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 Wrongful Death

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Little Bay ParkA motorcyclist died after he apparently crashed his bike into a tree in Bay Side, Queens, NYC.  According to the the NY Daily News the motorcyclist was found dead on a path in Little Bay Park  by a passing bicyclist. His dirt bike landed several feet away on some rocks near the water. The man apparently lost control of his bike and hit a tree. The cyclist who found him told the News that the motorcyclist may have hurt himself after crashing on the rocks and then walked to the grass and laying on it before he died. Read more in the NY Daily News

 

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Prince_St_-_Google_MapsAnother pedestrian was killed in a car accident in NYC in the 109th precinct. According to Streetblog, this is the third pedestrian to die in this precinct since the beginning of the year. The accident happened Tuesday morning at the crossing of Prince Street and 35th Ave in Flushing, Queens. A 57 year old man who was crossing the street in the crosswalk was struck by a SUV driven by 55 year old Raymond Ortiz as he was making a left turn. Ortiz stayed at the scene of the accident and was charged with violation of the right of way law. The victim died at the hospital.

Earlier in the year, at the beginning of March, in the same precinct, 90 year old Dorothy Heiman was fatally struck by a car making a left turn.  The driver wasn’t charged. In January a pedestrian was  killed by a cement truck in the same precinct and the driver wasn’t charged either. In both cases police weren’t very cooperative in providing accurate information to determine if the pedestrian had the right of way.

Last year after several pedestrians were killed in the precinct, most of the time by negligent drivers, the police and the council members blamed the victims for their own deaths and lectured pedestrians on how to walk.

 

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every schoolThe installation of 140 speed cameras in NYC proved to be a successful way to reduce speeding in school zones and protect residents from fatal car accidents. Today State Sen. Jose Peralta and Assemblyman Michael DenDekker will propose to extend the installation of similar cameras to 2,000 school zones in New York City. The two democratic politicians from Queens are also proposing to have these cameras running 24 hours instead of only during school time as is the case now. Peralta and DenDekker also suggest that if a driver gets caught five times or more he or she should have his vehicle registration suspended.

The new bills introduced today by the two legislators are coming on the steps of a new Transportatrion Alternative campaign that requires the installation of speed camerat at #EverySchool

Read more in the NY Daily News

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A pedestrian was fatally hit by a car in Manhattan on Friday.  The pedestrian was a 76 year old woman who was trying to cross Madison Avenue near 95th street. The car driver was heading north on Madison Avenue when he noticed a parking spot. As he attempted to back his car into it, he struck the pedestrian identified as Mary Jo Myselow. The woman suffered head injury but was conscious when she was found by a police officer lying on the ground. The driver stayed at the scene of the accident. Mary Jo Myselow died from her injuries at the hospital. Read more in the Gothamist

Two days earlier five pedestrians were injured in the Bronx after a driver lost control of his vehicle. The 26 year old driver had a suspended licensed when he jumped the curb at E. Fordham Road and Thiebout Ave in Fordham Heights. He was taken into custody by the police. Read more in the NY Daily News

 

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Decreasing the speed to reduce the number of car accidents resulting in death or serious injury in New York City is one of the top priorities of the Zero Vision Initiative launched by Mayor de Blasio in 2014.  Since November 7, 2014, the NYC’s default speed limit has been lowered from 30 mph to 25 mph and since that date the NYC Department of transportation has been implementing it. The DOT re-evaluated for each borough which streets should have their speed limit lowered to 25mph and which ones should be allowed to keep a 30 mph speed limit.  The DOT posted over 4,700 new 25 mph signs and removed 2,400 30 mph signs. There are still 700 more to be removed. At this point over 5,000 miles of NYC streets have a 25 mph or lower speed limit and over 800 miles of the streets have signs that explicitly indicate that the speed limit is 25 mph.  The DOT also added speed limits in the Vision Zero Map of traffic crashes. Read more in Streetblog

Manhattan Speed limit

 

 

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Two people died and dozen others were injured in an Amtrak train accident that happened between New York and Philadelphia  in the NorthEast Corridor yesterday morning. Train 89, also known as the Palmetto, struck a backhoe, killing the operator of the backhoe and an Amtrak supervisor.  The train had left New York for Savanah, GA around 6:00 am and was near Philadelphia when the accident happened.  None of the passengers died but more than 30 of them were transported to the hospital to be treated for non-life threatening injuries.

