Broward Injury Lawyer Blog

October 5, 2019

Proving Fault in an Unsafe Lane Change Accident

Errors made while changing lanes are among the most common causes of Florida car accidents, one of the more frequently-cited of the 73,000 right-of-way violations issued in Florida last year. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates approximately 9 percent of all crashes are caused by improper lane changes. car accident attorney

Causes of improper lane change accidents can include changing lanes without signaling, waiting to signal until after the lane change has begun, driving between lanes for an extended period of time, changing lanes on a stretch of road where lanes are separated by solid instead of dashed lines, driving impaired or driving distracted.

One of the first questions people think to ask in any crash case is how they can prove the crash was the other driver’s fault. Before answering this, it should be noted, that Florida is a no-fault state when it comes to auto insurance. That means you can usually recover some damages no matter who is to blame (up to $10,000 for medical bills and a percentage of your lost wages).

However, if your injuries or serious or someone died (meeting the threshold to step outside the no-fault law, as outlined in F.S. 627.737(2)), you will need to contact an experienced Fort Lauderdale injury attorney to advise you on filing a claim against the other driver. To collect any damages, you will be required to prove fault (legally referred to as “negligence”). Continue reading

September 30, 2019

Ask a Florida Probate Attorney: When Caregivers Marry Dependent Elders

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

With baby boomers increasingly aging into their golden years, issues of elder financial exploitation are being paid more attention. Many schemes involve caregivers who take advantage of elder dependents. One means of this that has recently come to light are marriage scams. This involves caregivers or others marrying older dependents for the sole purpose of obtaining power over their finances. probate lawyer marriage scam

These cases can be tough to prove, but some are occasionally successful. Perhaps the most infamous of these cases was that of Marshall v. Marshall, a U.S. Supreme Court case that involved the estate of an elderly billionaire, of which his son was executor, and his much younger wife, former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith.

It was difficult not to see the fact pattern in that case and jump to the conclusion that Smith had married the 89-year-old oil tycoon for his riches. But state law gives spouses broad legal powers over one’s estate and assets after they die. Proving that they shouldn’t receive it can be difficult, though not impossible. Continue reading

September 30, 2019

How Serious Does My Injury Have to be to File a Claim

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

Florida personal injury lawsuits are among the most commonly weighed in our state courts. To avoid overwhelming the courts, most personal injury claims settle prior to trial. Additionally, F.S. 627.737 sets a seriousness threshold has been set for recovering damages from an at-fault driver. If injuries don’t meet that threshold, then claimants will have to rely on their own personal injury protection policy issued by their own auto insurer. Broward injury lawyer

A bruised arm or a scratched leg likely isn’t going to cut it. PIP provides up to $10,000 in damages for medical expenses and 60 percent of your lost wages for the time you were forced to take off work. It will also cover things like travel expenses to doctor appointments. It will not cover things like pain and suffering or loss of consortium that would be available in lawsuit.

If your injuries are more serious and $10,000 will not cover your losses, a Broward injury lawyer can review the facts and help you determine if the injuries you’ve suffered medically meet the statutory threshold. Continue reading

September 20, 2019

How Does a Florida Car Accident Settlement Work?

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

Recovering physically is the first step after a serious car accident. But financial recovery is another key step. Fort Lauderdale car accident lawyer

No one ever plans to get in a car accident, so it’s understandable few have given much thought as to how the civil claims process will unfold. Some of the most common misconceptions include:

“I have to sue the other driver to collect damages.”
“My car accident claim will go to trial.”
“My auto insurance will cover me if I have serious injuries – that’s what it’s there for!”

The truth of the matter is, you may not have to sue anyone at all, and even if you do, your case isn’t likely to go to trial. Most Florida car accident injury claims are resolved through settlement negotiation. Continue reading

September 15, 2019

Payable on Death Accounts: What They Mean For Other Heirs

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

Florida payable on death accounts are financial tools used to keep funds shielded from the probate system. The money is held in a bank account with directions to transfer it to another person/beneficiary upon the primary account holder’s death.

The primary account holder can still access the money while they’re alive, and the recipient will receive whatever still remains in that account after the account holder’s death.

Payable on death accounts, as spelled out in F.S. 655.82 are sometimes the subject of inquiry to our Fort Lauderdale probate litigation attorneys. Let’s say you are the sole surviving heir of a parent. Their spouse has died. They have no other children. You might assume yourself the sole recipient of any of their assets, aside any creditors. However, that may not be the case if your parent had a payable on death account that named someone else the beneficiary. Continue reading

September 14, 2019

Nursing Home Abuse Lawsuit Will be Retried

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

The estate of an elderly, incapacitated woman who was sexually assaulted by a nursing assistant in an alleged case of nursing home abuse will have to take its case back to trial after a state supreme court reversed a $1.7 million award for damages and ordered the case retried. injury lawyer

Central to the decision to retry the case was the fact the trial court removed the question of whether the nursing home aide who reportedly raped the woman was acting in the course and scope of employment.

