Justia Injury Law Opinion Summaries

Melvin James appealed a circuit court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Assurance America Insurance Company ("Assurance") on its complaint for a declaratory judgment. In February 2019, Bernardino Mejia and James were involved in a motor-vehicle accident in Montgomery, Alabama. Mejia was driving a 2003 Chrysler Town and Country minivan, and James was driving a 2004 Toyota Camry automobile. As a result of the accident, Mejia's three children were ejected from the Town and Country. One of Mejia's children died, and the other two were seriously injured. James was also injured as a result of the accident. Mejia was arrested, and, on September 23, 2019, he was indicted for one count of reckless murder and four counts of first- degree assault as a result of the accident. He was incarcerated on those charges. In April 2019, James sued Mejia, ALFA Insurance Corporation, USAA Casualty Insurance Company, and various fictitiously named defendants for negligence, negligence per se, wantonness, and breach of contract. Mejia moved to stay the civil proceeding until the accident-related criminal proceedings against him were concluded; this motion was granted. Assurance sought the summary judgment motion at issue here, against Mejia and James. Assurance contended Mejia was not the named insured under the Assurance policy that covered the Town & Country he was driving, and that policy excluded coverage for injury or damage caused by an insured vehicle when driven by a person who was not listed as a driver on the declarations page of the policy and who did not have a valid driver's license. The Alabama Supreme Court reversed and remanded, finding Assurance did not produce substantial, admissible evidence to establish Mejia did not have a valid driver's license at the time of the accident and therefore did not shift the burden of proof to James. Accordingly, the trial court erred in granting Assurance's motion for a summary judgment. View "James v. Assurance America Insurance Company" on Justia Law

Turner, a Wisconsin resident, filed a putative class action against Costa, an Italian cruise operator, and its American subsidiary, alleging that their negligence contributed to an outbreak of COVID-19 aboard the Costa Luminosa during his transatlantic voyage beginning on March 5, 2020. The Luminosa had evacuated a passenger, who subsequently died of COVID-19, from a cruise immediately preceding Turner’s cruise. Costa told passengers that the ship was safe. It did not hire any experts to verify that the ship had been sufficiently cleaned and allegedly failed to refuse boarding to individuals who had COVID-19 symptoms or had traveled to high-risk areas. On March 8, the Luminosa had docked to transport passengers with COVID-19 symptoms to the hospital but did not inform passengers of those circumstances, When passengers disembarked on March 19, 36 of the 75 passengers tested positive for COVID-19. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the dismissal of Turner’s complaint on forum non conveniens grounds. Turner's passage ticket contract included a forum selection clause requiring that all claims associated with his cruise be litigated in Genoa, Italy. Forum selection clauses are presumptively valid and enforceable; Turner failed to defeat the presumption by showing that the clause was induced by fraud or overreaching, that he would be deprived of his day in court because of inconvenience or unfairness, the chosen law would deprive him of a remedy or enforcement of the clause would contravene public policy.’ View "Turner v. Costa Crociere S.P.A." on Justia Law

This discretionary appeal concerned discovery in a medical negligence lawsuit in which the patient suffered complications following surgery at a hospital. The issue was whether certain portions of the hospital’s credentialing file for the doctor who performed the surgery were protected from discovery. The hospital claimed protection under the Peer Review Protection Act and the federal Health Care Quality Improvement Act. The Supreme Court held: (1) a hospital’s credentials committee qualified as a “review committee” for purposes of Section 4 of the Peer Review Protection Act to the extent it undertakes peer review; and (2) the federal Health Care Quality Improvement Act protects from disclosure the responses given by the National Practitioner Data Bank to queries submitted to it – and this protection exists regardless of any contrary aspect of state law. The order of the Superior Court was reversed insofar as it ordered discovery of the NPDB query responses. It was vacated in all other respects and the matter was remanded for further proceedings. View "Leadbitter v. Keystone, et al." on Justia Law

