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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The intersection where Fruchter was struck by the car

Norman Fruchter died from his injuries after being struck by a car near his home earlier this month. Street safety activists as well as grieving family members and friends gathered yesterday night in Bay Ridge’s Owls Head Park to honor the life of  the legendary education reformer and civil right activist. The vigil was also attended by Senator Andrew Gounardes, Comptroller Brad Lander and Council Member Justin Brannan.

The driver who killed Fruchter was backing up the wrong way

Norman Fruchter died on January 4th after two weeks of pain and suffering. The accident occurred on December 22nd. Fruchter was crossing 68th Street from Owls Head Park to get to Bliss Terrace where he lives, when he was struck by a careless driver who was speeding in reverse the wrong way on 68th street. The driver backed up over him and then allowed the car to roll forward, striking the pedestrian again.

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SST new cardNew York City construction workers and their supervisors who are working on large or complex construction sites will be legally required to have a Site Safety Training Card issued by the NYC DOB Training Connect Platform.

These cards are equipped with a chip and can be scanned to validate their authenticity. This new legal requirement will take effect on February 1st 2023. Workers who have a SST card issued before January 1st 2022 have to contact the facility that provided them with training and ask them to replace their card with a new card that can only be issued through the NYC DOB Training Connect Platform.

Since  2017, after a peak in construction accident fatalities in New York City, a new construction law was adopted in an effort to reduce construction workers injuries and fatalities. The law  requires every hard hat working on a New York City construction site to attend site safety training classes and to carry a card attesting that they did it.  Unfortunately, while every worker is supposed to sit in classrooms for a certain amount of hours and learn about site safety, some unscrupulous contractors didn’t want to allow their workers to spend so much time sitting in classes and just issued fake cards to them. Other workers got fake cards from unscrupulous individuals and unauthorized course providers started to proliferate issuing invalid certificates to workers.

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location of the fatal pedestrian accident in ManhattanA 20 year old pedestrian died after she was struck by a racing hit and run  driver sending her barreling toward a MTA Bus that also struck her. The accident occurred last Thursday around 6:30 pm at the intersection of Third Avenue and 96th Street (see Google Map picture on the left). A witness who was working near by said the impact was so loud that she could heard it. The bus driver stayed at the scene of the accident but the driver of the car that hit her, a black sedan, never stopped. The police are still looking for the driver. The victim was rushed to the hospital but the injuries were so bad that she could not be saved. (read more in the NY Daily News)

Two more pedestrians killed earlier during the week

A senior pedestrian was killed as she was crossing the street in Lower Manhattan, last Monday morning. The accident occurred around 9:30 am. An 83 year old woman was crossing Lafayette Street when the driver of a pick up truck who was making a left from White Street onto Lafayette struck her. The 35 year old driver remained at the scene of the accident and so far has not been charged. A certified nurse assistant who happened to drive by the scene of the accident told the NY Daily news that the victim was too injured for emergency care. Other witnesses mentioned blood everywhere on the sidewalk.  Paramedics still rushed the victim to the hospital but she could not be saved.

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location of the deadly e-bike accident in ManhattanA cyclist riding an e-bike was killed by a hit-and-run driver in Manhattan, early Sunday morning.  38 year old Carlos Garcia Ramos was riding his e-bike East on West 24th Street in Chelsea and had just crossed 7th Avenue when the driver of a black Infinity sedan rear-ended him.  The cyclist who suffered severe head and body trauma was rushed to the hospital but he could not be saved. After the accident occurred, the e-bike got stuck in the wheel of the car. Instead of assisting the cyclist, the driver left his car on the side of the road and fled on foot leaving the cyclist dying in the street. He was later on identified as 24 year old Edgar Maeda-Luca. He was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of the accident.  (Read more in the New York Post).

Crosstown streets are dangerous for cyclists as very few of them have protected bike lanes

In Manhattan while most avenues are now equipped with protected bike lanes, crosstown streets remain dangerous for cyclists.  Bike lanes are still rare on crosstown streets and most of them are unprotected. So far, according to a recent article in Streetopia, out of hundreds of them only 8 crosstown streets have a protected bike lane in Manhattan: 12th Street, 13th Street, 26th Street, 29th Street, 52nd Street, 55th Street, 61st Street, and 62nd Street.  According to NYC Crash Mapper, over the last 12 months and including Carlos Garcia Ramos, out of the 5 people who died in bicycle accidents in Manhattan, 3 of them died in bicycle accidents that occurred on crosstown streets, one of them on an avenue with an unprotected bike lane and another one lost control of his e-bike in a bike-lane:

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location of the deadly accidentA construction worker died after falling from a scaffold in Manhattan last Monday morning. The accident occurred at a residential building located at 263 West End Avenue, on the corner of West End Avenue and 72nd Avenue in the Upper West Side of Manhattan (see picture).

