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Personal Injury

Recent Posts in Personal Injury Category

  • When Can Workers’ Compensation Claims Recover the Costs of the Case?

    A workers’ compensation case in Missouri clarifies when one side can be made to pay the court costs and attorney’s fees of the other side. According to the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission, only what happens during the claim for workers’ compensation matters – not anything that happened before the case was filed. Judge Makes Employer Pay Attorney Fees and Court Costs The case, Stratton v. ...
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  • Why Workers’ Compensation Judges’ Beliefs Are Difficult to Appeal

    In a recent workers’ compensation blog post, we discussed how administrative law judges weigh the credibility of testifying doctors . In short, it is very easy for these judges to see what they want to see. What an administrative judge wants to see typically aligns with their pro-business or pro-worker political stance, which in turn mirrors the stance of whoever appointed them to their position ...
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  • 3 Reasons for Car Crashes on Thanksgiving Holiday

    This Thanksgiving holiday is shaping up to be an especially dangerous one on the roads. The number of car accidents in western Missouri and St. Joseph will not be increased by lots of travel and drunk driving, but also some bad weather that forecasters are saying will hit at just the wrong time. 3 Reasons Why Thanksgiving Can Be One of the Most Dangerous Holidays to Drive One of the leading ...
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  • Car Hits House: What Can the Homeowner Recover?

    Two people were hurt in a car accident in Kansas City, Missouri, when a car ran into a house. The compensation that the homeowners should be able to recover in a personal injury lawsuit would go far beyond just their medical expenses. Can Crashes Into Kansas City House The accident happened just after 9pm on Friday, November 15, at the intersection of 88 th Street and Wornwall Road in southern ...
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  • The Problem With How Administrative Law Judges Determine Credibility

    An otherwise innocuous workers’ compensation case highlights one of the ways that the legal system is stilted against injured workers in Missouri. Whenever there are conflicting medical opinions about how a worker got hurt – and there usually are – administrative law judges have to decide which doctor is more credible. Those credibility findings are extremely difficult to overturn on appeal, and ...
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  • Proposed Bill Would Help Truck Accident Victims

    While there is rarely anything that can be called a trivial car accident , there are still some that are more severe than others. Among the worst are truck accidents . Many of these crashes end up causing severe or fatal injuries to the person or people in passenger cars. Despite the high likelihood for serious injuries, lawmakers have let the minimum liability insurance coverage requirements for ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation Cases and the Rule of Necessity

    A recent workers’ compensation case made it to the Missouri Court of Appeals. In the case, Nivens v. Interstate Brands Corp. , an injured worker applied to the Second Injury Fund for compensation after workplace injuries coupled with older medical conditions to make him unable to function on the job. The case is a rare one that revolves around the Rule of Necessity, which allows even conflicted ...
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  • Pedestrian Accident Could Have Harsh Legal Results

    A car accident involving a pedestrian in St. Joseph brings out some of the harsh realities about assigning fault in an accident. While many people assume that the “victim” in a crash was the one who got seriously hurt, the law focuses instead on who was responsible. In some cases, the person who suffered the most can also be legally liable for the other person’s losses and injuries. Pedestrian ...
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  • OSHA Continues to Give Workplace Safety Powers to Employers

    The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is said to be investigating a fatal workplace accident in St. Joseph. The role of OSHA in that investigation, though, has been shrinking to dangerously narrow proportions in recent years, as the agency pushes more and more responsibility onto employers. When employers investigate fatal accidents at their plants, the losers are the employees. ...
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  • How Do Medical Liens Work After a Car Accident?

    It is a common dilemma: People who get hurt in car accidents might very well be entitled to compensation from the other driver, but their medical bills are due now . The pressure from hospitals to pay the bills can make car accident victims think that they have no other options. It often drives them to settle their personal injury lawsuit as quickly as possible, even if it means they only get a ...
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  • Missouri Workers’ Compensation, Frolics, and Detours

    One of the most important limitations about workers’ compensation coverage is that it only applies to injuries you suffer on the job . In our last workers’ compensation post, we wondered whether a postal worker was still “on the job” when their mail truck was hit by a school bus . It was 5pm, and many jobs have set hours, so if the mail carrier was working past shutdown, they could have a tough ...
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  • Medical Liens Can Help Car Accident Victims With Insurance Worries

    In a car accident , insurance coverage will always play a big role in your recovery. Unfortunately, this ends up meaning that you often have to make hugely important decisions in the immediate aftermath of the crash. Poor medical insurance can make you think about denying the medical attention you think you can do without. That seems to be behind a recent truck accident in St. Joseph. Trucker ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation Questions After Mail Truck Hits School Bus

    A crash between a school bus and a mail truck in Kansas City raises some important questions about workers’ compensation law in Missouri. School Bus and Mail Truck Collide in Missouri The crash happened around 5pm on Tuesday, September 17, 2019. According to police, the mail truck and a school bus hit each other at the intersection of Delmar Lane and 103 rd Street , just over the border in Kansas. ...
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  • The Power of Traffic Tickets in a Car Accident Case

