Justia Injury Law Opinion Summaries

Schreiber resided in her apartment since the building was built in 1980. She was seriously injured when she fell through a skylight built into the apartment's deck. Lee built and previously owned the three-unit building. At the time of the accident, Lee’s adult children owned the property, which was managed by Golden. Before trial, Schreiber settled with the Lee children for $2.5 million. The trial court denied Lee’s motion for nonsuit on the ground Schreiber’s claims were based on a patent construction defect and barred by the statute of repose.The jury awarded Schreiber damages of over $2.6 million, allocating 12 percent of fault to Schreiber, 54 percent to Lee, 16 percent to Golden, and 18 percent collectively to the Lee children. After reducing the verdict to reflect Schreiber’s percentage of fault, the court offset the entirety of the economic damages by the amount of the settlement attributable to such damages; it denied any credit to Lee and Golden for the noneconomic damages and entered judgment against Lee for $756,000 and against Golden for $224,000. The court of appeal affirmed in all respects except as to the settlement credit, Golden, but not Lee, is entitled to a credit against both economic and noneconomic damages. The court noted the "unusual circumstances," that the Lee children were not only found independently negligent but also bore imputed liability for Golden's negligence. View "Schreiber v. Lee" on Justia Law

After plaintiff was struck by a car while crossing a street on her way to school, she filed suit against the city. Plaintiff alleged that the intersection in which she was hit constituted a dangerous condition of public property within the meaning of Government Code section 835. A jury returned a defense verdict and found that the property was not a dangerous condition at the time of the accident.The Court of Appeal held that the trial court did not commit evidentiary error in relying on the privilege set forth pursuant to 23 U.S.C. 409 to preclude admission of a document in which defendant acknowledged the subject intersection was hazardous. The court also rejected plaintiff's claim that defense counsel committed misconduct during trial. Furthermore, any potential jury confusion was cured by the trial court's thorough instructions to the jury. View "Ford v. City of Los Angeles" on Justia Law

In the absence of any clear legislative statement on the issue, a physician assistant acts within the scope of his or her license for purposes of Civil Code section 3333.2, subdivision (c)(2) if he or she has a legally enforceable agency agreement with a supervising physician, regardless of the quality of actual supervision.After plaintiff prevailed in her negligence claims, the trial court awarded noneconomic damages, but reduced them under section 3333.2, subdivision (b). The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's reduction of the damages awarded, rejecting plaintiff's claim that the negligence of the physician assistants is included within the scope of the proviso excluding certain conduct from statutory damages because the physician assistants acted without the supervision of a physician in violation of the governing statutes and regulations. View "Lopez v. Ledesma" on Justia Law

The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's judgment in favor of plaintiffs on their negligence cause of action against Technicolor. The jury found that Technicolor had been negligent and that its negligence was a substantial factor in causing harm to plaintiffs, assigning 95 percent responsibility to Technicolor. After the trial court reduced the jury's damages awards, judgment was entered in the amount of $803,838.30 for economic damages and $2,083,920 for noneconomic damages, for a total award of $2,887,758.30.The court held that substantial evidence supported the verdict where there was substantial evidence that Technicolor could have satisfied the labor verification requirement, and that Technicolor's negligence left plaintiffs in a worse position. The court also held that workers' compensation exclusivity was inapplicable and rejected Technicolor's remaining claims. View "Reynaud v. Technicolor Creative Services USA" on Justia Law

Father knew his son, C.B., had been addicted to drugs for a number of years, and "had paid on numerous prior occasions" for C.B. to undergo "detox and/or drug rehabilitation and treatment programs to treat his addiction." C.B. was not employed and was "dependent" on Father for financial support. Father provided "regular, consistent, and frequent financial support" to C.B., which included paying for C.B.'s housing and living expenses as well as giving him money for spending and "necessities of life." The question posed by this appeal was whether Father could be held liable for the death of his son's girlfriend by overdose on methamphetamine allegedly purchased or supplied by the adult son. Plaintiff appealed the dismissal of a wrongful death complaint filed against Father. The trial court concluded no special relationship existed between Father and his adult son such that Father should be held liable for wrongful death of the girlfriend. To this, the Court of Appeal agreed and affirmed dismissal. View "K.G. v. S.B." on Justia Law

