Notable Victories

Most law firms boast about their biggest recoveries, but these big recoveries don’t tell you the true nature of the case or the legal skill required to secure the recoveries. If someone is killed in a car accident clearly caused by the defendant, who has a few million dollars in available insurance, does the case require a lot of legal skill and know how? Does it require an aggressive, hardnosed litigator?

Rather than boast about our biggest recoveries, we feel it more important to boast about some of our most difficult recoveries; recoveries that required legal skill and know how coupled with aggressive, hardnosed representation. After all, you don’t want to know how well we handled the easy cases. No, you want to know how well we handled the difficult cases.

Here’s a sample of some of our most difficult recoveries:

• $1,100,000.00 Verdict in Montgomery County, PA: $1,100,000.00 verdict for an unlicensed, drunk motorcyclist who suffered a brain injury when he was cut off by a car exiting a parking lot, forcing him to dump his motorcycle and strike his head on the pavement. Our client was not wearing a helmet as required by law, and he was more than double the legal intoxication limit in Pennsylvania. We were able to preclude this damning information from being admitted into evidence, which ultimately helped win the case. Believing our client’s drunkenness caused the accident, and believing his failure to wear a helmet caused his injuries, the defense chose not to make any pre-verdict settlement offers. This verdict was a featured story in The Legal Intelligencer, Pennsylvania Law Weekly, and Verdict Search: Pennsylvania.
• $235,000.00 Settlement in Montgomery County, PA: $235,000.00 settlement for two motorists who suffered numerous broken bones when another car forced their car off the road and directly into a 100-year-old tree. The defense initially argued that one of our clients caused the accident by speeding and illegally passing the defendant driver on the right, but we were able to disprove this argument with the defendant driver’s own testimony and the help of an accident reconstructionist.
• $200,000.00 Verdict in Cumberland County, NJ: $200,000.00 verdict for a 20-year old woman who suffered facial scaring when the car in which she was a passenger t-boned a pickup truck that ran a stop sign. Our client was thrown forward into the windshield because she was not wearing her seatbelt – a violation of New Jersey law – because of which the defense argued our client caused her own injuries (i.e., she would not have suffered the injuries had she worn a seatbelt). The highest pre-verdict settlement offer was only $40,000.00.
• $175,000.00 Settlement in Montgomery County, PA: $175,000.00 settlement for a 45-year old woman who slipped on ice in the parking lot of her apartment complex just hours after a snow storm ended. The parking lot had already been plowed, but, because the storm had only just ended, property management had not yet had an opportunity to salt. Our client, overcome by cabin fever, broke her arm when slipped and fell as she left the building for what she hoped to be a nice walk in the fresh winter wonderland. This case was particularly difficult as we had to overcome substantial issues of our client’s own negligence as well as issues with the defendant’s having insufficient time to salt the parking lot
• $142,500.00 Settlement in Chester County, PA: $142,500.00 settlement for two motorists whose car t-boned a car that turned left directly in front of them. The driver suffered only a sprained Achilles tendon in her ankle, for which she had very little medical treatment, and the passenger suffered a partially torn meniscus ligament in her knee, for which she underwent minor surgery and three (3) months of physical therapy. The case settled a month before trial was scheduled to begin.
• $140,000.00 Settlement in Chester County, PA: $140,000.00 lump sum payment (workers' compensation settlement) for a UPS driver who fractured his tibia (shin) when he fell off his truck during a routine delivery. Our client had only been working for UPS for two (2) days when he got hurt.
• $95,000.00 Verdict in Philadelphia, PA: $95,000.00 verdict for a limited-tort motorist who suffered minor back injuries when another car side swiped his car. Being limited-tort, our client was not eligible to recover any money for his pain and suffering unless we proved he suffered a serious impairment of a body function, which we were able to do through his testimony regarding how his back effected his ability to work, play basketball, fish, roller skate, swim, go on amusement park rides, and play with his 10-year old daughter. The highest pre-verdict settlement offer, which came during jury deliberations, was only $5,000.00. This offer was, of course, rejected. This verdict was a featured story in The Legal Intelligencer, Pennsylvania Law Weekly, and Verdict Search: Pennsylvania.
• $85,000.00 Settlement in Chester County, PA: $85,000.00 lump sum payment (workers' compensation settlement) for a construction worker who fractured his ankle when he fell from scaffolding he negligently assembled (he forgot to install several screws).
• $75,000.00 Settlement in Montgomery County, PA: $75,000.00 settlement for a man who sprained his arthritic knee when another car ran a stop sign and t-boned him. This case was particularly difficult because the defendant’s insurance company, upon learning of the accident (before we were retained), went to our client’s house and offered him $175.00 in exchange for his agreement not to sue the defendant driver. Our client, not understanding the offer, agreed and signed a contract waiving his right to sue. Believing our client was tricked, we sued the defendant driver anyway. Within weeks of our filing suit, we convinced the defendant driver’s insurance company that its claims adjuster fraudulently induced our client to sign the contract, because of which the contract was invalid.
• $58,000.00 Settlement in Philadelphia County, PA: $58,000.00 settlement for two motorists whose car was rear-ended by a Mini Cooper. Neither car sustained any property damage whatsoever, because of which the defense denied that an accident even happened, let alone caused our clients’ injuries. The case ultimately settled while our medical expert was testifying on the witness stand.
• $50,000.00 Settlement in Philadelphia County, PA: $50,000.00 settlement for a drunk pedestrian that stumbled in front of a moving SEPTA bus. With the help of an accident reconstructionist, we were able to prove the SEPTA bus driver should have seen our client stumbling into the roadway at least 200 feet before he struck our client. The case settled during a pre-trial conference with the trial judge.
• $26,000.00 Settlement in Montgomery County, PA: $26,000.00 settlement for two limited-tort children who suffered nothing more than minor brush burns from their seat belts when the car in which they were passengers was cut off by another car.
• $14,000.00 Verdict in Philadelphia County, PA: $14,000.00 verdict for a man that suffered whiplash injuries in his neck when he was startled by a motorcyclist that revved his engine too loudly and without warning right next to our client’s open car window. The defense, of course, argued our client couldn’t possibly have injured his neck in such a scenario, but we were able to disprove this argument using our clients’ pre-existing injuries (cervical herniations) and medical testimony. As was expected, the defense did not make any pre-verdict settlement offers