As Broward nursing home injury attorneys can explain, skilled nursing facilities can be held vicariously liable for the negligence and even intentional misconduct/criminal acts of employees – but only if they were acting in the course and scope of employment. This is known as the doctrine of respondeat superior, Latin for “let the master answer.”

In many cases wherein a plaintiff seeks to hold a company accountable for damages inflicted by a worker, key issues will include:

Whether the worker was an employee or an independent contractor (respondeat superior doesn’t apply where the worker is an independent contractor);
Whether the worker’s actions occurred in the course and/or arose from the scope of his/her employment.

Employers can also be held directly liable under theories like negligent hiring, negligent retention and negligent supervision. Continue reading

September 7, 2019

An Unborn Child’s Right to Collect Damages for Wrongful Death of Parent

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

The pregnant widow of a man shot and killed in South Florida over a puzzling parking lot altercation that resulted in her husband’s death – which she witnessed – has vowed that in addition to pressing for justice from the criminal courts, she will file a civil lawsuit for wrongful death. Would her baby have a claim too?

The right of survivors to claim damages is one of two kinds of wrongful death lawsuits in Florida. The other is an estate claim that seeks recovery of damages on the decedent’s behalf. Fort Lauderdale wrongful death attorney

The Fort Lauderdale wrongful death attorneys at The Ansara Law Firm can help you determine the right of each survivor affected following the death of a loved one due to another’s negligence, recklessness and/or violence. We can also help you determine which kind of wrongful death lawsuit makes the most sense to pursue.

Florida law regarding the civil rights of fetuses can be a touchy subject, but statute does make it clear that a child who was not yet born when a parent died still has the right to pursue wrongful death damages – as long as they are eventually born. Continue reading

August 30, 2019

Florida Jury Awards $30 Million Drunk Driving Brain Injury Lawsuit

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

Jurors weighing the civil penalty in a drunk driving lawsuit awarded nearly $31 million in damages to a young woman who suffered catastrophic brain injuries. Plaintiff was just 18 when she was struck by a pickup truck driven by one of two underage drivers who moments earlier left a bar near the Florida State University campus. drunk driving injury lawyer

The verdict followed the second of two trials in Faircloth v. Cantina Tallahassee, LLC, et al., after the first ended in mistrial in February. The woman’s parents – filing the claim on her behalf, sued the two bars that served alcohol to the underage driver, who did not stop at the street. The victim was on foot, reportedly crossing the street, at the time of the crash.

As our drunk driving injury lawyers can explain, plaintiffs in catastrophic injury claims need to explore every avenue for recovering damages. In impaired driving cases, that means looking at whether a dram shop claim is viable. Continue reading

August 20, 2019

Florida Car Accident Damages Discussed Following $13 Million Jury Award

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

A jury in Gainesville recently awarded $13 million in damages following a Florida car accident in which a woman died in 2016 when another driver struck her vehicle during an illegal pass. The case has made headlines, and sparked a discussion over personal injury lawsuit damages and how they are calculated. car accident lawyer

As long-time Fort Lauderdale car accident lawyers, our Broward injury legal team recognizes that damages aren’t necessarily reflective of real-life losses. They never could be because, after all, how do you put a price tag on a human life or your ability to walk? Assignation of monetary values to such things may seem callous, but it’s the best means we have of helping to compensate people who suffered as a result of someone else’s careless or criminal actions.

Mostly in civil litigation, the damages we’re discussing are these type of “compensatory damages,” intended to “make whole” the individuals who are suffering, rather than about punishing the person who caused the injury. The exception to this is “punitive damages,” intended to penalize particularly egregious wrongs. Continue reading

August 20, 2019

Probate Litigation With Estate of One Embroiled in Legal Trouble

By Ansara Law Personal Injury Attorneys

The death of alleged sexual predator/billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, 66, in a New York jail cell of apparent suicide has left his estate, with assets reportedly valued at $560 million, the subject of intense interest. Women who were allegedly his child victims had pending civil lawsuits against him. Elderly retirees are trying to recoup the losses incurred when he invested their life savings into bonds and notes he later sold as part of a $470 million scam 25 years ago. Other creditors will inevitably come knocking too. probate litigation lawyer Fort Lauderdale

With so many competing claims, the case is likely headed for a protected and messy contested probate amid an ongoing federal investigation into the activities of Epstein and purported co-conspirators. It will be imperative for each of those staking a claim to work with a civil injury lawyer who has extensive experience with probate litigation, as The Ansara Law Firm does.

Although the Epstein case is unfolding on a stunning scale, it is not so uncommon for probate litigation cases to involve decedents who had been embroiled in legal trouble. That’s often a big part of what leads their estate to probate in the first place. Continue reading