After a seaman's hands were injured on a commercial fishing vessel out on the Gulf of Mexico and he ultimately loss some of his fingers due to infection, he filed suit against the vessel's owner and the production company that was filming a reality TV show on the vessel.The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's grant of summary judgment to the production company, holding that the production company was not liable under the Jones Act because plaintiff was not an "employee" or a "borrowed servant" to the production company. The court declined to construe the borrowed servant doctrine in the maritime context to impose a duty upon passengers and observers on a vessel to undertake acts inconsistent with the orders of the vessel's captain. The court also held that the production company was not liable under maritime tort law because there were not genuine issues of material fact as to whether the production company had a "special relationship" with plaintiff, the production company's rescue attempts were grossly negligent, and the production company acted negligently in taking charge of a "helpless" person. View "McHenry v. Asylum Entertainment Delaware, LLC" on Justia Law

When E.D. was 17 years old, a high school teacher began engaging in sex with her in his classroom. The situation was discovered after several months. The teacher admitted engaging in sexual intercourse with E.D. 10-20 times while she was a minor. The principal had previously disciplined the teacher for inappropriate contact with a student but the conduct had not been reported to authorities; no steps were taken to monitor the teacher’s contact with other female students. E.D. brought claims against the teacher for sexual abuse, against the school defendants for negligence and breach of statutory duties in failing to adequately supervise teachers and protect students, and against all the defendants for intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress; her foster mother joined in the claims of intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress. They alleged that they were not required to present a claim to the School District under the Government Claims Act (Gov. Code 810) due to the exemption for claims of sexual abuse of a minor, section 905(m). The District had enacted its own claim presentation requirement, purportedly overriding section 905(m)The court of appeal reversed the dismissal of E.D.’s causes of action. The Legislature has consistently expanded the ability of childhood sexual abuse victims to seek compensation but it is not clear that it intended to provide relatives the same rights as direct victims. View "Coats v. New Haven Unified School District" on Justia Law

Plaintiff and her husband filed a medical malpractice action against Doctors Medical and others, including Defendant Remington, after plaintiff became paralyzed following carpel tunnel surgery. Remington performed the spinal decompression surgery on plaintiff after she became paralyzed, but she did not recover a substantial amount of function following the surgery.The Court of Appeal held that the trial court properly granted the motion for a new trial and affirmed the judgment. The court agreed with the trial court that granting summary judgment in favor of Remington on statute of limitations grounds constituted an error of law. The court wrote that the persistence of plaintiff's symptoms was not necessarily an appreciable manifestation of harm from Remington's treatment. The court held that there is a factual dispute regarding when plaintiff experienced appreciable harm that would have caused a reasonable person to be suspicious of Remington's wrongdoing. View "Brewer v. Remington" on Justia Law

This proceeding stemmed from a minor’s collapse during football try-outs at Lincoln High School in Stockton in 2017. Respondent Shynelle Jones presented a timely claim on behalf of her son, Jayden, to the Lincoln Unified School District under the Government Claims Act. About four months later, Jones submitted an application to the school district for leave to present a late claim on her own behalf based on her allegedly newfound realization of the severity of her son’s injuries, their impact on her own life, and her right to file her own claim. She declared that up until that point she had been able to attend to her own interests. After the application was denied, Jones filed a petition for relief from the claim presentation requirement in the superior court based on the same facts. At the hearing on her petition, her counsel, Kenneth Meleyco, presented a new explanation for the delay in submitting Jones’s claim: the day after Jones presented a claim on her son’s behalf, she retained Meleyco on her own behalf, and an error in the handling of Meleyco’s dictated memo within his office prevented the earlier preparation of Jones’s claim. The superior court granted Jones’s petition, despite noting “legitimate concerns regarding [her] credibility” because it “determined based on the directives provided in case law, to provide relief from technical rules, that [Jones] has met her burden of proof to demonstrate that her neglect was excusable.” The Court of Appeal found this ruling was an abuse of the trial court’s discretion. "[T]he general policy favoring trial on the merits cannot justify the approval of a petition that is not credible and that does not demonstrate a right to relief by a preponderance of the evidence." The Court issued a writ of mandate compelling the superior court to vacate its order and enter a new order denying Jones relief from the claim presentation requirement. View "Lincoln Unified School Dist. v. Superior Court" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed suit against the city for injuries he sustained when he rode his bicycle into a rope attached to a badminton net stretched across a paved path in MacArthur Park. The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's grant of the city's motion for summary judgment, holding that plaintiff's claims were barred by the doctrine of trail immunity. In this case, the danger was inherently connected to and existed only because of its connection with the trail. The court explained that a badminton net is not a dangerous object in its ordinary context, but a badminton net stretched across a trail may create a dangerous condition. The court wrote that this was only true because it impedes the regular use of the trail. View "Reed v. City of Los Angeles" on Justia Law