Articles Posted in Premises Accidents

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On Jan. 17, 2011, Susan Buckel was at Villa Olivia, a ski hill in the far west Chicago suburban town of Bartlett, Ill. She had purchased a ticket to snow tube on a hill, but as she moved to sit down on the tube, a sharp object that was part of the tube implanted itself in the ground and caused her to come to a sudden stop.

While Buckel was stopped, another snow tube struck her from behind and injured her.  On Jan. 4, 2013, Buckel filed a lawsuit against Villa Olivia, Tube Pro Inc. “unknown snow tube manufacturer” and “unknown owners and non-record claimants.” Buckel later voluntarily dismissed Villa Olivia as a party defendant.

In the lawsuit, Buckel alleged that her tube was defective and that this defect caused it to suddenly stop on the hill, endangering her and proximately causing her injuries.  She alleged negligence against Tube Pro, claiming that it “negligently designed, manufactured, distributed and sold the snow tube equipment without appropriate safeguarding and an adequate warning label.”

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On Dec. 16, 2009, Terry Smith was employed by Sycamore Specialized Carriers.  He drove his tractor-trailer to the defendant Casini Warehousing Corp.’s warehouse in Bensenville, Ill. Casini’s personnel used an overhead crane to load an injection molding machine onto Smith’s step-deck trailer.

After the injection molding machine was loaded onto the step-deck, Smith was attempting to cover it with a 20-foot by 20-foot tarp that weighed 150 pounds. While he was attempting to cover the machine, he fell from the top of the machine to the ground.

In the lawsuit that Smith filed, he argued that the trucking industry custom and practice required Casini Warehousing to use its crane to assist him in draping the heavy tarp over the machinery. Smith said that he asked Casini workers for assistance, but they refused and chose to go to lunch instead.

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The Illinois Supreme Court has reversed a decision by a trial judge and the Illinois Appellate Court that dismissed a lawsuit against the East Joliet Fire Protection District regarding the death of Coretta Coleman. Her family claimed that the defendant, East Joliet Fire Protection District and its ENTs, were both negligent and willful and wanton in their conduct for choosing not to respond to a 911 call.

Coleman had called an ambulance by 911 because she was having difficulty breathing. This happened in June 2008. She gave the 911 dispatcher her address and told the person to “hurry.”  The 911 dispatcher asked Coleman to hold and transferred the call from the Will County dispatch to the Orland Central dispatch.

Deviating from written protocol, the Will County dispatch hung up after making a transfer without communicating to Orland Central dispatch the nature of the emergency. When Orland Central dispatch attempted to ask Coleman questions, it received no response and did not know whether the call was dropped or if Coleman was still on the line. The Orland Central dispatch staffer hung up and placed the call in line for an ambulance dispatch.

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In July 2013, ALL Erection & Crane Rental Corp. of Independence, Ohio, leased a crane to White Construction of Clinton, Ind. The crane was a Manitowoc 2250 Crawler Crane.

In the summer of 2012, Kyle Carson was working for White Construction at a wind farm in Indiana where his employer had a contract to build wind turbines.

Carson worked primarily as a crane oiler, providing general maintenance on the crane and serving as the eyes and ears of Joe Dowell, the crane operator. On Sept. 20, 2012, Carson and Dowell were told to move the crane to a wind turbine platform several miles from where the crane started that day.

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Gilberto Rebollar was 40 years old when he was struck and killed by a Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority train (Metro). He was walking through a pedestrian crossing at the time of the incident. Rebollar suffered traumatic brain injury, foot amputation, dislocated left shoulder and fractures. His medical expenses were $175,000.

Rebollar was a cook at the time of the accident.

The lawsuit was filed against Metro, the transit authority, claiming that its train operator had been speeding and chose not to avoid impact with a pedestrian, Rebollar.

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On May 24, 2011, Michael Racky was bicycling across 95th Street at LaCrosse Avenue in Oak Lawn, Ill. He jumped his bike over a 12-inch curb at the southwest corner to reach the sidewalk. There, the bike slowed and wobbled due to the loss of momentum.

Racky was 52 years old at the time. He continued riding south parallel to a commercial building, Karnezis Properties Plaza, when he extended his left arm and his right hand lightly touched a large, plate-glass storefront window while he attempted to retain his balance on his bike.