A team from the National Transportation Safety Board arrived yesterday at the site of the accident. They started to investigate the reasons why a maintenance crew was working on an active track. In a statement New York Senator Chuck Schumer indicated that it was highly possible that human error was the cause of the accident. He said that the Amtrak’s chairman, Mr Anthony Cosica told him that Amtrak employees have to follow a rigorous 20 step procedure to obtain clearance to place equipment on the track. Schumer added that a possible breakdown in communications between the train dispatchers and the maintenance crew may have been at the origin of the crash.

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1229 45th streetA 21 year old worker died in a construction accident in Brooklyn NYC. Yesterday afternoon Alex Santizo from Queens was working on the construction site of a two-family townhouse on 45th street near 12th Ave in Borough Park, Brooklyn. He was on the second floor of the house when the roof collapsed. Santizo was hit by debris then he tumbled into an airshaft and landed two stories below in the basement.  The young man died from his injuries at the hospital. Records from the New York City DOB indicate that the building located at 1229 45th street had a total of 11 complaints that all had been resolved before the accident happened. The construction site was also the subject of 13 violations with 7 of them still open.  Read more in the NY Daily News 

Picture source: Google map

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A man was injured in a car accident in NYC this morning  after he lost control of his vehicle and slammed into a private house.  23 year old Shirley Lucas and her 2 year old daughter were inside their house located on Bruckner Boulevard near Thierot Avenue in Soundview, Bronx when the accident happened. The car first crashed through a metallic gate located at the entrance of the property and then hit the brick wall of the house.  According to the NY Daily News The mother and the daughter weren’t injured but had to stay out of the house while Con Edison and the DOB were analyzing the damages.

Another man crashed in a Bronx building on Saturday night. He died in the accident. According to witnesses the 37 year old man was speeding east on Allerton Ave in the Bronx when he lost control of his vehicle. He first hit two parked cars and then a light pole before crashing into a dry cleaner store located at the corner of Barnes Ave.  The driver was transported to the hospital but he didn’t survive. Read more in the NY Daily News

Below is a Google Map Street view of the location of the Saturday night accident.

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Several people were injured and one person died in two fire accidents in New York City this week-end.

Early Saturday around 12;14 am two civilians and two firefighters were injured in a three-alarm blaze in Washington Heights. According to the NY Daily News , the fire started in an apartment on the sixth floor of a building located on Broadway and W. 151st Street. The fire and the smoke spread quickly through the building and 138 firefighters were needed to stop it.

On Sunday morning around 4:00 am,  another fire started in a house in Jackson Heights, Queens killing an 88 year old man who was living there.  65 firefighters were called to the rescue. It took them 45 minutes to stop the blaze that ravaged the house located on 87th Street and 35th Avenue in Queens, NYC. The victim was found dead by the firefighters with severe burns on his body.

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Yellow_cabA taxi driver fatally ran over a woman who was lying on a New York City street and didn’t stop. At his arraignment he said he thought he hit a pothole, not a human being.

Saturday morning around 3:30 am, 68 year old John Bangura was driving his yellow cab on First Ave near 17th Street in Stuyvesant Town, Manhattan. For some unexplained reason, 44 year old Kenya Flores was laying on the ground when the taxi ran over her and dragged her briefly on First Ave. Before laying in the path of the taxi, Flores had laid down in a bus path.

According to the NY Daily News, witnesses saw the taxi trying to drive around a car who had stopped in front of him when he hit the woman.  He dragged her down the street and sped away.  Flores was taken to the hospital where she later died.