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A woman injured in a New Orleans wreck with a dumpster truck recently recovered more than $640,000 in damages. But it could have been more. If the jury that decided her case had not held her 15% at fault, the award would have exceeded $750,000. Despite an appeal, the damages award remained unchanged. The opinion issued by the Louisiana Court of Appeal in the case is a useful reminder about the amount of discretion the law gives juries in injury cases. In the case, the injured woman was determined to be 15% at fault, based upon her decision to use the highway and her failure to exercise “greater caution” while driving. The appeals court upheld this jury verdict, stating that the evidence in the case did not indicate that the allocation of fault was “clearly wrong.”

The case involved Hieu Phuong Hoang, who was injured when the car she was driving on US Highway 90 was struck by a dump truck driven by Kenneth Thornton. Hoang sued Thornton and his employer for her injuries. At trial, Hoang put a variety of witnesses on the stand. She called her neighbor, an expert witness, and herself to testify that the stretch of highway where the accident occurred was a dangerous area, due to heavy truck traffic and road construction. The parties also submitted photographs of the area where the wreck occurred.

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The Louisiana Court of Appeal recently refused to throw out a man’s conviction on third-offense DWI despite his arguments that one of his prior convictions should not have counted against him in his current case. Although there were certain things the judge in the previous case did not tell the man about criminal law and trial procedure, none of those pieces of information was required by the Constitution, so the conviction was properly included as part of the basis for the man’s current charge.

Damion Billups’ most recent DWI case began when a state trooper observed him speeding along a rural road in Northeastern Louisiana. When the trooper stopped the driver, he thought the driver appeared intoxicated, put him through some field sobriety tests, and, based on those results, arrested the man for DWI. The state charged the matter as a third-offense DWI, since Billups had two previous DWI convictions, one each in 2008 and 2010. The driver challenged the charge brought against him, arguing that his 2010 plea was unconstitutional and that this offense should not count against him. After the trial judge concluded that both prior offenses were validly counted against the man, Billups entered a conditional guilty plea and was sentenced to one year of hard labor.

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In a recent case from south-central Louisiana, a shopper who slipped and fell in a grocery store aisle near a “Wet Floor” sign was unable to pursue her case against the store. Although the shopper’s evidence included contradictory testimony about the basis for the sign’s placement, her case still fell short. The Louisiana Court of Appeal‘s decision reminds businesses and patrons that, to succeed in a Louisiana Merchant Liability Statute case, the injured person needs proof that the store caused the hazard and that the hazard had existed for “some period of time.”

The source of this case was the injuries Regina Williams suffered while shopping at a Super 1 Foods store in New Iberia. Williams and her daughter were walking down the frozen foods aisle when they spotted a “Wet Floor” sign. The women passed the sign, and, a few steps later, Williams slipped and fell on what she described as a puddle of water. Williams sued the store’s owner, Brookshire Grocery Co., for her injuries.

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The Louisiana Supreme Court recently upheld a driver’s conviction and sentence to 25 years of hard labor for DWI, fourth offense, even though the jury in the driver’s trial consisted of only six people. The high court’s decision clarified that, in situations like this, when the driver’s mandatory hard labor sentence only arose from a multiple-offender sentencing enhancement, and the crime charged on the original indictment contained a range of possible sentences both with or without hard labor, the trial court’s empaneling of a six-person jury was not an error and did not require giving the driver a new trial.

The events leading up to this decision started with a traffic stop in Bogalusa in 2011. A state trooper pulled over a pickup truck that had been weaving erratically down the road. The driver, Gerald Dahlem, smelled of alcohol, slurred his speech, and displayed glassy, bloodshot eyes. A blood alcohol level test revealed that Dahlem’s BAC was .180.

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In any civil trial, the entity charged with weighing the evidence and issuing a verdict (whether it’s a jury in a jury trial or a judge in a bench trial) has many tasks. One of the most important ones is deciding which witnesses are credible and which are not. The law gives a jury (or a judge in a bench trial) wide breadth in making these decisions. That latitude figured into a recent Louisiana Court of Appeal decision upholding a judgment in favor of an injured driver. Although witnesses differed on who ran the red light, the trial judge was within his bounds to find the injured driver’s witnesses more credible.

The accident leading to this case involved a fairly common set of facts. In March 2014, Vicke Mosley was driving south on a four-lane road in Shreveport when she approached an intersection that was regulated by traffic lights. Mosley drove through the intersection where her car collided with that of Jacob Griffin, who was driving east on the intersecting road. Each driver claimed that their light was green. The testimony of other witnesses was mixed, with some saying Mosley entered the intersection on a yellow light and others pointing to Griffin for advancing while his light was red.

