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 Personal Injury

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5 people were injured in a collision between a yellow cab and a SUV in Manhattan early Wednesday morning in NYC. Two people were critically injured and two others were in serious condition, the fifth person only suffered minor injury. Among the victim was a two year old baby. An investigation is still ongoing to find out the exact cause of the accident.

The accident occurred around 1:20 am in Chelsea. The yellow taxi mini-van was driving West on 23rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. The driver was transporting two passengers, a male and a female. For reasons that are still being investigated the taxi driver rammed into an Acura MDX SUV.  A woman was driving the SUV. She had two passengers, another woman and a 2 year old child.

A witness told the New York Post that the taxi female passenger had blood all over her face while the SUV passenger and the baby seemed ok. Pictures in the New York Post show that both cars were seriously damaged. The front of the taxi was completely destroyed.

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Daniel-Pollack-1Sexual grooming can psychologically damage a child or a teenager for the rest of her or his life. In a recent article published in Youth Today, Daniel Pollack, a professor at Yeshiva University’s School of Social Work in New York City is raising awareness about child sexual groomers.

According to Pollack who is also a frequent expert witness in cases involving child abuse and foster care, child sexual groomers are very difficult to catch. They often hide in plain sight and pose like do-gooder teachers, friends, scout leaders, coaches, neighbors, foster parents and first cousins. They have the instinct of a cockroach or a chameleon and the craftiness of a fox.  Just like these animals, child groomers hate to be exposed to the light therefore one of the best ways to scare them is to raise awareness among organizations dealing with children and talk about them.

Read the complete article here 

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children at campConcussion is one of the most commonly sustained injuries by children and teenagers when they are at camp.  Therefore it is important that camps not only have specific requirements and guidelines to prevent traumatic brain injuries but also have a medical staff that is trained to recognize and treat concussions.

In regards to prevention, camps should always make sure that children wear proper helmets for activities involving motorized vehicles as well as activities such as skate boarding and skating.  Helmets also have to be mandatory when kids are involved in adventure activities such as climbing, spelunking or zip lining.  Children should also wear a helmet when bike riding as well as when horseback riding including pony riding.

Despite actively preventing concussions, accidents still happen and the camp medical team has to be ready.  The camp medical staff has to be able to recognize and evaluate a concussion sustained by a camp goer.  After  the camp clinician properly evaluates the young patient, he will have to communicate not only with the child but also with the parents to assure a proper recovery.

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A construction worker suffered critical personal injury while working on the top of an office building in Manhattan last Tuesday afternoon around 1:30 pm. For  some reason that is still being investigated the construction worker was zapped by high voltage electricity. The man was working on the rooftop of a 29th floor landmarked office building located on Park Avenue near East 32nd Street when the accident occurred.  He was transported to the hospital in critical condition. ( Read more in the NY Daily News)

Last week another construction worker was seriously injured at the Brooklyn Navy Yard according to DNA. The accident occurred at a dry dock located at 63 Flushing Ave around 10:30 am last Thursday. The hard hat was transported to the hospital. He is now in stable condition.

The construction boom in New York City has led to a dramatic increase in construction accident injuries and deaths over the last few years, the majority of them occurring at construction sites hiring non union workers. Mayor Bill de Blasio is working on a proposal to increase training for all construction workers in an effort to decrease accidents on construction sites (see previous blog)

 

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Two people were critically injured in a car crash in New York early Wednesday morning. A reckless driver who was speeding north on Third Avenue blew a red light and crashed into a tractor trailer truck belonging to the New York City Department of Transportation. The impact was so strong that a taxi parked nearby was also hit and damaged. The taxi driver suffered serious injury and was taken to the hospital.  The driver and the passenger of the speeding car suffered critical injury. Their car was completely mangled and the FDNY had to cut the top of the car off to extricate them. They were rushed to the hospital. The driver is now in stable condition but the passenger is still clinging to his life. The truck driver wasn’t injured according to the police. Read more in the NY Daily News

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The police are still looking for a hit and run driver who almost killed a pedestrian in New York. The 36-year-old man was crossing Riverside Drive at the intersection of West 155th Street when a speeding car hit him and sped away in the night. The pedestrian suffered a fractured skull , a broken arm and a deep laceration of his head. He was in critical condition when he arrived at the hospital but he is now stable. After the accident the police said that they were chasing the driver who hit the pedestrian. They had tried to pull the driver over for a traffic violation ten blocks away.

