NY Accident Lawyers Blog

The question of the constitutionality of New York City’s “stop-and-frisk” policy was taken up today during a debate sponsored by Crain’s Tuesday morning.  Four of the five Democratic candidates for the state’s top law enforcement office said they believed the police department’s widespread policy of stopping and searching people without probable cause may be unconstitutional.

The policy has apparently merited an investigation and possibly could lead to a lawsuit against the New York Police Department.

Eric Dinallo, a former prosecutor for the attorney general’s office under Eliot Spitzer, said the Supreme Court’s ruling in a 1968 case, Terry v. Ohio, allowed the police to use stop-and-frisk policing, but only in limited circumstances.

“The police department in the City of New York has taken that and made it into an institutional, systemic approach which I question the constitutionality of,” Mr. Dinallo said.

Sean Coffey, a former prosecutor, said stop-and-frisk was not being used to prevent crime but rather to simply meet a precinct commander’s arrest quotas.

The police maintain that they do not set quotas, though they do have “productivity goals,” according to statements made in previous news reports.

State Sen. Eric Schneiderman, who co-sponsored the bill that limited the use of the police database, said the overuse of stop-and-frisk was “part of a larger pattern of abuse in the criminal justices system” that has eroded people’s confidence in government.

The penalties for driving drunk should be much stiffer and New York personal injury lawyers should be allowed to go after the perpetrators to the max.

The New York Daily News reported today that the airport shuttle driver critically injured in a fiery crash with a wrong-way drunken driver this month died Thursday.

John Rey 64, of Greenlawn, L.I., died of multiple organ failure after weeks of “unthinkable pain” following the horrific July 5 accident on the Long Island Expressway in Queens, his daughter said.

The intoxicated driver should be receive 10 years for every day of pain this man was in before he died.

His daughter said he was a “Sweet, caring, innocent, loving man who has suffered unthinkable pain and punishment for another man’s crime.”

A spokeswoman for the Queens district attorney said prosecutors will ask a grand jury to upgrade charges against Dave Richards, 30 – whose blood-alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit when he slammed his Mercedes head-on into Rey’s van.

Richards is currently charged with vehicular assault, a class D felony.

The New York Daily News reported today that a Staten Island mother and her four children died in a three-alarm fire that tore through their apartment – which did not have a required smoke detector.

A neighbor of the stricken mother said her goal in life was to make sure her kids made it.  ”She wanted them to succeed and she wanted them to have a better life than she had.”

So why didn’t she have smoke detectors in the apartment, which is mandated by law?  Fire commissioner Salvatore Cassano said he tries to keep reminding people that the cheap little device saves lives.

The device is required to be provided by the building’s landlord. The landlord at the dead family’s apartment was said to be on vacation at the time of the fire.

Look for personal injury lawsuits to start flying and top New York personal injury lawyers to be going after the vacationing landlord.

Two police officers ran toward the burning building on Nicholas Ave. and kicked in doors to alert other residents, witnesses said.

More than a dozen people escaped the building, which consists of two attached residences that each house two families.

The cause of the inferno remains under investigation but it is not consider suspicious.

There have been two complaints filed against the building owner, according to the Department of Buildings.

In 2005, a report of an illegal conversion prompted a Buildings inspector to twice visit the building but the official could not access it either time, officials said.

Crane’s announced this afternoon that The Bronx Housing Court released a notorious slumlord from prison claiming he no longer owns the buildings he ran into the ground.

The magazine said a hearing is set for Monday, July 26, at which time the slumlord must provide documentation that shows a change in ownership. If Mr. Suzuki, who had been in prison since June 24, fails to provide proof, he could be sent back to custody.

Frankly, I don’t see why the sale of the property should have anything to do with letting a criminal out of jail.  He wasn’t punished for harming a building.  He was jailed for creating an unsafe, unhealthy and unlivable situation for his tenants. Selling the building doesn’t lessen his crimes against his tenants.  A crumball like this will now only go out and buy another building and repeat the same behavior.  I only hope some tenants hire top personal injury lawyers to go after this creep now that he’s out of jail.