The United States Third Circuit Court of Appeals certified a question of law to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court involving the state's Motor Vehicle Financial Responsibility Law (“MVFRL”). In July 2015, Corey Donovan (“Corey”) suffered significant injuries due to a collision between a motorcycle, which he owned and was operating, and an underinsured vehicle. He recovered the $25,000 limit of coverage available under the policy insuring the underinsured vehicle as well as the $50,000 per person limit of UIM coverage available under Corey’s policy insuring the motorcycle, issued by State Farm Automobile Insurance Company. Corey then sought coverage under a policy issued by State Farm to his mother, Linda Donovan (“Linda”), under which he was insured as a resident relative. Linda’s Auto Policy insured three automobiles but not Corey’s motorcycle. Linda’s policy had a UIM coverage limit of $100,000 per person, and Linda signed a waiver of stacked UIM coverage on her policy which complied with the waiver form mandated by Section 1738(d) of the MVFRL. First, the Pennsylvania Court considered whether an insured’s signature on the waiver form mandated by 75 Pa.C.S. 1738(d) resulted in the insured’s waiver of inter-policy stacking of UIM coverage where the relevant policy insured multiple vehicles. To this, the Supreme Court held the waiver invalid as applied to inter-policy stacking for multi-vehicle policies in light of its decision in Craley v. State Farm Fire and Casualty Co., 895 A.2d 530 (Pa. 2006). The Court then determined whether the policy’s household vehicle exclusion was enforceable following its decision in Gallagher v. GEICO Indemnity Company, 201 A.3d 131 (Pa. 2019). Finally, after concluding that the household vehicle exclusion was unenforceable absent a valid waiver of inter-policy stacking, the Court addressed the third question posed by the Court of Appeals regarding the applicability of the policy’s coordination of benefits provision for unstacked UIM coverage. After review, the Supreme Court held that the policy’s coordination of benefits provision for unstacked UIM coverage did not apply absent a valid waiver of inter-policy stacking. Having answered these questions of law, the matter was returned to the Third Circuit. View "Donovan, et al. v. State Farm Mutual Ins. Co." on Justia Law

In December 2015, the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation created and centralized the In re Bair Hugger Forced Air Warming Devices Products Liability Litigation (MDL) in the District of Minnesota for coordinated pretrial proceedings. Plaintiffs in the MDL brought claims against 3M alleging that they contracted periprosthetic joint infections (PJIs) due to the use of 3M's Bair Hugger, a convective (or forced-air ) patient-warming device, during their orthopedic-implant surgeries. The MDL court excluded plaintiffs' general-causation medical experts as well as one of their engineering experts, and it then granted 3M summary judgment as to all of plaintiffs' claims, subsequently entering an MDL-wide final judgment.The Eighth Circuit reversed in full the exclusion of plaintiffs' general-causation medical experts and reversed in part the exclusion of their engineering expert; reversed the grant of summary judgment in favor of 3M; affirmed the discovery order that plaintiffs challenged; affirmed the MDL court's decision to seal the filings plaintiffs seek to have unsealed; and denied plaintiffs' motion to unseal those same filings on the court's own docket. View "Amador v. 3M Company" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court vacated the decision of the trial court to exercise personal jurisdiction over Defendant, Logan Wagner, in a proceeding initiated by Plaintiff, Marisa Mucha, who was seeking to obtain a domestic violence protection order, holding that Defendant did not have the requisite minimum contacts with North Carolina.The only contact Defendant had with North Carolina was more than two dozen phone calls he made to Plaintiff's cell phone on the day she moved to North Carolina. Plaintiff filed a pro se complaint and motion for a DVPO in District Court, Wake County. Defendant filed a motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction. The trial court denied the motion to dismiss and entered a DVPO. The Supreme Court dismissed the trial court's order, holding that the Due Process Clause forbade the trial court from exercising personal jurisdiction over him to enter a DVPO. View "Mucha v. Wagner" on Justia Law

In the aftermath of her divorce from ex-Methodist minister Andrew Johnson, Kim Miller sued not only Johnson but also his employer, the Mississippi Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church (MUMC). Miller also sued fellow MUMC minister Susan Woodard. Her claims against Johnson were aimed at his risky extramarital sexual behavior, which led to Johnson contracting HIV and later infecting Miller with the virus. Miller based her claims against MUMC and Woodard on her allegation that, had the conference and the fellow minister followed United Methodist policy and procedure, they would have discovered Johnson’s behavior and remedied it or warned Miller before she contracted HIV. The question before the Mississippi Supreme Court on interlocutory appeal was whether she established a wrong for which she could legally recover. After review, the Court found "it is clear that Miller seeks to hold MUMC and Woodard legally accountable for failing to follow religious doctrine and procedure. Under the First Amendment, this Court has no authority to consider and enforce religious standards. Thus, MUMC and Woodard are entitled to summary judgment." The Court found Miller’s claims against her ex-husband, Johnson, were not barred by the First Amendment. Still, Johnson insisted he was entitled to summary judgment based on a mutual release in Miller and Johnson’s divorce settlement. The Court found Johnson did not pursue his affirmative defense based on the release for more than two and a half years. By that time, the trial court deemed this defense waived. And after review, the Court held the trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying Johnson summary judgment on this basis. The trial court's orders denying MUMC’s and Woodard’s motions for summary judgment were reversed; the order denying Johnson’s motion for summary judgment was affirmed and Miller’s claims against Johnson remanded to the trial court for further proceedings. View "Woodard v. Miller" on Justia Law

