South Florida Injury Attorney Blog

(Sun Sentinel, Fort Lauderdale, FL) A 39-year-old construction worker was recovering in the hospital Thursday after falling down an elevator shaft, according to Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue.

He was extricated, stabilized and taken to Broward General Medical Center. The injuries are not believed to be life-threatening, he said.

As a Fort Lauderdale Attorney practicing worker's compensation law for the past 10 years in South Florida, I have represented numerous families who have been victims of this type of personal injury. I would advise the family of the injured worker to keep all record of his injury in the form of pictures of his immediate injury with timeline showing his recovery; pictures of the job site and the exact location where the injury occurred; request a copy the accident report from the first responders whether it be the Fire Rescue or the Fort Lauderdale Police; also seeing that worker was taken to Broward General Hospital, his family should request copies of his medical reports should be kept, as this will assist his legal counsel in filing a strong worker's compensation claim should he decide to.

Should your or a loved one be a victim of personal injury accident requiring worker's compensation you should immediately seek legal counsel to ensure you get the compensation you deserve. Contact any of our offices located in : Fort Lauderdale, Weston; Coral Springs; Aventura; Pembroke Pines or Silver Lakes for your free consultation via telephone 954 431 8100 or 305 624 9186 or online.

Continue reading "Construction job injury" »

Another interesting story was the workplace injury to a man who fell at his jobsite in Davie Florida.

As I recall the worker received his injuries when he was repairing a hole in the roof of a building that was recently damaged by fire. Paramedics was called to the scene as the worker was unconscious briefly, he was transported to Broward General where he was kept for observation.

Once he was released he was advised to seek legal counsel to ensure his rights were recognized and he received proper compensation for his medical bills and lass of wages due to his injury. Apparently he was entitled to workers compensation benefits from his employer. There was an accident report filed by his supervisor as there would have been investigations to ensure that it was not negligence or failure to adhere to the safety standards as mandated by both OSHA and the federal Occupational Safety and health Administration for the city of Davie.

The worker’s attorney was experienced in this type of accident and filed a claim on his behalf, to which he was successful. Always contact an experienced South Florida Personal Injury Attorney who will look into a third party claim, which is usually filed against an entity or a person other than the victim’s employer, whose negligence may have caused the workplace accident, your personal injury attorney should have a strong and successful track record in handling these third party claims, as he will be able to help this worker in securing the compensation they deserve.

Should you or a loved one be injured at the workplace you should consult an experienced attorney in workplace injury and premises liability to ensure that you receive the compensation you deserve. Contact us online or at 954 431 8100 or 305 624 9186 for your FREE consultation.

With the economy slowly picking back up we see construction sites hiring workers and this can only mean injuries on jobsites are evident. Recently a 30yr old man Mr. Ramos received injuries after falling from the roof of a home at a jobsite in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. His company sent him out to a neighborhood to do roof repairs to a couple homes. Mr. Ramos was doing minor repairs to a roof which from the recent rains was leaking, and, not realizing the extent of the damage fell through the roof. Paramedics were called to the scene as he was said to be unconscious briefly, and the owner of the home was uncertain as to the extent of his injuries. Mr. Ramos regained consciousness but was taken to Broward General where he was kept under observation.

As a Fort Lauderdale attorney I have worked on numerous cases like this and Mr. Ramos will no doubt be entitled to workers compensation benefits from his employer. Once he has filed claim for Worker’s compensation his employer will have investigations done to ensure there was no negligence on the worker’s behalf and ensure that there was no failure to adhere to the safety standards as mandated by both OSHA and the Federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration for the city of Fort Lauderdale. The worker in turn should keep all records: the incident report and all medical bills etc which he will have to present to his attorney once he has filed claim for injury.

Should you or a loved one find yourself in a situation like Mr. Ramos, please contact an experienced Personal Injury Attorney who will look into a third party claim, which is usually filed against an entity or a person other than the victim’s employer, whose negligence may have caused the workplace accident, your personal injury attorney should have a strong and successful track record in handling these third party claims, as he will be able to help this worker in securing the compensation they deserve. Contact us at 954 431 8100 or 305 614 9186 to set up a FREE consultation to discuss your legal options.

Injuries at the workplace are a 'lil' more common than we realize, if you have been injured at work you will have to first apply for Worker's Compensation through your employer's insurance company. Representing victims of work place injury for the past years in Fort Lauderdale we have found some situations where the victim may be able to file a third-party injury claim for damages associated with your injuries. This is where seeking legal counsel from an experienced work place accident attorney in Fort Lauderdale is best, as he/she will give you the guidance you need and will assist you to understand your rights.

