Archive for December, 2009

Now that winter officially began on Dec. 21,  two days after a powerful storm dumped almost two feet of snow over Philadelphia and the region, it’s the perfect time for homeowners, renters and business owners to review their responsibilities when it comes to clearing their sidewalks after a snowstorm.

Think no one’s watching if you leave the snow out there and skip the shoveling?  Think again.

Most municipalities have laws requiring that sidewalks be cleared within six hours after a snowstorm so that pedestrians can safely traverse the walks.  What comes after that includes tickets and fines, often starting at $25 per incident and increasing up to as much as $300 for each violation. Check with your local municipality for the rules in your neighborhood.

A man shovels snow from a snow-covered sidewalk in a storm. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/lammerst333

These laws are not there just to annoy homeowners, though many people do feel that way.  Actually, the rules are there to protect you from liability if someone should slip and fall on the snow or ice and then sue you. The laws are to protect homeowners, renters and business people, as well as the pedestrians who are using the sidewalks. Think about how you’d feel if you slipped and fell and were injured while walking on someone else’s uncleared sidewalks.

These kinds of slip and fall injuries are one of the most common types of personal injuries, leading to one of the most common types of lawsuits. For homeowners, it’s definitely something you want to avoid.

In Philadelphia, the rules are very clear,  according to the Streets Department Web site:

“Within six hours of the end of a snowfall or freezing rain, you must clear a path at least 30 inches wide on your sidewalk.  Do not shovel or sweep the snow into the street.  The penalty for violating this regulation can range from a minimum fine of $25 up to $300 for each violation.  To report a sidewalk that has not been cleared, residents my call the Streets Department Customer Affairs Unit at (215) 686-5560.”

For pedestrians, the consequences of inaction  are critical — if property owners don’t clear the sidewalks, then there is no safe path where pedestrians can walk.  It’s an accident waiting to happen, and a preventable one at that.

It’s an important courtesy for everyone involved, and you will avoid lots of legal headaches if you follow these rules. Oh, and when you consider the idea of shoveling the snow from the sidewalks back out into the street, you might want to skip that idea. That’s also against the law, and it’s dangerous for vehicles passing through on your street.  Just put the snow safely onto the grass or between the curb and sidewalk.

Look, winter is here for three more months.  So grin and shovel when it snows, for the good of your neighbors. Have a snowball fight with your kids while you’re all shoveling.

Here’s looking to spring.

You’ve heard those horrific stories in recent years about airline passengers whose flights sit on airport taxiways or gates aprons for hours because the planes are waiting for the weather to improve or for an arrival gate to open up.

You’ve heard about the problems as the planes just sit there for hours on end in the cold or the heat, as the planes become foul-smelling as toilets fill up and can’t be used anymore.  You’ve heard about claustrophobic,  exhausted and frustrated passengers who get cranky or downright angry over the inhospitable conditions as they sit in the planes waiting endlessly without food, water and other basic necessities.  And you’ve likely heard about some of the lawsuits that have been filed in connection with these difficult incidents.  You may have even experienced such an indignity and inconvenience in the last few years.

Well, finally, the federal government is doing something about it, and it’s about time.

In a story in The New York Times this week, new U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) rules will mean that airlines will face penalties of up to $27,500 per passenger if food and water isn’t offered on board to affected passengers after delays of at least two hours.  Planes will also be prohibited from remaining parked on the ground with passengers on board for more than three hours without allowing them to get off the aircraft.  That’s great news and a great place to start.

A man waits in his seat inside an airliner. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/mkurtbas

The new rules limiting airline “tarmac delays” were unveiled by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood earlier this week and will go into effect next spring.  “Airline passengers have rights, and these new rules will require airlines to live up to their obligation to treat their customers fairly,”  LaHood said in a statement.

The DOT had already reacted to tarmac delay incidents like these in some cases recently, including a combined $175,000 fine against Continental Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines and Mesaba Airlines in connection with a nearly six-hour ground delay at an airport in Rochester, Minn.

The New York Times story reported that only about 1,500 flights a year in the U.S. experience these extended delays, which amounts to about one out of every 6,200 flights,  “but that has been enough to affect more than 100,000 passengers a year and to create substantial public resentment,” according to the Times.

That’s putting it mildly.

Yes, you can always sue in such an instance and hope that you can recover damages for inconvenience, travel delays, suffering and hassle, but these kinds of preventable scenarios shouldn’t be occurring in the first place.

Kudos to the DOT for finally taking a stand for airline passenger’s rights.

After spending 35 years in prison for a crime he always insisted he hadn’t committed, James Bain walked out of the courthouse in Polk County, Fla., yesterday, a free man once again,  according to an Associated Press story in today’s New York Times.

It took many legal attempts to finally get the courts to analyze his DNA and compare it to DNA left at the scene of the kidnapping and rape of a nine-year-old boy back in 1974.  When the tests were finally done this year, the results clearly demonstrated that the wrong man had been charged, convicted and imprisoned.