According to Crane’s, last year Mr. Suzuki’s company, Hunter Property Management, took over six distressed building in the Bronx. The buildings had a total of 260 apartments.  Shortly after he took over the buildings, a group of tenants filed a lawsuit against him to correct 97 violations throughout their individual apartments, including immediately hazardous violations. The five-story building has 691 open violations.

According to one Legal Aide Society lawyer representing one of the tenants, Mr. Suzuki’s attorneys in court said Suzuki refuses to reveal who the real owners of the buildings are “because of Japanese cultural business practice; if he revealed them his life would be in danger.”

I guess there are just some accidents that can’t be avoided.  Or can they?

Never having been to this illegal swimming hole I can’t speak for the warning signs and other efforts by the city to keep people away from a dangerous spot in the Bronx River.  But kids are kids.  Signs mean nothing and adults should know it.  If there’s a way over or under a fence to get to some fun, a kid will find it.  You can count on that.

What the City didn’t count on was the drowning of two teens in the Bronx River on Sunday after, as The New York Daily News reports,  ”years of broken bones and near misses at the popular summer retreat.”

One kid told the News, “We jump off the rocks all the time, but people do get hurt. ”A girl broke her arm here recently.”

Emergency responders say they’re frequently called to the spot near the Bronx Zoo to rescue injured swimmers.

I wonder what the city would do if this was happening in Central Park, in the reservoir, right off Fifth Ave.  vs. the Bronx, near the Zoo?  Perhaps, this is a question that should be put to a top personal injury lawyer in New York.

According to the News, signs warn swimmers to stay away from the fenced-off swimming hole above a waterfall.  One 16 year old neighbor told the News, ”They should put barbed wire so this doesn’t happen again.”   You’re absolutely right, kid.

Another 13 year old said kids know they’re not allowed to swim there but don’t think about the consequences. “Sometimes the parks people come and kick us out, but never the real cops,” he said.

The city Parks Department did not say whether changes would be made to secure the area. But sources said the department increased fencing at the park in recent years to deter swimmers and has been vigilant about posting “No Swimming” signs.

Yeah, no swimming signs.  It’s been in the high 90s for weeks.  Does the city really think that signs are going to keep kids out of the water?

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Doesn’t this just beat everything?  Even in New York City.

The New York Daily News reported today that the Harlem school principal whose school went on a deadly beach field trip faces only a slap on the wrist since officials granted him tenure just days after the girl’s death.  After the girls death, that he is largely responsible for causing.

While a teacher was fired and an assistant principal demoted after the June 22 drowning of 12-year-old Nicole Suriel, officials could only seek to put Jose Maldonado-Rivera on probation because his tenure became effective July 1, even after he acknowledged authorizing a beach field trip as a reward for fund-raising.

His lame excuse was that he was unaware of deadly riptides at Long Beach and didn’t realize there would be no lifeguards there that day.

Another completely tone deaf school official, Columbia Secondary School parents association co-president Maria Herrera,  said there’s support for the principal staying as school leader.  The mind boggles at who this lame principals supporters might be.

They should fire these teachers.  And, they the parents should sue them.

The NY Daily News reported today that school investigators slammed Harlen school teachers over a beach field trip that ended in a student’s drowning.  But what wasn’t said in earlier reports was that at least four other kids needed to be saved from the waters.

In a report released Wednesday, investigators bashed the staff at Columbia Secondary School for allowing kids in the water without lifeguards on duty.

Wh0 are these teachers?  Who hired them?  What were there superiors thinking?  If anything.

Investigators also revealed that at least four other students were in distress and had to be rescued before sxith-grader Nicole Suriel drowned.

City officials said the obvious: “It was poor judgement for allowing kids in the unguarded water.”  But I want to know who hired these people?  Don’t they bear some of the responsibility?

Teaching intern Victoria Wong, 19,  one of just three chaperones, said Bailey called out for help from the lifeguards when she saw her students struggling in the water.

“‘Where is the lifeguard?’”  she screamed.  They weren’t on duty.  And, everyone who had responsibility for these children should have seen that.