Workplace accident third-party injury claims can include one or more of the following :
- use of a defective product or equipment, or you may be
- injury due to a toxic substance at the workplace, maybe you were injured due to
- maybe thru intended wrongdoing of your employer
- injury through a third-party whilst at your workplace

Workers' compensation will provide payment and benefits to the injured victims but may not compensate for damages. It will also not cover punitive damages against employers who did not take proper workplace safety measures. Injuries in the workplace can range from slip and fall accidents, to injuries to the body such as back, arm, shoulder, elbow and knee.

As I always advise victims of workplace injury always seek counsel from an experienced workplace accident injury attorney or premises liability attorney as it is important that you understand and know what your legal rights and options are, and ensure that you receive the proper compensation that you deserve. Contact us at 954 431 8100 or 305 614 9186 to set up a FREE consultation to discuss your legal options.

A whistleblower Web site less than three months old has already led to 328 complaints about companies violating Florida workers’ compensation laws, the Miami Herald reported Aug. 14. The Florida Division of Workers Compensation launched its site in June, requesting that people refer companies they believe are not in compliance with workers’ compensation laws. Visitors can complain anonymously and track the progress of their complaints through a referral number that does not identify them. They may also look up their companies to see whether a complaint has already been filed.

According to Florida’s Chief Financial Officer, Alex Sink, the site had already produced 328 referrals to companies suspected of non-compliance, including 73 in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach Counties. Of those referrals, 36 ended with orders from the state to stop all work, including eight in Miami-Dade and two in Palm Beach County. The state also levied more than half a million dollars in penalties -- $526,000, including $112,000 in Miami-Dade. Complaints are about companies doing business without the required workers’ compensation coverage, which includes companies that outright fail to buy insurance as well as companies hiding their non-compliance by paying employees outside an official payroll or misclassifying their employees to make their insurance rates cheaper.

As a Hollywood workers’ compensation lawyer, I am glad to see our state actively rooting out employers who fail to comply with the law. Failing to buy adequate workers’ compensation insurance doesn’t just violate the law -- it has serious negative consequences for the injured worker. By law, people injured at work give up their right to sue over the injury in exchange for the right to make a workers’ compensation insurance claim -- but they cannot do that if there is no insurance. When that happens, workers are left pretty much on their own to face six-figure medical bills and the challenge of making ends meet while they can’t work. In this way, employers that fail to meet their legal obligations victimize employees twice, because the failure to buy insurance is no fault of the employees’.

Continue reading "State Web Site Nabs More Than 300 Companies Accused of Not Buying Workers’ Compensation Insurance" »

Gov. Charlie Crist should veto legislation that would harm Floridians seeking fair workers’ compensation payments, the St. Petersburg Times wrote in a May 18 editorial. The Times opposes Florida’s HB 903, legislation that reestablishes a cap on payment to attorneys in Florida workers’ compensation lawsuits. That cap sets compensation very low -- in some cases, only slightly above Florida’s minimum wage. This would make it financially unwise for many lawyers, who run small businesses and often have six-figure student loan debt, to take workers’ compensation cases. And that, the editorial said, would hurt injured workers further by making it nearly impossible for them to get help in these legally and medically complex cases.

The legislation is a response to last year’s Florida Supreme Court decision in Murray v. Mariner Health -- a decision I wrote about at the time. In that case, a nurse was forced to sue after she was wrongly denied workers’ compensation for an injury related to lifting a patient. She won her case, but under the formula established by the 2003 workers’ compensation “reform” law, her attorney was awarded just $8.11 an hour in fees. The Supreme Court unanimously found that this violated the law’s own requirement that fees be “reasonable” and overturned it, giving Florida judges the discretion to adjust fee awards upward or downward when necessary. Both that decision and the Times editorial noted that the attorneys for the insurance companies continued to get appropriate fees, like the $150 an hour paid in the Murray case.

As a Fort Lauderdale workers’ compensation attorney, I agree wholeheartedly with the Times. Of course, I would prefer to be able to take these cases for a reasonable fee -- but the real losers if this bill passes would be people who are injured at work. I can choose whether to take a workers’ compensation case, but workers cannot choose not to be injured. Without a lawyer, they have a choice between representing themselves -- tricky even in simple cases, which workers’ compensation cases are not -- and giving up. Some such workers end up using public assistance programs to get health care or make ends meet, socking taxpayers with a burden that workers’ compensation insurance is supposed to bear. Worse, the situation creates an incentive for insurers to deny valid claims, knowing that the worker’s chances of overturning the decision are low.

Workers’ compensation law is complicated, involving medical, legal, insurance, workplace safety and sometimes union issues. If you have been injured at work, you have the legal right to claim workers’ compensation benefits, which include payment of all your medical bills as well as replacement wages of two-thirds your normal salary. But workers’ compensation benefits are expensive, and some insurers would rather leave hurt workers on their own than pay what they owe. If this happens to you, you should call our firm, Cohn, Smith & Cohn, as soon as possible for help. We can represent you throughout the appeals process, up to and including filing a Miami workers’ compensation lawsuit when necessary.

