Personal Injury & Medical Malpractice

Expert Analysis

• Judge's Rebuke Of Mass. AG Has Lessons For All Attorneys

  

  A Massachusetts federal judge’s recent rebuke of the state Attorney General’s Office for refusing to respond to discovery requests in Alliance for Automotive Innovation v. Healey highlights six important considerations for attorneys who want to avoid the dreaded benchslap, say Alison Eggers and Dallin Wilson at Seyfarth.  

• Font Considerations To Give Your Legal Briefs An Edge

  

  Following the D.C. Circuit’s recent notice discouraging use of the font Garamond in legal briefs, Jason Steed at Kilpatrick looks at typeface requirements and preferences in appellate courts across the country, and how practitioners can score a few extra brief-writing points with typography.

• Discerning Need For 2nd COVID Workers' Comp Claim In Calif.

  

  Diana Tsudik at Gilson Daub explains how California employers can determine whether an employee’s second round of industrial COVID-19 leave requires a new workers' compensation claim form, and how a secondary filing could unnecessarily expose the company to double liability for one injury.

• Make Profitability Management Part Of Your Law Firm Culture

  

  As the legal industry continues to change in the post-pandemic world, law firms should adapt to client demands by constantly measuring and managing the profitability of their services, says Joseph Altonji at LawVision.

• 4 Trends In Discoverability Of Litigation Funding Documents

  

  Recent rulings shed light on how courts and international arbitration tribunals decide if litigation funding materials are discoverable and reaffirm best practices that attorneys should follow when communicating with funders, say Justin Maleson at Longford Capital and Michele Slachetka and Christian Plummer at Jenner & Block.

• Opinion

  Keep Junk Science Away From Juries

  

  Well-grounded scientific testimony in judicial proceedings has become more essential than ever, especially with large verdicts at stake in cases concerning hot-button issues like talc and climate change, so judges must act as gatekeepers to exclude unsound science from jury trials, says Lawrence Ebner at the Atlantic Legal Foundation.

• 7 Lessons For Young Lawyers Starting Their Careers

  

  This year's law graduates and other young attorneys must recognize that the practice of law tests and rewards different skills and characteristics than law school, and that what makes a lawyer valuable changes over time, says Vernon Winters, retired partner at Sidley.

• Opinion

  Fla. Amendment Should Make Courts More Insurer-Friendly

  

  Effective May 1, a seemingly innocuous amendment by Florida's Republican-appointed Supreme Court, aligning the state summary judgment standard with that of federal courts, should make state courts much more hospitable to defendant insurers, says Charles Lemley at Wiley.

• The Pandemic's Bright Spots For Lawyers Who Are Parents

  

  The COVID-19 crisis has allowed lawyers to hone remote advocacy strategies and effectively represent clients with minimal travel — abilities that have benefited working parents and should be utilized long after the pandemic is over, says Chelsea Loughran at Wolf Greenfield.

• Opinion

  Revise Mansfield Diversity Mandates To Also Benefit Veterans

  

  The well-intentioned efforts and salutary purposes of the legal industry's Mansfield Rule diversity metric are tainted by the Diversity Lab initiative's omission of veterans, who are underrepresented at large law firms and entitled to advantageous treatment based on more than 200 years of public policy, says Robert Redmond at McGuireWoods.

• NY Birth Injury Rulings Show Medical Fund Is Working

  

  Recent New York rulings show that the state's Medical Indemnity Fund — intended to pay for the medical needs of children injured at birth and reduce malpractice exposure for medical providers — is working as intended after multiple legislative fixes, say Bradley Zimmerman and Christopher Nyberg at the Jacob Fuchsberg Law Firm.

• 5th Circ.'s Health Care Fraud Ruling May Help Defendants Broadly

  

  The Fifth Circuit's recent decision in U.S. v. Nora, reversing a defendant's health care fraud conviction, highlights the difficulty in proving a defendant's intent and may strengthen myriad defense theories, say Richard Roper and Elissa McClure at Thompson & Knight.

• Lessons From Key Expert Testimony In Chauvin Trial

  

  During the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, pulmonologist Martin Tobin gave a gripping account of the cause of George Floyd’s death, engaging jurors in creative ways and bringing five important lessons for lawyers preparing expert witnesses, say Harlan Prater and Logan Matthews at Lightfoot Franklin.

• Why The Future Law Firm Model Is Industry-Based Offerings

  

  Multidisciplinary, industry-based groups at law firms allow for more holistic legal advice, lead to sustainable client relationships, and are likely to replace practice group monoliths at many firms, say Jennifer Simpson Carr at Furia Rubel, Timothy Corcoran at Corcoran Consulting and Mike Mellor at Pryor Cashman.

• Beware Sunny Days: Lessons From BP's 2005 Texas Blast

  

  The 16th anniversary of the massive explosion at BP's Texas City refinery is an occasion to remember that when companies grow complacent about favorable safety metrics, they leave themselves open to disaster — and to the civil and criminal liability that may follow, says Gerry Caron, chief counsel for safety, health and environment at Cabot.