Protecting People throughout Northern California
Home Improvement Store Pays Damages After Display Falls On Customer
The customer was interested in new marble countertops for a kitchen remodeling project. He was greeted in the natural stone department by the salesperson who directed him to the display of marble slabs. He was left alone to make his selection with no instructions on how to safely move or view the slabs. The marble sections were heavy. They measured 3 feet by 5 feet and were stacked at an angle on an A-frame and secured with a strap. As the customer began to move the slabs for further inspection one of them fell away from the A-frame, pinning him to an adjacent display and breaking his knee cap. The lawyers of Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons represented the customer and successfully argued the store had failed to warn him of the hidden dangers of the display. The suit was filed in Contra Costa County Superior Court and settled in arbitration.
Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons Settles Child Injury Case Against AC Transit
The mother of three had her hands full with her children on an AC Transit bus. Their ages were 2, 3 and 10. The bus slowed to a stop and the mother and 3 children were trying to exit through the rear door. The 2 year old safely got off of the bus but the rear door closed too soon and the 3 year old's foot was trapped. The mother is terrified as she is still on the bus trying to open the rear door. The emergency door release is not working and the driver is paying no attention to her screams. Two passengers help the mother open the door and the child's foot is released. The Hayward case was successfully settled on behalf of the mother and her injured child.
Drug Store Pays After Denying Responsibility For Customer Fall
Many year's of foot traffic had finally worn down the cover of an electrical panel in the floor near the drug store's front door. The store's solution was to cover the panel with a mat. Nothing was done to repair the now-hidden danger of a loose panel in the floor. As our client was leaving the store she stepped on the mat that was hiding the dangerously loose panel. The panel shifted under her weight and she was thrown off balance and fell to the floor. Her injuries included fractured shoulders and a torn rotator cuff. At first the store refused to accept any responsibility for the hazardous condition but the lawyers of Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons brought the case to a successful settlement.
A Doctor's Professional Judgement Should Also Include Common Sense
Our 87 year old client had a medical history of frequent dizzy spells and falls. Her doctors were not able to diagnose the cause. She also suffered from dementia. Her condition worsened late one night and she was taken to the emergency room. The doctor discharged her at 3:00 a.m. on a cold and rainy December morning. She did not have her walker and the doctor expected her to make it on her own to a taxi for the ride back to her board and care home. She fell as soon as she stepped out of the hospital and fractured her right hip. The case was successfully arbitrated on behalf of our elderly client.
Hayward Attorney Rick Simons Settles Police Shooting Case for $1.2 Million
The City of Oakland has agreed to pay $1.2 million to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit filed by Hayward attorney Rick Simons on behalf of his client Charles Davis, Jr.
An Oakland Police Officer shot Mr. Davis in the back without warning after Davis was lawfully arrested and standing unarmed with his hands up. The shooting left Mr. Davis a paraplegic.
Attorney Simons, of Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons LC, Hayward CA, says the shooting “violates the basic social agreement that allows police to carry and use weapons- reasonable force does not mean shooting homeless people in the back.” The $1.2 million will help Mr. Davis with the basic needs and care he’ll require for the rest of his life.
The officer claimed that after warning him to “freeze”, Mr. Davis turned towards him with a shiny metallic object in his hand. But Mr. Simons’ uncovered the testimony of another officer and physical evidence that proved there was no warning, no object in Davis’ hand, and that Davis was not turning towards the Officer.
Listen as Rick Simons discusses the case on KGO Radio, San Francisco.
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Multi-Million Dollar Personal Injury Settlement - Leg Amputation from Guardrail
Mr. Jaspovice negotiated a multi -million dollar settlement for a single mother who veered off of a county road during the morning commute. Her vehicle struck a guardrail that penetrated her car, causing an above the knee amputation of her leg. Locating and hiring one of the country's leading experts in guardrail safety, and flying him to the Bay Area from Texas to inspect the guardrail, the law firm was able to establish the responsibility of the county and its contractors. Had they followed established state and federal guidelines installing the guardrail it would have collapsed on impact and separated from its support posts, instead of spearing the client's car and severing her leg. The settlement created a lifetime annuity capable of supporting the family, paying future medical expenses, and establishing a four year college fund for the client's minor son. (Baskin-Gilmore v. County of Contra Costa, Sup. Ct. # CIV MSC05-00318).
Personal Injury Settlements and Verdicts - Representing Oakland and San Francisco
The lawyers of Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons LC are pleased to discuss the results of their cases. Some of the case names and other details have been deleted to preserve the confidentiality of the parties involved. Other results are well known and publicized, appearing in local newspapers, media, or in official legal reports. The attorneys at Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons LC are proud of the results we obtain for our clients and of the personal relationships we develop with clients during their cases. A review of some of the most recent results we have obtained includes:
Birth Injury Claim Results in Lifetime Medical Care
A child who suffered cerebral palsy from loss of oxygen during birth will benefit from a lifetime medical trust fund and other payments obtained in settlement of his claims. The case involved mismanagement of a high-risk diabetic pregnancy. Rick Simons, representing the child and his mother, assembled a team of the best specialists in the world in the fields of genetics, obstetrics, pediatric neuroradiology, and pediatric neurology, and established that the child's significant disabilities were directly caused by mismanagement of the pregnancy and birth by the general practice OB/GYN. The defendants argued that an underlying genetic brain deformity was the cause of the child's problems. The settlement Mr. Simons negotiated included a lifetime medical trust fund, income support payments for the child, and a settlement for both parents as well. The total value in today's dollars of the lifetime payout is $3.3 million.
