Wrongful Death

January 7, 2009

Baxter Contaminated Heparin Class Action Lawsuit Filed

A class action suit against the maker of a blood thinning Heparin drug claims the company is substituting safer ingredients – cooked, dried pig intestines – with more dangerous ones.

Joyce Ann Osteen of Illinois is suing Baxter over its anticoagulant drug Heparin in St. Clair County Circuit Court.

She claims the company began substituting a more dangerous ingredient to “reap greater profits as a result of utilizing cheap component parts.”

Baxter began making the drug from enzymes found in pork intestines, according to the complaint filed Jan. 5.

January 5, 2009

Tyler Texas Store Not Liable For Elderly Shopper’s Death

by Dr. Shezad Malik

On Sept. 24, a jury rejected a family’s claim that its elderly patriarch died as a result of injuries sustained when he fell at a Family Dollar Store.

The family of Warren Tiner, 84, alleged he was shopping at the Tyler store when he tripped over a box left out in an aisle.

Complaining of back pain, he checked into a hospital eight days after the September 2006 incident. His condition worsened, and he developed other health issues, including pneumonia, heart problems and eventually paralysis from spinal cord compression.

December 30, 2008

Texas Wrongful Death Suit Blames Sawmill’s Safety Violations

by Dr. Shezad Malik

MARSHALL TEXAS- The family of a man killed while working at a Texas sawmill is suing the company for alleged safety violations.

According to the complaint filed Dec. 28 in the Marshall Division of the Eastern District of Texas, the man was employed at Southern Hardwood Co. on Jan. 20, 2007, when he died.

The man was making wooden boards for pallets using a board edger, when the Crosby board edger “shot back” a board into his chest.

The man was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead and the cause of death determined to be from a blunt force trauma to the chest.

December 25, 2008

Ambulance And Car Accident in Leonard, North of Dallas

by Dr. Shezad Malik

LEONARD TEXAS— An ambulance collided with a car at a rural North Texas intersection, killing all three people inside the sedan.

Police in Leonard say the ambulance driver failed to see the Chevrolet Malibu before turning onto U.S. Highway 69. The car slammed into the ambulance, sending both vehicles off the road and leaving the ambulance on its side in a ditch.

December 19, 2008

4 Die On Icy North Texas Roads

by Dr. Shezad Malik

DALLAS — Four people, including a 14-month-old toddler, died in accidents on icy roadways as a wintry storm moved through Texas over the past week.

Authorities blamed icy roads for all four traffic fatalities. In three of the four deadly accidents, Monday night and early Tuesday, the drivers of the vehicles were speeding on slick roads, officials said.

December 18, 2008

Heavy Truck Accidents Caused By Fatigue

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Driver fatigue is responsible for up to 40% of all accidents caused by semi-truck drivers. Data from the Deptartment of Transportation show that driver fatigue causes as many as 750 deaths and nearly 200,000 injuries on an annual basis.

Under the current rules, a driver must be allowed 10 hours off duty is he has been driving for more than 11 hours and/or has been “on duty” for up to 14 hours. In addition to this daily rule is a weekly rule that requires drivers to stop operating their truck if they have been “on-duty” for either 60 hours in a 7 day period or 70 hours in an 8 day period.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has fought unsuccesfuly to tighten these rules and avoid the driver fatigue that has caused so many accidents and injured so many people.

December 17, 2008

Family of Inmate Who Died Sues S.F. for $10 M

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The family of a man who died at a San Francisco jail has filed a $10 million federal civil rights lawsuit against the city, saying sheriff’s officials ignored prisoners’ pleas that he needed medical help in the hours before he died.

The 48 year old man, died in his cell, a day after he was booked on suspicion of possession of drugs for sale following his arrest.

Five inmates have alleged that jail staffers did not respond to prisoners’ pleas for the man to be treated by a doctor after he complained of feeling ill.

The man’s death was listed as accidental, the result of a heart attack caused by acute drug intoxication, the medical examiner’s office said.

The wrongful-death suit filed on behalf of man’s family Friday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco claims that jail staffers failed to recognize that the man was undergoing opiate withdrawal. He told staffers and other inmates that he “felt like he was dying,” the suit said.

December 15, 2008

Family Sues Disney Over Defective Product Death

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The family of a child who died in a Winnie the Pooh bassinet has sued the Walt Disney Co., alleging the company allowed sales of the bassinets despite a flawed design that had been linked to another baby’s death.

The bassinet had a drop-down side for easy access, but the design created a gap where babies could slide through and hang to death. The child was 6 months old when she was strangled.

Shortly after the child’s death, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission directed retailers to stop selling the bassinets, which were manufactured by Simplicity Inc. Disney’s consumer products division licensed its Winnie the Pooh name and image to Simplicity.

The suit, filed in California state court in Los Angeles, raises questions about a common practice in the nursery products industry: Are companies that license their names and characters to other manufacturers responsible when those products turn out to be deadly?

December 8, 2008

Wal-Mart Sued by Family of Trampled Man

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The family of a man killed in a stampede by holiday shoppers filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Wal-Mart Stores Inc, seeking unspecified damages.

Shoppers on New York’s Long Island broke down doors and surged into the Valley Stream Wal-Mart, the day after Thanksgiving, known as “Black Friday,” traditionally the busiest retail shopping day of the year.

The 34 year old man, was knocked to the ground and trampled to death. He had been assigned to cover security as an independent contractor.

December 6, 2008

Lawsuit in Florida Blood Bank Death

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The parents of a 7-year-old boy who died after contracting West Nile virus from a transfusion of tainted blood asked the Florida Supreme Court to restore an $8 million jury verdict against a blood bank.

The Court have been asked to decide whether all blood banks are covered by Florida’s medical malpractice statutes, which include special procedures and limits on damages and attorney fees, rather than general negligence laws.

The American Red Cross and two national blood bank associations are participating in the case through a written “friend-of-the-court” argument that sided with the defendant, LifeSouth Community Blood Centers Inc.