Los Angeles Personal Injury Lawyer - Los Angeles Times

Metrolink Settles Most Cases from 2005 Glendale Train Crash

Paul Kiesel — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:33:29 GMT

After years of legal wrangling, Metrolink has settled most of the outstanding lawsuits arising from the 2005 Glendale crash that killed 11 people and injured about 180, the second-deadliest in Metrolink’s history, attorneys said.

Metrolink has agreed to pay $30 million to settle the majority of the approximately 150 claims and lawsuits filed against Metrolink, according to the lead plaintiff's attorney.

The remaining cases are expected to be resolved in the next month, plaintiffs’ attorneys said.

Any cases that are not settled are scheduled to go to trial in January.

Metrolink could not immediately be reached for comment.

A claims report in a July agenda for Metrolink’s board said it would be paying $3,901,500 in seven recently resolved lawsuits. Most of the cases involving serious injuries and fatalities were settled in a flurry of mediation talks in the last six months, attorneys said.

Plaintiffs' attorneys said Metrolink showed little interest in settling the larger cases until this April, more than four years after the Jan. 26, 2005, incident, which was the most severe in its history until last year’s Chatsworth crash.

“There was a sea change in attitude,” said Jerry Ringler, the lead plaintiff’s attorney, said in a recent interview. “I think we developed liability theories that were extremely powerful.”

In the 2005 crash, a Compton laborer parked his Jeep Grand Cherokee on the tracks and doused the interior with gasoline in what he later claimed was a suicide attempt.

A three-car southbound train, which was being pushed by a locomotive, slammed into the car, skidded down the tracks, then derailed. The lead passenger car crashed into an idle freight train, jackknifed and collided into a passenger train going the opposite direction on its way to Burbank.

“Thus far, we believe the Glendale settlements have been fair and reasonable given that Juan Alvarez, who parked his jeep on the Metrolink right-of-way, has been subsequently convicted of 11 counts of first-degree murder,” Ringler said in a statement released today.

Click here for the rest of the article.

And click here to read archived blogs related to Metrolink.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Metrolink Still Struggling with Saftey Improvements

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 15:18:10 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

As the anniversary of the Sept. 12 Chatsworth train disaster approaches, officials with Southern California's sprawling commuter rail service are facing a vexing array of technical, financial and potential legal challenges as they struggle to deliver on pledges of trailblazing safety reforms.

A burst of energy to remake the region's Metrolink train operation was unleashed by the deadliest rail collision in modern California history, a watershed event that killed 25, injured 130 and prompted landmark federal mandates to modernize the nation's rail safety systems.

Today, the rush to reform Metrolink -- a thinly staffed hybrid transportation agency once derided as the political stepchild of the five counties that created it -- is becoming increasingly costly, time-consuming and complicated.

Labor leaders are digging in to fight an unprecedented push by agency officials to place locomotive train crews under continuous video surveillance.

Technical and financial challenges loom over an ambitious schedule to a deploy a $200-million collision-avoidance network for all commuter, freight and intercity trains moving across hundreds of miles of track.

Meanwhile, Metrolink officials have reversed course on an effort to assume direct control over hiring, training and supervising rail crews, a move prompted partly by disclosures that in Chatsworth, an engineer employed by a contractor apparently ran a red light while sending a text message on his cellphone just before colliding head-on with a freight train.

Fearing that trying to manage on-board train crews could overtax staff and trigger thorny labor issues, Metrolink's board of directors opted to farm out the critical function again, this time to Amtrak.

Compounding financial strains, ridership has been sliding since the crash, largely because of lower gas prices and the recession. Fare revenues dropped $1.4 million below estimates in the last quarter alone.

And operating insurance premiums recently surged $1 million above estimates because of Metrolink's accident history over the last decade, averaging one potentially catastrophic liability payout every two years, records show.

Although no major wrecks have occurred since Chatsworth, smaller accidents involving cars and pedestrians are running about the same this year as last -- 3.25 and 3.4 per month, respectively, the agency says.

But a rash of incidents leading up to this week's memorial observances has served as a reminder of the risks Metrolink confronts in its heavily urban mixed-rail environment.

Click here for the rest of the article.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

UCLA Willed Body Program Tactics Seen at Illinois Cemetery?

Paul Kiesel — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:39:20 GMT

As far as what's been reported on this story, yes, it reeks of the UCLA WBP days of 1999-2003 (i.e. trafficking body parts, improper disposition of body parts, bank accounts set up in UCLA's name, without UCLA's permission, by professors and employees of the school, then used by Henry Reid to embezzle money, etc.).

From the Los Angeles Times:

Five employees of the historic Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip were taken into custody Wednesday after authorities learned numerous bodies had been dug up and the grave sites were illegally resold, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart said.

Detectives discovered a pile of bones -- from more than 100 decomposed bodies -- above ground and uncovered in an overgrown, fenced-off portion of the cemetery, Dart said.

"What we found was beyond startling and revolting," the sheriff said.

On Wednesday night, as news of the grim discovery spread, devastated families started trickling onto the cemetery grounds to check on their loved ones' graves.