Clergy Sexual Abuse of Child Finally Results in Justice
A nurse who experienced repeated and horrible sexual abuse as a child at the hands of her family's beloved Catholic priest has negotiated a settlement and received an apology from the current Bishop. The abuse, which remained a dark secret for nearly 20 years, was committed by the priest both in the rectory and at motels and homes where he would take the child. The breach of trust by this serial pedophile was so great that he even molested the child while babysitting her during a family vacation to Hawaii, where he was the family's honored guest. In addition to a settlement of $3 million negotiated by her legal team and attorney Rick Simons, this brave survivor, and other survivors of childhood sexual abuse by the same priest received public apologies from the new Bishop. "We hope this case, and the many other cases like it, not only bring justice to the individual victims who have suffered in silence for all of these years, but will go a long way toward protecting generations of children in the future from ever experiencing these horrors again" stated Mr. Simons at the conclusion of the case. The settlement is one of the largest settlements for childhood sexual abuse by a priest negotiated with a single Diocese in the entire nation.
For those persons who are survivors of childhood sexual abuse by priests, Mr. Simons recommends they seek assistance from groups such as the Survivors' Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP www.snapnetwork.org).
Products Liability - Sulzer Hip and Knee Recalls Reach National Settlement
Furtado, Jaspovice & Simons LC is one of several firms across the country representing innocent patients who received contaminated hip and knee replacement parts, manufactured by Sulzer Orthopedic between 1997 and 2000. Our firm is recovering millions of dollars for our clients who were victims of these defective products, which were surgically implanted in thousands of patients. Because of the contamination, the patients experienced non-union of their hip and knee replacements, and most had one or more revision surgeries and other complications. While acknowledging the error, the Sulzer entities in the United States and Switzerland tried to force a "low ball" settlement offer on the affected patients, many of whom were elderly and in poor health. The patients' attorneys, led by our colleagues in the Consumer Attorneys of California, used the legal process to negotiate a much larger settlement fund for the patients.
This case demonstrates how the civil lawsuit system can bring some responsibility and accountability to large corporations who, in an effort to make more profits, abandoned the most important principal of design and manufacture of products for personal medical use: the well-being of the patient. For more information on the terms of the Sulzer settlement, or to determine whether or not you may have any rights in this defective product litigation, please refer to the official Sulzer Implant Settlement website, www.sulzerimplantsettlement.com (in RE: Sulzer Hip Prosthesis and Knee Prosthesis Liability Litigation, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio).
Fertility Clinic Liable for Bad Advice
Rick Simons recently won a jury verdict for a Bay Area man in a three-year battle to establish new recognition of the importance of full disclosure by commercial fertility clinics to patients in non-traditional family donor and surrogate parenthood cases. Our client, sterile from testicular cancer, believed he was the father of a child born to himself and his domestic partner through artificial insemination by an anonymous donor. The Pacific Fertility Medical Clinic, a for profit business that performed fertility services, negligently advised our client that he would have full parental rights to the baby created through their medical intervention. Their advice was erroneous, and the client lost his parental rights in a custody battle. The family law attorney then referred the client to us for a possible remedy against the fertility clinic. By applying medical "informed consent" principals and evolving emotional distress law, Mr. Simons obtained a recovery for the client in a case that not only broke new ground with its verdict, but also broadened the rights of unmarried surrogate and donor parents in an earlier opinion published by the California Court of Appeal. (Dunkin v. Pacific Fertility, San Francisco, May, 2002, and Dunkin v. Boskey (2000) 82 Cal.App. 4th 171)
Wrongful Death - Death of Father of Three Children in Motorcycle/Truck Accident Results in Multi-Million Dollar Lifetime Payout
Rick Simons negotiated a multi-million dollar lifetime stream of payments for the three young children of an Alameda County father who died when a tractor-trailer rig driven by an inexperienced driver turned left in front of his on coming motorcycle. The attorneys for the prominent national trucking company that employed the driver claimed the deceased had been speeding, and was not paying attention to traffic, but Mr. Simons' work with one of California's foremost accident reconstruction experts led to a "structured settlement" that will support each child with a combination of tax-free monthly checks, and periodic payments of large lump sums, for the rest of their lives. Mr. Simons stated that this case is one where the attorney can feel great satisfaction, not only from performing skillful legal work to obtain a good result, but also in providing financial security to a family whose primary breadwinner has tragically been taken away from them. (Case: Confidential, Alameda County)