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Another Mardi Gras has just come and gone. Hundreds of thousands of revelers descended on New Orleans to partake of the pageantry and festivity. Mardi Gras inevitably comes with some risk of injury. Certainly, there are things that the government, the krewes, and the revelers themselves can do to keep everyone safe, but injuries sometimes happen anyway. With that in mind, a Louisiana Court of Appeal decision from last spring offers some helpful insight into what the law can (and cannot) do for you if you’ve been injured during Mardi Gras.

The spectator in the case was Rose Ann Citron, who sued the Krewe of Endymion for injuries she suffered at the 2012 Endymion Extravaganza. (The extravaganza is an invitation-only continuation of the Endymion Parade that usually is held inside the Superdome.) The krewe throws beads to spectators below during both the parade and the subsequent extravaganza. Citron, whose husband was aboard an Endymion float, was struck in the head by a bag of beads. The impact knocked her unconscious. She suffered a concussion along with injuries to her eyes, nose, and mouth.

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A woman whose vehicle was sideswiped obtained a judgment and damages award for herself but not her children in a recent case decided by a District Court in Jefferson Parish. That ruling was affirmed by the Louisiana Court of Appeal. Despite testimony from the children and their chiropractor, the appeals court nevertheless determined that the trial court’s decision was not so unreasonable as to require reversal.

The crash occurred on Williams Boulevard in Jefferson Parish. A vehicle driven by Joel Hashim moved from the left lane to the center lane of the road and, in the process, struck the vehicle driven by Regina Tezeno, who was already traveling in the center lane. The total damage amounted to one lost headlight and scraped paint. Tezeno sued Hashim and his auto insurer for personal injuries on behalf of herself and her two children. At a trial without a jury, the judge heard evidence and found Hashim 100% at fault. The judge awarded Tezeno $5,535 in damages. The children recovered nothing.

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While it may not be common, there are certain circumstances when Louisiana law allows a private citizen to stop another citizen for a suspected violation of the law. In a decision from last fall, the Louisiana Court of Appeal concluded that this aspect of the law made the stop of a suspected drunk driver legal, even though the citizen who made the stop was an employee of a fire department who used his vehicle’s emergency lights to make the stop and used physical force to restrain the driver at the scene.

At first, most of the facts of the case may sound fairly ordinary. Detective Darryl Sanders was driving his marked SUV early on June 18, 2011, when he spotted a white Ford Ranger proceeding in an erratic fashion north of Baton Rouge. Sanders turned on his lights and pulled the vehicle over. The driver, Michael Pratt, exhibited slurred speech and was belligerent toward Sanders. Sanders used physical force to restrain Pratt. Deputy Scott Courrege also responded and administered field sobriety tests, which the driver failed. Pratt refused a chemical breathlyzer test and ultimately was arrested for DWI.

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Insurance companies sometimes seek out ways to deny a claim even if the person making the claim is entitled to be paid. Sometimes, even when they pay, insurance companies delay an excessively long time in doing so. Such an excessive delay was the basis of an Ascension Parish man’s lawsuit against his auto insurer. The man lost his case, though, after a trial court and the Louisiana Court of Appeal decided that the insurance company’s payment was made in a timely manner, even though the man’s lawyer did not receive the insurance company’s check until three days after the deadline imposed by the Louisiana Statutes.

The case arose from a 2010 auto accident involving Beau Schexnaildre and Nathan Spicer. Spicer was at fault, and the two sides eventually settled Schexnaildre’s claim through Spicer’s insurance. After that resolution, Schexnaildre also sought payment from his own insurance company, State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co., under the terms of his underinsured motorist coverage. Thirty-three days after Schexnaildre made his claim, his lawyer received a check from State Farm for $25,000, the limit of the man’s underinsured motorist coverage.

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A man who seriously injured his ankle when he was walking across a grassy lawn was unable to recover damages for the injuries he suffered. He lost because the owner of property was a public entity, and, according to the law of premises liability as applied to public entities, the hole did not represent an “unreasonable risk of harm.” The ruling by the Louisiana Court of Appeal highlights the differences that can exist in pursuing a premises liability case against a public entity as opposed to a private one.

The injured man in this case, Marcushawn Smith, was walking across a piece of property that was owned by the City of Ville Platte’s Housing Authority. The property contained a grassy lawn and also some sidewalks around the lawn. Smith bypassed the sidewalks and chose to walk through the grassy area when he stepped into a hole that was 4-5 inches deep and 6 inches wide. Smith fell and seriously injured his ankle in the incident. The man sued the housing authority for premises liability, specifically for failing to maintain the grassy area in a proper and safe manner. The housing authority asked the court to throw out the case, and the trial judge did so.

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