No one can give James Bain those 35 years back, but his experience underscores again that our system of law is not without flaws and can allow innocent people to be imprisoned for decades.  The good news, however, is that there are national groups like The Innocence Project that continue to work on behalf of people who have been falsely accused of heinous crimes.

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/hatman12

Bain is the 248th person who has been exonerated of crimes due to DNA testing in our nation, according to the group.

The details of his case are chilling.

“The victim described the perpetrator and the victim’s uncle said the description sounded like James Bain,” according to The Innocence Project’s press release yesterday.  “The victim then viewed a photo lineup and identified Bain as the perpetrator.  He would later say in a deposition that he had been asked to ‘pick out Jimmie Bain.’”

When he was arrested, Bain was 19 years old.  He maintained that he was at home with his younger sister at the time the crime has been committed.  His denials went unheeded and he was arrested, charged, convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

In this case, it took repeated legal attempts by attorneys from the Innocence Project of Florida, a six-year-old non-profit group that uses DNA testing to help innocent prisoners in Florida obtain their freedom and rebuild their lives, to get a judge to order the tests.

This is a classic example of  how justice delayed is truly justice denied.  James Bain was allowed to rot in a Florida prison even though DNA evidence could have and should have exonerated him long ago.   Shame on the Florida judiciary,  shame on the county prosecutor and shame on all who contributed to this long,  sad,  unfair and miserable  miscarriage of justice.

What this case — and the hundreds just like it that have occurred in recent years across our nation — illustrates is that justice is never perfect, but that it can be corrected as long as their are people who make it their business to fight for those who are wrongly accused.

It also clearly shows that because justice can be imperfect, irreversible penalties such as death sentences should never be permitted.  If a prisoner is given a death sentence, and it is carried out, then finality is all that is left. And in Bain’s case, it would have been a tragic miscarriage of “justice” had the circumstances of his case never received further reviews.

Convicted killer Cameron Todd Willingham in Texas may not have been so fortunate.  He was charged and convicted in the murders of his three young children in 1991 in a house fire, which was ruled an arson.  He denied that he set the fire and refused to sign a plea agreement, choosing to let his story come out in court.  After a dramatic trial, he was found guilty and sentenced to death.  He was put to death in February, 2004, by lethal injection in a Texas prison.

Five years later, in a 17-page analysis story published this September in The New Yorker,  serious questions were raised about the techniques, conclusions and analysis done in the arson investigation in Willingham’s case. The tragedy is that though the questions raised could have impacted his case, Willingham had already been killed and he could not seek appeals based on the new information that could potentially have cleared him.

Some critics insist that justice is always fair, always right and that the accused are always guilty.

Remember that if you are James Bain or Cameron Todd Willingham and are accused of a crime that you insist you did not commit.

Death penalties are not the answer.

Justice, even justice delayed, is the only and ultimate answer.

James Bain’s tortuous case and his ultimately proper release from prison is proof of that.

Monopolies are typically not a good thing, unless you are playing the popular and beloved Parker Brothers game with your children.

But for years, Philadelphia sports fans in the greater Philadelphia area who wanted to watch most of the games involving their beloved Phillies, Flyers and Sixers on television  haven’t been able to watch unless they subscribed to Comcast Corp.’s cable TV services.  That’s because most Phillies, Flyers and Sixers games are broadcast only on Comcast’s own SportsNet channel.  That’s not a problem if you are a Comcast subscriber, but if you want to partake of satellite TV providers like DirecTV or Dish Network for a more competitive price or a different assortment of channels,  you’ve been out of luck.  Comcast doesn’t make Comcast SportsNet available to the satellite companies for broadcast.  So if you want to watch the games that are only available via SportsNet, you can’t go with a satellite provider.

But that might change next year,  according to a story in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer.

Comcast SportsNet broadcasts could be available to satellite TV providers under a rules change being considered by the FCC. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/starfotograf

The Federal Communications Commission is apparently looking at changing a “terrestrial loophole” in its rules that for years has allowed Comcast to keep its SportsNet programming from its competitors,  according to the Inquirer.  The FCC’s chairman, Julius Genachowski, reportedly wants this loophole closed to promote fairer competition among pay-TV companies, the story said.

In the big scheme of things in this crazy world of ours, this is a tiny issue.  But it is a matter of fairness for literally millions of pay-TV subscribers whose choices are limited in part by a monopolistic regulation created in a different time.

And fairness, after all, is the reason for reviewing laws, regulations, loopholes and other issues that are outdated or outmoded.

This FCC  rules review is a good one for everyone, from TV viewers to pay-TV providers.  And creating some real competition on a more level playing field could help bring better rates and service deals for consumers who have been locked in by high rates from all the pay-TV companies.

The FCC ruling could come in January, according to the Inquirer.  What a great New Year’s present that could be for TV viewers seeking better choices.

With the December holidays in full swing, from Hanukkah to Kwanzaa to Christmas to New Year’s Eve,  it’s a perfect time for us all to remember and carefully consider the dangers of  drinking and driving as we celebrate family, friends and festive events.