    A car accident in St. Joseph shows how traffic citations from a crash can impact a subsequent personal injury case. St. Joseph Car Accident Leads to Driver Receiving Traffic Ticket According to the early reports, the accident happened at the intersection of Woodbine Road and Frederick Avenue , in St. Joseph. Police say that, around 8:30pm on September 9, 2019, an elderly man was driving southbound ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation Claim Leads to Firing in St. Joseph

    A former worker at Mosaic Life Care is suing the St. Joseph hospital for firing her. She claims that her discharge was done in retaliation for reporting a workplace injury . As we have discussed in earlier blog posts, she will have an uphill battle under a workers’ compensation law that has been stilted in favor of her employer. St. Joseph Hospital Worker Claims She Was Fired for Reporting an ...
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  • Why Car Thefts in St. Joseph Mean More Car Crashes

    St. Joseph continues to place high on the list of cities that have the most car thefts per capita. The trend does not just elevate everyone’s car insurance rates; it also increases the likelihood for a car accident . St. Joseph’s Ongoing Car Theft Problem While other cities see far more car thefts in a given year, they also have far more people. According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation Denied Because Accident Happened While Walking

    In our last workers’ compensation post, we covered a disturbing case where a decision by the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission was overturned on appeal for a rare credibility problem . The Commission’s denial of workers’ coverage was disturbing because of how blatantly it disregarded testimony by the injured worker. But that was not the only disturbing part of the Commission’s decision. ...
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  • Why Wrongful Death Claim After Car Accident Will Not Benefit from Murder Charge

    A man from St. Joseph is being charged with murder for causing a car accident earlier this month. While manslaughter charges are more common, murder charges like these can follow from fatal car crashes that happen during another crime. However, the effect they have on a personal injury case is less than you might expect. Car Accident Leads to Criminal Charges The incident happened back on August ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation Case Overturned on Appeal for Rare Credibility Problem

    An appeals court in Missouri overturned a workers’ compensation decision that denied coverage for a high school teacher’s injuries. The reasons why the workers’ compensation was originally denied, though, raises some serious questions about how these cases are being decided in Missouri. High School Teacher Falls, Gets Hurt, and Is Denied Workers’ Compensation On January 8, 2013, an ESL teacher ...
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  • Repair Costs After a Truck Accident Can Be Staggering

    A truck accident south of St. Joseph left no one hurt, but seriously damaged a tractor trailer. Because truckers rely on their vehicles for their livelihood, a truck damaged in a car accident can be a huge blow. Truck Accident Damages Tractor Trailer The crash happened on Saturday morning, July 27. A tractor trailer was going southbound on Interstate 29 when it overturned just outside of Buchanan ...
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  • Do Employers Have to Pay for Second Injury Fund Injuries, Now?

    The dust is beginning to settle from the fallout of the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision in the workers’ compensation case, Cosby v. Treasurer of Missouri . Perhaps the most interesting possibility is that the Supreme Court has made employers liable for injuries that would have been covered by Missouri’s Second Injury Fund . Missouri Supreme Court Strictly Construes Workers’ Compensation Laws ...
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  • Motorcycle Accident with Deer Proves Fatal

    A motorcyclist was killed in a crash after hitting a deer in western Missouri. While motorcycles are easier to maneuver around a deer in the road, if a crash does happen the biker is far more likely to get seriously hurt than if they were driving a car. Motorcycle Hits Deer: Biker Killed The crash happened eight miles south of the town of Bethany, an hour northeast of St. Joseph. A 65-year-old ...
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  • Workers’ Compensation and Separation of Powers

    A workers’ compensation case from Florida is being appealed to the state’s supreme court. While the case comes from Florida, its claims could impact the process of Missouri’s workers’ compensation laws because of similarities in our workers’ compensation systems. Failed Shoulder Surgery Leads to Numerous Medical Opinions The victim was an elementary school worker who partially tore her rotator ...
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  • Children Hurt in Car Crashes Have Longer to Sue than Adults in Missouri

    A car accident in St. Joseph has sent several people to the hospital after someone ran a red light. Some of the passengers in one of the vehicles involved were children. While it is unclear how badly they were hurt, or even if the children were injured in the crash, the statute of limitations in Missouri can help them recover the compensation they need. St. Joseph Car Accident Sends Several to the ...
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  • St. Joseph Car Accident an Example of Proximate Cause in Action

    A single-vehicle car accident in St. Joseph provides an excellent illustration of one of the most difficult concepts in personal injury law: Proximate cause. Car Hits Power Pole, Causes Power Outage On Monday, June 17, a driver in the south side of St. Joseph lost control of their vehicle and hit a power pole . She then overcorrected and hit two other poles, knocking one down. The crash knocked ...
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