died when a truck hit her while making a turn. The female bicyclist was riding in the bike lane when the truck struck her, and she succumbed to her injuries and was later pronounced dead at San Francisco General Hospital. As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, it wasn’t until Monday that the San Francisco Police Department agreed to expedite the release of a copy of the police report on the collision to the Le Moullac family.

As the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s most up-to-date statistics reveal, bicyclists even younger than Le Moullac are the highest risk group for injuries in traffic crashes. While the 45-54 age group of bicyclists accounted for the highest number of those of killed in traffic collisions in 2011, the 16-20 age group of bicyclists registered the highest number of injuries resulting from traffic crashes for that year. Indeed, just as NHTSA statistics showed that the majority of bicyclists killed or injured in 2011 were males – 85 percent and 78 percent, respectively – within injuries alone, the largest single group of the 38,000 male bicyclists injured in 2011 were the 6,000 in the 16-20 age category. By far, the highest injury rate per million in the population of both males and females, 380 per million, was registered by 16- to 20-year-old bicyclists involved in a traffic collision in 2011.

While on their way to and from school or college, teenagers often choose to ride their bicycles, especially in a state with an ingrained bicycle culture such as California. As NHTSA statistics further reveal, it was precisely during the period when students are most likely to be returning home from class, during the 4 p.m. to 7:59 p.m. period, that largest percentage of bicyclists were killed in traffic collisions in both 2010 and 2011, at 28 percent and 30 percent, respectively. In 2010 and 2011 the 8 a.m. to 11:59 a.m. period (13 percent and 14 percent, respectively) and the noon to 3:59 p.m. time slot (17 percent and 18 percent, respectively) – when students are most likely to be on their way to school – also accounted for large shares of bicyclist fatalities from traffic collisions.
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PG&E Awaits Decision on Fines as Bay Area Continues to Deal with Safety Issues in Wake of 2010 San Bruno Explosion

August 23, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

As we approach the third anniversary of the September 9, 2010, gas line explosion in San Bruno that killed eight people and destroyed and damaged more than 50 homes, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, the utility whose gas lines exploded, has yet to complete an overhaul of its gas system in the San Francisco Bay Area. According to Bloomberg, the California Public Utilities Commission, which is the state agency responsible for regulating PG&E, also has yet to determine a punishment for the fiery catastrophe but expects to make a decision by the end of this year.

Utility’s Bill for Disaster Yet to be Tallied
Should the CPUC levy a $2.25 billion fine – commission staff recommended that penalty last month – PG&E’s total bill for the disaster would come to $4 billion, including funds already spent on infrastructure repairs and safety upgrades, according to company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Tony Earley. In the meantime, the utility and its shareholders are concerned that the CPUC-imposed fine could push PG&E into its second bankruptcy in 12 years.

Concern over PG&E’s financial health notwithstanding, much work remains to be done on the Bay Area’s gas line network, with many infrastructure and safety issues that were raised by the explosion still unresolved or whose fixes are a work in progress. And, according to a recent report in the San Francisco Chronicle, PG&E has not been forthcoming enough on disclosing problems concerning transmission lines in its system and has employed records with errors to document maintenance. With natural gas such a volatile element and with the high-use winter months fast approaching, a less-than-safe gas network and an error-prone utility maintaining that system is hardly a reassuring combination for residents of San Bruno and other Bay Area communities to contemplate.

Poor Record-Keeping Bedevils Gas Network Still in Need of Key Fixes
Inaccurate records were a key factor behind the September 2010 disaster in San Bruno. PG&E failed to accurately describe the failed gas line’s characteristics, which in turn led to the utility not conducting tests that would have revealed the gas line’s fatal flaws. Furthermore, PG&E’s erroneous or outdated records led the utility to run a gas line at a pressure level that was dangerously too high for another urban area on the Peninsula. Indeed, government investigators have found that PG&E has inaccurate or even nonexistent records for much of the more than 1,000 miles of gas transmission lines in its system. These fundamental lapses in record-keeping procedures have come to light in the context of revelations that PG&E workers have found significant stretches of gas pipes with faulty seams in a major connector line on the Peninsula – contrary to what records kept by the company asserted – which could result in a major explosion similar to the one that rocked San Bruno three years ago.
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Keeping Kids Safe and Advocating for the Smallest of Car Crash Victims

July 29, 2013 | Gregory J. Brod

As a San Francisco accident law firm, we see the faces of tragedy. Some of the most pained faces we see belong to families mourning the death of a child. We also see parents struggle as they watch their child confront a painful injury with life-altering consequences. The Center for Disease Control (“CDC”) reports that car accidents continue to be the leading cause of child deaths in the U.S. Child car accident cases are heart-wrenching and we are honored to protect the rights of these young victims.

We also want to be certain that every caretaker knows that safety seats save lives. They aren’t perfect and we see many parents who took every possible precaution. Still, there is a particular sadness in the faces of those who are left wondering “what if.”

CDC Statistics on Child Injury & Child Safety Seats