According to the activist group Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), last year there were 11,773 fatalities nationally involving a driver with an illegal blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or greater.  That’s 11,773 too many drunk driving deaths.  And with this year’s holidays now upon us, according to MADD, the dangers caused by drunk drivers increases because vehicle travel is heavier on the roadways and drunk driving increases. In 2007, between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, 1,495 people were killed nationally by drunk drivers, according to MADD.  In 2006, 1,566 people were killed.

Sobriety checkpoints will be set up across the nation this holiday season to prevent drunk driving. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/sdominick

We all are responsible, starting with each of us individually, to choose not to consume alcoholic beverages and then hop into our vehicles and drive when our driving skills are impaired.

Bartenders, waiters, waitresses and restaurant and club owners are also responsible through liquor liability laws and dram shop liability to  ensure that none of their customers drinks so much that they are visibly intoxicated and a danger to others on the roads.  In Pennsylvania, and in other states, there are training programs for bartenders and wait staffs so that they learn when and how to stop customers who are drinking too much.  The Pennsylvania Liquor Control  Board (LCB) offers its  Responsible Alcohol  Management Program (RAMP), which offers a full range of important training.

That’s a good thing, but it doesn’t end there.

We are all stewards of this responsibility if we hold parties and serve alcohol, or if we attend parties where alcohol is being served.  You can be sued and held responsible for damages if someone is at your gala, drinks too much, drives away and is involved in a vehicle accident. You have to know to say no to your friends and loved ones if they party too much.  If someone is visibly intoxicated, don’t let them drive away on their own.  Get them in a taxicab or find them a ride with someone who has not been drinking. Let them sleep in your spare room. Do whatever it takes to prevent a tragedy.

Think of it this way — if your teen-aged son or daughter is out driving this holiday season, would you rather not allow drunk drivers to be out there on the streets with them, sharing the roads and plowing into them? That’s one reason why we all have to be vigilant for each other.  It doesn’t always happen to other families.  Such tragedies have perhaps happened to someone in your family, or a friend’s family. No more.

Starting tomorrow, states across the nation will begin stepping up their holiday drunk driving enforcement efforts as the national Governors Highway Safety Association joins the U.S. Department of Transportation, the Office of National Drug Control Policy and state and local law enforcement agencies to launch an extensive holiday drunk driving crackdown across the nation through Jan. 3, 2010. Here in Pennsylvania, police departments will be conducting increased DUI enforcement as part of the Operation Safe Holiday campaign.  More than 600 municipal police and all State Police Troops are expected to participate, according to the group.  Last year during the holiday crackdown, 262 DUI citations were written.

Make their work easier — don’t drink and drive.  Don’t become one of the statistics.  Don’t hurt or kill someone else or someone you love by driving drunk and getting into a serious accident.

Have a great time this holiday season, but let’s be responsible and careful out there.

If you or a loved one was prescribed Yaz birth control pills, you probably believed it would prevent pregnancy, while curing acne, treating premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), and controlling cramps. Why wouldn’t you? That is what the advertisements claimed. What they didn’t say is that Yaz can also cause blood clots in the legs, heart attacks, gall bladder disease and other serious side effects.

For many months, Yaz was advertised as a “golden birth control pill,” while failing to warn of the potentially serious and life-ending side effects. The deceptive advertising practices of the Bayer pharmaceutical company — the maker of Yaz — prompted the Food & Drug Administration to issue a warning. While Yaz commercials did make the correction, for millions of women it was too little, too late.

Deceptive practices by pharmaceutical companies are more common than you think. Yaz is only one example of a drug that can cause more harm than good. Others include, Hydroxycut, Vioxx, Baycol and Fen Phen. Unfortunately, many consumers never know the risks involved with these medications until they suffer the consequences.

Pharmaceutical companies need to be held liable for their actions. Not only is it unfair to lie, deceive and cheat consumers, it also unethical and illegal. Causing someone pain and suffering, possibly even death, is not a laughing matter. It is a serious injustice that must be dealt with in the court of law.

Know that if you are a victim of a Yaz or another defective drug, you have legal options. Some valid claims you may be able to make against a drug company include:

• Failure to warn of the dangerous side effects
• Failure to issue a recall for the dangerous prescription after learning of the serious side effects
• Deceptive marketing and false advertising
• Knowingly encouraging the use of a dangerous and defective prescription drug
• Failure to perform adequate tests and research that would expose the harmful side effects

Also, know that you are not alone. In Pennsylvania, several women have already taken the step to file complaints against Bayer for Yaz side effects. These women, and others like them across the country, suffered a variety of ailments from pulmonary embolisms to gallbladder disease. Several required surgery. In fact, so many people have suffered complications that motions have been filed to consolidate them into a single class action lawsuit, giving the plaintiffs a stronger front against a powerful and heavily represented pharmaceutical company. See this Yaz lawsuit article for more information.

The Yaz birth control pill has cost many women their health, and in some cases, their life. At MyPhillyLawyer, we hope that Bayer and other pharmaceutical companies will open their eyes to the pain and suffering they cause, and stop deceptive advertising practices. In the mean time, our firm will be there to hold pharmaceutical companies accountable and to help recover compensation for our injured clients.