Texas Personal Injury Lawyers – Jim Adler & Associates – Blog

In 2003, USA TODAY carried a story about an 86-year-old driver who killed 10 people when his car veered into a crowded farmer’s market in Santa Monica, CA. In 2004, the Chicago Sun Times ran a story about an elderly driver whose car plowed into a Chicago Subway sandwich shop killing one patron and injuring two others. In 2005, FOX NEWS reported that a 93-year-old driver in Florida hit a pedestrian and kept on driving with the victim stuck on his windshield.

Authorities fear these stories will become commonplace as more Baby Boomers – 79 million people born between 1946 and 1964 – reach age 65 and their physical abilities begin to decline. The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety warns that by 2025, “people aged 65 and older will account for 25 percent of U.S. drivers…” It says state licensing systems are ill prepared to weed out unfit drivers. (more…)

Yes, they are…if they talk on a cell phone, even a hands-free phone, while they are driving. New research debunks the idea that talking on a “hands-free” phone while driving a car is safe. In a breakthrough brain imaging study last spring, scientists at the Carnegie Mellon Institute showed for the first time “that listening alone reduces by 37 percent the amount of brain activity associated with driving. This can cause drivers to weave out of their lane, based on the performance of subjects using a driving simulator.”

Teen drivers (and others) often head down the road with a host of distractions diverting their attention from driving: music, listening to the radio, texting, eating, talking to passengers. But scientists at the prestigious engineering college in Pittsburg think that cell phones “may be especially distracting” because of the social demands they impose, like not ignoring the party on the other end in heavy traffic. (more…)

Beware of people who show up after a car accident saying they represent lawyers and medical clinics. These predators not only are breaking the law but their greed could keep you from getting good medical care and expert legal representation.

Attorney Mitch Ginsburg knows their scams by heart since these con artists have been operating in San Antonio, where he heads a Jim Adler office. Ginsburg says the most common scam involves a “solicitor” who contacts the person involved in the accident saying he’s from an insurance company, a doctor’s office or the police. He then directs the injured person to a specific clinic using several ploys: “We will pay (insurance) or “I recommend this doctor” or “We will file your claim for you.” When the victim goes to the clinic, he or she is ushered into a room where a representative persuades them to hire a specific lawyer. After that, Ginsburg says, the victim almost always has trouble getting in touch with the lawyer and the doctor is usually affiliated with a clinic that provides substandard care and is under investigation by the insurance industry. These scams are apparently on the rise elsewhere. (more…)

Believe it or not, a law governing rights of sailors to recover damages if they’re hurt could come into play if relatives of six offshore oil rig workers killed in a helicopter crash Jan. 4 can file suit against the company that owned the copter. The deadly crash happened about 100 miles southwest of New Orleans. The off-shore oil rig workers who lost their lives may be protected under The Jones Act, a federal law that says an injured worker only has to show that “employer negligence played any part, even in the slightest, in producing the injury…” Offshore oil workers may recover damages if they are hurt in accidents traveling from one company location to another. (more…)