Principal Jose Maldonado-Rivera and Stillman were faulted for poor planning.  Poor planning?  He should be charged with reckless endangerment of minors.

Both Stillman and Maldonado-Rivera spoke with investigators, insisting there was a clear policy at the school forbidding swimming when no lifeguard were on duty.  Right take kids to the beach and tell them not to swim on a hot day.  Right.

The 24 chaperones carefully watched over the 51 students from that school, making a circle around them, investigators found.  But this effort clearly didn’t work.  How did the kids end up in the deep six?  The ocean is a dangerous place.  It’s criminal to let kids swim in the Atlantic when guards are nowhere to be found.

According to a report on CNN today, a video showing polyester straps blamed for breaking and spurring a deadly New York City crane collapse was shown Tuesday at crane rigger William Rapetti’s manslaughter trial. His lawyers arranged the experiment.

Prosecutors say Mr. Rapetti took shortcuts when lashing a nearly 6-ton piece of steel to the crane with the straps. Prosecutors say one badly worn strap failed, overloading and breaking the remaining straps.

Prosecutors say that unleashed the steel piece and destabilized the crane, causing the collapse that killed seven people in midtown Manhattan in March 2008.

The defense experiment showed that when a worn strap was cut, the other three held.

Prosecutors are to question a defense engineer later Tuesday.

I had the ignoble distinction of having traveled today, south for about 3 hours, on the Garden State Parkway…on route “down the shore.”  Hadn’t done that in while, not since moving from central Jersey about 30 years ago to points North, specifically New York City.   My new summer playground is referred to as the beach a la “Jones, R. Moses, etc.

Anyway, back to the GPS.   Much progress has been made to widen this heavily-traveled route from two lanes to three.   Legions of hardhat workers were out in the heat of day with pick axes and shovels, sweating feverishly in the early afternoon sun.  The goal is to complete the highway weight gain by this time next summer.

Construction work can be a dangerous business.  And, construction sites dangerous places.  Falls from high places, heavy equipment that malfunctions, falling objects, sadly, are common occurrences on worksites.  And, very bad things can happen to cranes.  But has anyone ever considered another possible deadly consequence for the men and women in jeans and yellow vests?  Namely, skin cancer?

The dominant skin color du jour under those hardhats today was red, some more red than others.  Yet, despite the blazing sunshine, I didn’t catch a glimpse of any of these rough and ready men and women spreading sun screen where clearly too much sun had already shone.  I had to wonder if the subject of using sun screen is even mentioned on the list of safety tips, like wearing hardhats and not drinking alcohol on the job, that workers are expected to follow.

I’m not aware of any situations of a construction worker suing his or her employer for contracting skin cancer on the job.  But there’s always a first time.  And, should that happen I’m sure the folks at Coppertone have a solution.

The thermometers bounced over the 100 degree mark yesterday for the second day in a row, and Con Edison had it’s hands full trying to prevent the total collapse of its grid.

According to an article in today’s The New York Times, most residents in the region had electricity in their homes throughout the spell to power lights, and more importantly, air conditioners, despite fears of an impending melt-down at the power company.

I suppose had the worst had happened and darkness had fallen over the five boroughs, the jovial TV weatherman would have made an appropriate fall guy, ooops, I mean, fall person and born the brunt of jokes.  Not the power company.

But one has to wonder why.

Why in the age of global warming, would one of the largest and richest power companies in the world not be ready to handle a little heat wave?  When management at Con Ed huddle around tables to draw up plans for dealing with probable, real-world crisis scenarios, isn’t preventing the collapse of the grid in a little hot, ok, very hot, weather be on the agenda?

It’s summer.  And, backs of necks get dirty and gritty.  Is it too much to expect to see temperatures rising in the triple digits for a day or so?  Shouldn’t Con Ed have this one nailed and be on to solving the next hypothetical crisis?

Why should Con Ed be let off the hook if something did go wrong and people started dropping like flies for lack of a cool bedroom to sleep in?

I’d like to hear a really talented trial attorney argue a case against Con Edison for a client who lost power in a heat wave and ended very sick and in the hospital with heat stroke.

Would the weatherman be called in to testify for the defense?