Police chases are triggering too many crashes and often end in killing or badly injuring innocent people like this unfortunate pedestrian.  They should very limited in New York City depending upon the reason for the pursuit.

Read more on CBS New York website

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subway accident fire nycAnother subway accident occurred on Monday morning in New York. This time, 30 feet of train track trash caught fire in a tunnel between 145th street and 133rd street in Harlem. Hundreds of panicked passengers were stuck in trains as a smoky blaze developed in the tunnel. Thousands more passengers, most of them on their way to work, were stuck waiting in overcrowded sweltering subway stations.

The fire was reported this morning at 7:18 am by a subway conductor. Trains were stopped and an order was given to the subway conductor to stop the AC to prevent the smoke from being sucked into the cars by the AC system. The service was finally restored at 9:34 am. 9 passengers had to be transported to the hospital for minor injuries related to heat and smoke.

MTA Chairman and CEO Joe Lotha apologized and said the he would increase the effort in Operation Track Sweep. This operation includes 500 employees who are supposed to maintain the tracks clear from garbage.

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2 people suffered personal injury after being struck by a patrol vehicle on Long Beach in Long Island, NY. A 48-year-old man and his 36-year-old female companion, both from Hempstead, were lying on the beach among people a little bit after sunset when a cop driving a beach patrol SUV ran over them.  Both of them were transported to the hospital to be treated. The man suffered broken ribs and a bruised lung. His companion had a broken finger and a leg injury. The man was released from the hospital on Monday. The woman is still in the hospital.

The police officer, 32-year-old David Walpole, was making a three-point turn on the beach when the accident occurred. According to the police, Walpole just didn’t see the couple. The cop had driven his SUV in an area where cars usually don’t go because he was trying to prevent a large crowd from going into the ocean as the lifeguards had gone off duty a little bit earlier.Walpole has 20 years of service with the police. He was also sent to the hospital where his blood was checked for alcohol and drugs. Results came out perfectly clean.

A witness said that he was walking on the beach and thought he was hallucinating when he saw the cop car on top of a human body.

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accident sceneTwo people died and several others were injured in a NYC car accident caused by a drunk driver who was speeding. 34-year-old Andrew Shakespeare was driving back from a wedding on Sunday morning. He had 4 other passengers in his car. He was allegedly drunk and was speeding on the Grand Central Parkway in Queens, NYC. As he approached the 188th street exit, Shakespeare changed lanes and side-wiped a Nissan Sentra driven by a 59-year-old woman. He then lost control of his BMW X5 SUV and careened into a Nissan Rogue driven by a 52-year-old man. Both cars crashed into the center guard rail. A 38-year-old woman driving a Mercedes was then struck by the BMW despite trying to swerve to avoid hitting the two cars. The impact sent her car into trees on the side of the road and back rolling over on the road.

The BMW front passenger, 34-year-old Layon Campbell was transported to the hospital with critical head and body injury. He was pronounced dead upon his arrival. 16-year-old Akeam Grant who was sitting on the rear right seat of the BMW died at the scene of the accident. The two other passengers, a 21-year-old and a 16-year-old survived. One of them fractured his pelvis and his right arm. The other lacerated his right arm. They were both transported to a hospital to be treated.

Among the people in the 3 other cars involved in the crash, both drivers of the Nissans were taken to the hospital for neck and back injuries but were listed in stable condition. The two passengers of the Nissan Rogue were also rushed to the hospital. The front passenger, a 50-year-old man injured his right leg. The rear passenger, a 63-year-old man fractured his rib and his neck. He also suffered from neck and back pain. Both passengers are in stable condition. The Mercedes-Benz driver was also transported to the hospital to be treated for pain in her right shoulder.

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New York Personal Injury Attorneys Rubinowitz and TorganIn their recent trial advocacy column in the New York Law Journal, New York Personal Injury Attorneys Ben Rubinowitz and Evan Torgan write: Too often trial lawyers fail to maximize key points that, if fully developed during cross, will serve not only to discredit the witness, but to anger the jurors so that they begin to question and doubt your adversary’s entire case. A thorough line of attack with respect to a lie does not simply prove that a witness was dishonest, but explores the thought process that went into concocting the lie in the first instance, the motives behind that lie, and the ultimate goal that the witness hoped to achieve by engaging in such deception.

Read the complete column here