Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf is a New York Plaintiff's personal injury law firm specializing in automobile accidents, construction accidents, medical malpractice, products liability, police misconduct and all types of New York personal injury litigation.

Articles Posted in Pedestrian Accidents

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5 pedestrians died and 696 suffered personal injury in April in New York City compared to respectively 8 and 854 in April 2014 and 12 and 904 in April 2013.  Pedestrian fatalities have been declining since the beginning of this year and reached their lowest in April. The total number of pedestrian fatalities since the beginning of the year was 28 compared to 39 for the same period of 2014 and 55 for the same period of 2013.  Since the beginning of the year there was also a decrease in the number of pedestrians who suffered personal injury in a traffic accident in NYC.Pedestrian deaths and injuries NYC April 2015

2 people died and 300 were injured in a total of 300 bicycle accidents in New York City in April compared to respectively 1, 306 and 382 in April 2014 and 0, 288 and 358 in April 2013.  The number of cyclists fatalities and injuries remains elevated in the City.

Bicycle accidents injuries deaths NYC April 2015
Even though there was an unusually high number of 10 motorist deaths last April the total number of traffic fatalities in New York City since the beginning of the year is down compared to the same periods of 2014 and 2013.

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i - bus driverIn New York every year several pedestrians and cyclists die and many others suffer personal injury after being struck by an MTA Bus. In many of these accidents investigation shows that drivers were negligent and failed to yield or failed to exercise due care.  Since the beginning of the year a few bus drivers were arrested after a new Vision Zero Law made it a misdemeanor for drivers to strike pedestrians or cyclists who have the right of way.  TWU Local 100, the bus drivers Union is against this new law and would like bus drivers to be exempted from it.  This morning TWU local 100 launched a work slow down on 181st Street in Washington Heights between 7:00 am and 9:00 am to protest the law.

The flyers handed out to bus drivers by the Union (see picture) said “DO NOT TURN UNLESS THE INTERSECTION IS CLEAR!”. Isn’t that what bus drivers are supposed to do to keep NYC streets safe?

Read more in the New York Post and on Streetblog

 

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Right of WayLowering the speed limit from 30 mph to 25 mph on Prospect Park West may have saved the life of 5 year old Roark Bennett who was hit by a car at the exact same spot where 12-year-old Sammy Cohen Eckstein was fatally struck by a car two years earlier.  After the death of her son, Amy Cohen became a Vision Zero activist and successfully campaigned to lower the speed limit on Prospect Park West from 30 mph to 25 mph.  Yesterday when Roark Bennett escaped from his parents and ran out in the street against the light, the driver who hit him was travelling at the speed limit and thankfully Roark suffered only minor injuries.  Read more in the NY Daily News

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Every day in New York  City pedestrians and other road users are endangered by reckless drivers who are running red lights.  A study just released by Hunter College indicates that nearly one out of 10 motorists don’t follow the most basic rule of the road.  Lead by Professor Peter Tuckel of Hunter’s sociology department, the study analyzes the behavior of 3,259 motorists at 50 different intersections in New York City. The intersections are all within a few blocks from subway stations.

A total of 283 drivers were caught ignoring red lights. Half of them didn’t even reduce their speed. 85 of them ran the red light as they were turning.

The intersection of Gates and Evergreens Avenues in Bushwick, Brooklyn, NYC, was the most dangerous of all intersections analyzed during the study followed by W50th and Seventh Ave in Manhattan and New Lots and Miller Avenues in Brooklyn.

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61 year old Robert Ray who served 10 years in prison after admitting he was drunk when he crashed a train in Union Square in 1991 was hit by a car and suffered critical personal injury as he was crossing The Grand Concourse from east to west at E.182 St  in the Bronx last Thursday night. The driver sped off and disappeared in the night. Police who don’t have a description of the car haven’t made an arrest. Read more in the NY Daily News

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A 35 year old pedestrian was in critical condition after he was hit by a car driven by a 44 year old retired police officer who was drunk. The retired NYPD cop crashed into the pedestrian as he was turning off the Henry Hudson Parkway onto Broadway near W. 254th street in the Bronx, NYC. He remained at the scene of the accident and was taken into custody for drunk driving. The pedestrian was rushed to the hospital in grave condition.