To learn more about your options at a free, confidential consultation, please contact Cohn, Smith & Cohn online or call us today at (954) 431-8100.

In late October, the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics finally released its statistical report on nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses in 2007. As a Florida construction accident and workers' compensation lawyer, I was pleased to see that both the raw number of injury cases and the rate have gone down slightly since 2006. The agency reports 4 million overall cases of injury or illness in the workplace, down from 4.1 million in 2006, while the rate per 100 workers dropped from 4.4 in 2006 to 4.2 in 2007. (These numbers apply only to private industry; government workers are not counted.) Happily for us here in Florida, our state's rate of injury or illness is actually below the national rate -- 3.9 cases per 100 workers.

According to the agency, five individual industries saw declines: mining, construction, manufacturing, health care and social assistance, and the category of agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting. This is interesting in part because among those categories are some of the most dangerous industries in the United States. Construction, mining, agriculture/fishing/hunting and manufacturing are all well-known as some of the most dangerous civilian jobs in the United States, with high fatality and injury rates. About half of the injury or illness cases were considered serious, said the Bureau of Labor Statistics, meaning that the worker needed time off to recover, a job restriction or a temporary transfer. That number also fell, from 2.3 cases per 100 workers in 2006 to 2.1 in 2007.

The vast majority of the cases in the study were injuries, not illnesses, which accounted for 3.8 million of the four million reported cases. Health care is not among these, but the agency did note that it saw a sharp decline in skin diseases, which we hope reflects a drop in preventable hospital staph outbreaks. Among business types, general medical and surgical hospitals had by far the most cases of injury or illness, more than 253,500. That's far more than the number of cases in the next largest industry, general merchandise stores, which had about 142,000 cases.

Workplace injuries are important. People who work 40 hours a week spend about a third of their waking lives at work, where they cannot always control their working conditions. Federal and state workplace safety laws are supposed to help ensure a secure workplace and Florida workers' compensation laws are supposed to help workers get help after an injury. Unfortunately, employers and others sometimes ignore these laws in an effort to save money, regardless of the cost in human lives, pain or suffering. If you've been injured at work in South Florida and would like to learn more about your legal rights, my firm, Cohn, Smith & Cohn can help. Please contact us as soon as possible to set up a free consultation.

The Florida Supreme Court struck a blow for injured workers on Oct. 23 when it overturned part of the provisions of the 2003 overhaul of our state workers’ compensation laws. In Emma Murray v. Mariner Health/ACE USA, the court overturned the 2003 law’s formula for awarding attorney fees in workers compensation cases, noting that the formula would result in attorneys’ fees that would be either excessive or inadequate. This violated the law’s own requirement that fees be reasonable, as well as past rulings on the subject. In this case, the formula resulted in an award of just $8.11 an hour for the plaintiff’s attorney, a fraction of the $200 an hour cited in the case as standard for Florida workers’ compensation attorneys and significantly below the $150 an hour paid to the lawyer for the other side.

It is probably easy to see why Florida workers’ compensation lawyers like me appreciate this ruling -- after all, we stand to make more money, at least in some cases. (In others, it might result in lower attorney fees than otherwise.) It might be a little harder to see why I think this is also a victory for injured workers, so let me explain. If you’re injured at work, you have the right to claim workers’ compensation benefits, regardless of who was at fault for the injury. In exchange for that right (not the benefits themselves), you give up your right to sue your employer for any wrongdoing that caused the injury.

Unfortunately, sometimes valid claims are denied, as in this case. When that’s the case, workers have to appeal their claims through administrative hearings with the state, and eventually, by filing a lawsuit in Florida courts. It is much, much easier to succeed in this if you have a lawyer, because workers’ compensation law is particularly complex. Even many other personal injury lawyers prefer to refer clients to someone who specializes in this area.

However, the formula in the 2003 law made it nearly impossible for certain injured workers to find a lawyer who will take on their cases. If all of their fees were around $8.11 an hour, as in this case, Florida workers’ comp lawyers would simply not be able to run their offices and pay their bills. As a result, fewer and fewer lawyers in Florida were willing to take on workers’ compensation cases, which left workers stuck with no benefits, no matter how valid their claims, and no recourse other than to represent themselves or use government benefits to get the health care they need.

I hope and believe that the state Supreme Court’s ruling in Murray will change that, although it will likely continue to be an important political issue. In the meantime, if you’ve been hurt in the course of your own job and you believe your workers’ comp benefits were unfairly denied, you should talk to our firm, Cohn, Smith & Cohn, to learn more about your legal right to workers’ compensation benefits.