As he touched the window, it collapsed. He fell inside the storefront with his legs draped over the broken glass. His left leg was cut to the bone. An eyewitness to the incident, an off-duty Chicago Fire Department paramedic, tried without success to apply a tourniquet to Racky’s leg.

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On March 22, 2013, James McGinley, a delivery driver at the House of Blues in Chicago, was using a freight elevator to deliver heavy boxes of liquor to that location. However, when he was using the elevator, a descending door struck him and injured him.

He filed a lawsuit against Sysco Corp., pleading that upon his information and belief, a Sysco employee had been delivering goods to the same location earlier that day and had left his key in the elevator, which in turn was the cause of the door descending onto McGinley and injuring him.

McGinley alleged that Sysco was negligent and was also negligent as a common carrier. Sysco argued that it neither owned the premises nor controlled the elevator and thus had no duty of reasonable care to McGinley.

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James and Vanesha Doran and their daughter, Candice, attended a dinner following Candice’s college graduation ceremony. The dinner was held at Arbor Station Apartments. As James, Vanesha and Candice were standing on the second-floor balcony with Sandra Miles and other guests waiting to enter Candice’s apartment, the landing suddenly collapsed, causing the guests to fall about 20 feet to the pavement below.

James Doran, 43, suffered multiple fractures to both of his legs, including compound fractures to the left tibia and fibula and a fracture of his right femur. He underwent open reduction internal fixation surgery on the tibia and fibula fractures and was hospitalized for nearly a month, including 3 weeks of inpatient rehabilitation. He now walks with a cane. He incurred $156,200 in medical expenses and his future medical expenses are estimated to be about $105,800. Doran was a machinist and was unable to return to his job and is now permanently disabled. His past and future lost earnings are estimated to be more than $900,000.

James’s wife, Vanesha Doran, 43, sustained a right heel fracture, injuries to the right foot resulting in contracture of the middle toes at the joints, a tear to the right medial meniscus (right knee cartilage) and a lumbar herniated disk. She underwent surgeries to repair the meniscus tear and to implant a spinal nerve stimulator after nerve-block injections failed to relieve her lower back pain. She also developed complex regional pain syndrome in her lower back, resulting in chronic, debilitating pain. She now uses a wheelchair. Her past medical expenses totaled about $124,300. Her future medical expenses and life-care costs for what is expected to be a total knee replacement and to replace batteries in the stimulator were said to be estimated at around $4.23 million. She was a legal assistant at the time of the incident and is now permanently disabled. Her lost future earnings are estimated at over $800,000.

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A Cook County, Ill.,  jury has found that the Double Tree Hotel Chicago was not negligent when its hotel shuttle bus improperly transported the plaintiff, Mary Larkin, to the upper level terminal at O’Hare Airport by dropping her off on an expansion joint in the roadway, which was unsafe. As a result, Larkin fell and sustained a trimalleolar fracture of the right ankle, which required open reduction internal fixation surgery followed by a second procedure to remove some of the hardware.

The hotel asserted that Larkin failed to watch where she was walking. She had filed an earlier claim against the City of Chicago, which settled with her for $55,000.

The jury in this case, however, sided with Double Tree Hotel Chicago and found it not negligent or a cause of Larkin’s injuries.

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In September 2010, Thomas Berz was riding his bike in an Evanston alley when he hit a pothole. Berz fell off his bike and suffered a traumatic brain injury. He sued the City of Evanston in July 2011 claiming that it was negligent for choosing not to maintain the surface of the alley. A month later, Evanston filed a motion to dismiss on the basis that the Tort Immunity Act (745 ILCS 10/1-101 et seq.) protects the city from plaintiffs who are injured from using property differently than its intended use. 

The circuit court judge dismissed the case in November 2011, but granted Berz leave to amend his complaint. Berz amended the complaint providing new photographs of the alley’s condition and included greater detail on how this incident took place. Berz argued that under the Evanston Municipal Code and city-published bicycle maps, he was an intended user of the alley.

However, the trial court disagreed with Berz and dismissed his amended complaint in August 2012. But Berz filed a third amended complaint, arguing that his bike was a vehicle and therefore an intended user. Again, the city moved to dismiss arguing that a bicycle rider was not an intended user of an alley and the court agreed dismissing Berz’s complaint in November 2012.  Berz appealed to the Illinois Appellate Court, which reviewed whether a bicyclist was considered an intended user of the alley based on state law, the city’s ordinance and signage in the alley.

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