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Business groups that howl about bogus lawsuits and plaintiff lawyers who claim to fight for ordinary folks victimized by corporations engage in a war of words.
The news media often are criticized for distorted coverage of the legal system. But is digital journalism – news distributed via websites, Facebook, Twitter and other electronic channels – making matters worse? A report from a New York-based consumer advocacy group, the Center for Justice & Democracy, contends that is [...]
Are personal injury lawsuits, as many business groups contend, often frivolous and damaging to the nation's economy? And are juries apt to side with plaintiffs and give them huge, unwarranted punitive damage awards? Quite the contrary, says a report by the Center for Justice & Democracy, a New York-based non-profit consumer [...]
Each year, about one in 14 doctors gets sued for malpractice, but only one claim in five results in a settlement or other payout, according to the most comprehensive study of these claims in 20 years. While the findings might suggest that most of these claims are meritless, authors of the [...]
Last week's U.S. Supreme Court decision opening the way to more consumer safety lawsuits against automakers already has revived a case filed by a woman who blames her son's death on the window glass used in a Ford pickup truck. The South Carolina Supreme Court ruled last year that Mary [...]
Minnesota could become the latest state to pass a so-called cheeseburger bill banning lawsuits by consumers who blame their obesity on the high-calorie offerings of fast-food restaurants. According to the National Restaurant Association, such bills have passed in 23 states, but similar legislation has failed twice in Minnesota, most recently [...]
Philadelphia, home to the cheesesteak sandwich and the Liberty Bell, now has a new distinction: It just was rated the worst place in the country for a company to be sued. (Or perhaps, if you have a different perspective, the best place to be a plaintiff.) The "worst" ranking comes [...]
Searching for money to go the distance in costly legal battles, many alleged victims of medical malpractice or corporate misdeeds are getting help from outside investors, including some financial heavyweights, says a report by the Center for Public Integrity and The New York Times. Always looking for lucrative projects to back, hedge funds, banks, and private investors are getting [...]
Health professionals agree that some radiation scans are unnecessary, and potentially harmful, but there is considerable debate over what needs to be done to protect patients. The discussion played out in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine, where one health expert called for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to [...]
About one in four cardiologists say they order tests to avoid being sued, a new study shows. The Center for Outcomes Research and Evaluation at Maine Medical Center in Portland surveyed nearly 600 doctors to determine, among other things, how non-medical issues influence their decisions to order invasive heart tests. [...]
The president of the American Medical Association says a recent decision by the Georgia Supreme Court to strike down medical liability caps could limit patients’ access to healthcare. The reaction came in response to the court’s ruling on Monday, which said the $350,000 cap defined under a 2005 state law [...]
Cesarean sections have reached an all-time high in the U.S., driven in part by legal pressure faced by doctors, according to a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics. The rate of Cesarean births increased by over 50 percent from 1996 to 2007, with nearly one in three [...]
Delaware, home base of more than half of all Fortune 500 companies, also has the most business-friendly courts in the country, a survey by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce suggests. By contrast, when it comes to a ''reasonable and balanced'' approach to tort liability cases, West Virginia is at the bottom of the heap, the survey says, with Lousiana [...]
In a 4-3 ruling, the Georgia Supreme Court upheld a state law making it more difficult for patients to win malpractice lawsuits in cases where emergency medical assistance was required. The law, passed in 2005, requires plaintiffs to establish that emergency healthcare providers knowingly mistreated patients. The Associated Press reports [...]
Supporters of tort reform — and late-night comedians — like to make fun of what they say are frivolous lawsuits. One they particularly like to lampoon is the case of the woman who sued McDonald’s after she was scalded by too-hot coffee. What they don’t talk much about is just how hot the coffee was or that the 79-year-old woman was hospitalized with severe injuries. The two sides ultimately settled.