At issue before the Mississippi Supreme Court in this interlocutory appeal was whether the trial court erred by finding cause to grant a 120-day extension of time to serve process on Progressive Gulf Insurance Company. Plaintiffs, Jaswinder Kaur, Harvinder Singh, Karanveer Kamboj, and Gurdev Kamboj, were occupants of a vehicle that was involved in a collision with a vehicle operated by Mary Orebo and owned by Cassandra Mann. Plaintiffs’ vehicle had uninsured-motorist coverage provided by Progressive Gulf Insurance Company. Each Plaintiff filed a separate suit against all three Defendants on the eve of the expiration of the three-year statute of limitations. Progressive contended that difficulty locating other Defendants, the owner and driver of the vehicle, was not adequate cause. After review, the Supreme Court concluded the circuit court did not abuse its discretion in that decision. However, all parties agreed that the circuit court erred by refusing to dismiss the suits of three of the Plaintiffs who failed to seek extensions of time to serve process on Progressive before the end of the original 120-day period. View "Progressive Gulf Insurance Company v. Kaur, et al." on Justia Law

Kent Turner suffered from multiple sclerosis (MS), which caused loss of his motor skills. When his wife, Kathy Turner, could not, due to her own health issues, provide necessary in-home assistance, Kent moved into a nursing home and then into an apartment, where he died in a fire. Kent’s estate, through Kathy Turner, sued the Washington State Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) and Lewis-Mason-Thurston Area Agency on Aging (LMTAAA) (the area agency on aging) with case management responsibilities for Kent’s care, for negligence and for abuse or neglect. DSHS and LMTAAA moved for summary judgment, which the trial court granted. The trial court ruled that no special relationship was formed and only an ordinary duty of care was owed. The trial court further held that no breach occurred and causation was lacking. After review, the Washington Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s summary judgment dismissal of the claims against DSHS and LMTAAA. View "Turner v. Dep't of Soc. & Health Servs." on Justia Law

Maryam Hedayati appealed the grant of summary judgment in favor of Interinsurance Exchange of the Automobile Club (Auto Club or the Club) on Hedayati’s breach of good faith and fair dealing claim. Hedayati suffered catastrophic injuries in October 2012 when Auto Club’s insured ran a red light and struck her in a pedestrian crosswalk. The insured driver immediately notified Auto Club of the accident and authorized the Club to disclose his policy limits ($25,000); he also informed Auto Club he had no other insurance or assets. Auto Club’s policy with its insured required him to relinquish to the Club his right to negotiate settlement of potential tort claims falling within the policy. When he inquired about a release, Auto Club inaccurately told its insured driver Hedayati was not willing to sign one. Despite repeated requests during settlement negotiations from Hedayati’s attorney, Auto Club initially declined to disclose the insured’s policy limits; eventually it acquiesced, but Auto Club still declined to provide written proof of those limits, which the Club knew was common practice to facilitate a settlement. Auto Club then withheld from Hedayati’s counsel the insured’s written declaration which indicated he had no other insurance, which the Club had confirmed, and the insured’s statements that he had no assets. Auto Club also, despite multiple requests from Hedayati’s lawyer, failed to provide a copy of its insured’s policy which Hedayati’s lawyer needed to verify its terms. Hedayati’s counsel had demanded a hard copy of the policy as a settlement condition. Auto Club ultimately failed to settle the matter within its $25,000 policy limits. Hedayati subsequently obtained a $26 million judgment against the insured driver, along with assignment of the insured’s claim against the Club for breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing implicit in its policy with him. The trial court concluded the evidence presented by Hedayati was insufficient as a matter of law. After its de novo review, the Court of Appeal disagreed with the trial court’s evaluation of the evidence. It therefore reversed the summary judgment ruling and remanded for further proceedings. View "Hedayati v. Interinsurance Exchange of the Auto. Club" on Justia Law