Every month in New York City, there are more than 100 vehicle accidents related to drunk driving. This number reached a peak of 235 in September 2014, went back down below 150 at the beginning of the year and was again above 150 in March 2015.

car accidents alcohol NYC

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brNew York Personal Injury Lawyer Ben Rubinowitz who is representing Dana Lerner and Richard Stock in a wrongful death lawsuit against Koffi Komlani, the taxi driver who killed their son Cooper in a traffic accident, said to the New York Post that both parties were proprely served after the lawyers representing the cabbie tried to  use a technicality to dodge the lawsuit.

Copper was crossing the road with his dad at 97th Street and West End Avenue in the Upper West Side in January 2014 when he was fatally struck by the taxi driver who was making a left-hand turn. A witness took a video of Richard Stock trying to pick up his son just after he was run over by the taxi. This video will be included in the lawsuit. “[Richard Stock] is screaming at the top of his lungs. There could never be anything worse for a father,” said Ben Rubinowitz.

Because of insurance caps, Cooper parents do no expect to receive more than $50,000 but they want to pursue a wrongful death lawsuit to hold the cab driver accountable for his recklessness.

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The Borough Pedestrian Safety Action Plans are one of 63 Vision Zero initiatives designed to eliminate deaths and personal injuries from traffic accidents in New York City. This set of five plans have been developed by the New York Department of Transportation and the NYPD. Each safety action plan addresses specific borough related challenges to pedestrian safety. The action plans are based on the input of the borough inhabitants gathered during multiple community workshops and also from numerous data and comments collected on the interactive Zero Vision map.

Bronx Pedestrian Safety Action Plan

Bronx Pedestrian Safety MapThe Bronx pedestrian fatality rate is higher than the NYC average. Most traffic fatalities and personal injuries happen  in the high-density neighborhoods in the north- and south-westerly portions of the Bronx. Arterial streets such as The Grand Concourse, 3rd Avenue, and Fordham Road are the most dangerous.  A lot of pedestrians are killed when crossing the street mid- block because of the lack of an adequate number of crossroads. The Bronx has a lot of overnight pedestrian fatalities. Seniors represent 36% of the Bronx pedestrian fatalities and young adults 18%. Dangerous driving such as speeding, failing to yield, turning on red distracted driving and DUI are the cause of 85% of the pedestrian fatalities in the Bronx and hit and run occurs in 30 % of cases.

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brNew York Personal Injury Lawyer Ben Rubinowitz has extensive experience representing the families of pedestrians and cyclists who have been killed or severely injured by negligent motorists in New York. Recently Ben tried a wrongful death case in The U.S. District Court for The Southern District  of New York, in which the Court held the Federal Government %100 liable and awarded monetary damages estimated to be approximately $5 million for lawyer Nat Dershowitz in a successful civil case against the driver of a U.S. Postal Service Truck that struck and killed his wife(see prior blog). Ben also represents Dana Lerner, the mother of 9 year old Cooper Stock who was hit by a taxi driver as he was in the crosswalk with his father resulting in his death.  In a recent article in NY Press Ben reflects on a recent decision by Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance Jr. to charge a  motorist who killed a pedestrian  in the Bowery with manslaughter.

Read the article here

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Two men suffered severe personal injury in two separate accidents that happened in Brooklyn, NYC, on Sunday night. One of them was a 46 year old cyclist who crashed his bike into the back of  an MTA bus in Williamsburg and the other one was a pedestrian who was struck by a car three hours later in Crown Heights. Both were transported to the hospital in critical condition.

Read more in the NY Daily News