According to a preliminary investigation of the Department of Buildings, the 36 year old construction worker whose identity was not revealed, was installing netting on a scaffold at the 15th floor of the building when he fell to his death onto the sidewalk shed.  So far, the investigation of the DOB found that the worker did not receive site safety orientation before he started his work.

A full stop order was issued as DOB continues its investigation. The building owner, Riverside Towers Corporation, had an active work permit for façade repair and for the scaffold at the time of the accident. The  worker was employed by Rennon Construction and the General Contractor of the site is J&S Waterproofing. (read more in Construction Dive)

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accident scene3 people died in 3  separate traffic accidents in New York City on Tuesday.

The first accident occurred early morning in Queens. Around 6:00 am, a pedestrian was fatally struck by a car driver on 84th St near 153rd Ave in Howard Beach. The pedestrian who was found lying unconscious on the ground by EMS was identified as 53 year old Cristina Ana Acosta. She was rushed to the hospital but did not survive. The victim was killed a block away from her home.

The 45 year old driver of the Nissan Rogue who struck her remained at the scene of the accident and was not charged. A picture of the car that struck her in the NY Post shows that the car that struck her had plates reading “JOVILOCO”. It appears that the car driver is a repeated speeding offender and has accumulated  almost 30 school zone camera violations in 3 years according to howsmydriving. 

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location of the deadly crash on the Cross Bronx expresswayA car driver died in a fiery NYC crash that occurred in the Mount Even section of the Cross Bronx Expressway, underneath University Avenue, around 12:30 am on Monday night.

According to media, 49 year old Shelly Vilsaint from Bayonne, New Jersey, was driving her 2019 Range Rover west bound of the Cross Bronx Expressway in the middle lane when she rear-ended a tractor trailer contracted by the U.S. Postal Service.  Both drivers got out of their vehicles to talk.

The accident was a minor fender-bender for which usually the NYPD does not respond anymore but the woman insisted on waiting for the police. The driver of the truck suggested they pull over but she refused. Both got back in their vehicles and shortly after another tractor trailer rear-ended the Range Rover. The car was crushed between the two trucks and Shelly Vilsaint died at the scene of the accident.

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location of the tractor trailer truck accidentA cyclist was killed in a hit-and-run tractor trailer accident in New York City on Thanksgiving day. The victim was riding her  bike East on Liberty Avenue near the intersection of the Van Wick Expressway Service Road in Queens, NYC when she was struck by a tractor trailer truck making a left turn onto the Van Wick Expressway Service Road.

The victim, a 43 year old woman, was knocked down from her bicycle, and fell under the truck where she got trapped.  She was then dragged several feet by the truck. The truck driver never stopped. The victim was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident.

The truck driver who was behind the wheel of a 2014 Kenworth T8 Series tractor trailer truck is a 48 -year old man who was later on identified by the police. The accident is still being investigated by the police. The intersection of Liberty Avenue and Van Wick Expressway is extremely dangerous, especially for people on micro mobility devices.

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construction workers have a high risk of fatalityDespite OSHA’s efforts, the death rate on construction sites in the US has not declined for the last 10 years, questioning the effectiveness of the agency.

While there is no doubt that OSHA is doing a great job developing and implementing safety standards, it does not have enough resources to proprely inspect jobsites. Additionnally fines are not only too low to dissuade bad actors but also most of the time they are not being paid and OSHA has little resources to go after those who don’t pay. Also on the top of deaths purely related to construction accidents, the opioid crisis and suicides are also taking a toll on construction workers.

For the last decade, out of every 100,000 construction workers, 10 died on the job. Among those fatalities 3 out of 5 died from what is known in the construction industry as the “Fatal Four”:

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Car are dangerous to pedestrians and cyclistsAmong rich countries, America is one of the most dangerous for road users especially pedestrians and cyclists.  In The Exceptionally American Problem of Rising Roadway Deaths, an article recently published by the New York Times,Emily Badger and  take an in-depth look at road fatalities in the US compared to other rich countries. They found out that during the Covid19 crisis, most countries in the world saw a decline in fatalities with the exception of the United States, Switzerland and Ireland.  When  comparing national traffic fatalities in 2020 to an average yearly traffic fatalities in 2017 to 2019 , Italy, Hungary, Turkey, Spain, France and Sweden all saw a decline or more than 20% in road fatalities. Italy recorded a 27% decline in traffic fatalities while the united States had a 5% rise in traffic fatalities.

While most rich countries have developed bicycle and pedestrian friendly infrastructures over the last decade, the United States did not do as much

While many countries started to take measures to protect pedestrians and cyclists such as protected bike lanes, lowering of speed limits and adopting safe vehicle technologies such as automatic braking systems, cars got bigger and deadlier in the United States.