Donetta Newman, 35, whose father and both of her grandparents are buried at Burr Oak, stood in the rain trying to get inside to see if their grave sites had been disturbed. "You always think this is the final resting place," she said. "This is just shocking. I'm very distraught."

One of the first predominantly African-American cemeteries in the area, Burr Oak is home to many historic figures, including Emmett Till, blues legend Dinah Washington and heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles.

Dart said he was certain Till's remains were not disturbed, but he could not ensure the preservation of the others.

"We cannot give people definitive answers at this point," he said, adding they were working with forensic medical examiners to try to identify the remains.

None of the remains had been removed from the site, said Steve Patterson, a sheriff's spokesman. The state's attorney's office and FBI are also investigating, Dart said.

Click here for the rest of the article.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

The Case of a Shattered Windshield, a Dead Fish and a Rose Moves Forward... Sorta

Paul Kiesel — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:12:53 GMT

From DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com:

Imprisoned former celebrity P.I. Anthony Pellicano and a man he allegedly hired to threaten former entertainment business journalist Anita Busch (then working as a contract employee for the Los Angeles Times) have pleaded not guilty to two felony charges. Pellicano, who is representing himself, and Alexander Frederick Proctor are expected back in court June 25th for a status conference. A preliminary hearing has been tentatively set for June 29th.

And...

From the Los Angeles Times:

Hollywood private eye Anthony Pellicano and his alleged hired hand, Alexander Proctor, pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges that they threatened reporter Anita Busch in 2002 to scare her off a story.

Pellicano and Proctor, both 65, were charged four years ago in the threat on Busch's life. Busch, who was then working for the Los Angeles Times, found the fish with a rose in its mouth on the broken windshield of her car along with a sign reading "Stop," court documents allege. The windshield was punctured and made to appear like a bullet hole, prosecutors wrote in the complaint against the two men.

Los Angeles County district attorney's spokeswoman Jane Robison said the case was called for arraignment this week because Proctor, who is serving a 10-year sentence on an unrelated federal drug conviction, made a demand for a speedy trial. Pellicano, who is acting as his own attorney, as he did in his two federal criminal trials, showed up in court wearing an orange prison jumpsuit and a pair of sunglasses because of an eye condition, Robison said.

The case against Pellicano and Proctor was put on hold while the closely watched federal trial against Pellicano and his accomplices moved through the courts. At the conclusion of that trial in December, Pellicano was sentenced to 15 years in prison on a long list of federal wiretapping and racketeering charges. Both Pellicano and Proctor were transferred to state custody for their arraignment.

It was the threat against Busch that triggered the unraveling of Pellicano's investigations business. Proctor told an FBI informant that he had been hired by Pellicano to threaten Busch; based on that statement, authorities obtained a warrant to raid the investigator's Sunset Boulevard office. There, they found the extensive computer files that led to a wide-reaching grand jury investigation into Pellicano's illegal wiretapping enterprise.

Authorities initially charged Proctor in federal court, but dropped the charges after determining they did not have jurisdiction. State prosecutors took over the case and charged Proctor in 2003 with making a criminal threat. They filed an additional case in 2005 charging Pellicano with conspiracy and making a criminal threat, and Proctor with an additional conspiracy count.

If convicted, the men face maximum sentences of three years. They were ordered back in court June 25, Robison said.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

California Closer to Banning BPA in Plastics

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 18:40:32 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

Reporting from Sacramento -- Despite a fierce lobbying effort by the U.S. chemical industry, the state Senate narrowly approved a proposal Tuesday that would ban the use of a substance in baby bottles, toddler sippy cups and food containers that independent scientists say is a threat to childhood development.

The bill by state Sen. Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills) prohibiting the use of bisphenol A -- more commonly dubbed BPA -- now goes to the Assembly, where it is expected to face a wall of resistance from manufacturers of the infant products that contain the controversial chemical.

Industry leaders have targeted California for an orchestrated lobbying and grassroots PR campaign to turn back efforts by health and consumer groups to ban the use of the chemical, a component in the manufacture of plastic containers.

Researchers from the chemical industry say the public health threat has been vastly overblown. But more than 200 independent scientific studies have linked BPA to brain development and behavioral problems in young children, early puberty and the eventual onset of some types of cancer. Scientists say the chemical can leach into a liquid, particularly when a bottle or cup is heated.

Pavley said on the floor that the goal of her legislation is to protect "the most vulnerable," stressing that affordable alternatives are already available to the chemical industry.

"For each year we delay, 500,000 babies are born in California" who could be affected, she declared.

The measure squeaked through with a bar majority largely on partisan lines, 21-16, though two Democrats -- Sens. Ron Calderon (D-Montebello) and Gloria Negrete McLeod (D-Chino) voted with the Republicans.

Sen. George Runner (R-Lancaster) said the measure is a "knee jerk reaction" that sidesteps efforts the state undertook just last year to more fully study the effects of potential chemical threats before adopting blanket bans.

BPA has been used since the 1950s as an additive to give plastics more strength and is common in hundreds of household products, including plastic bottles and food containers. It is also used in the linings of canned goods such as soup, baby formula and fruits or vegetables.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Lax Oversight Forces Metrolink to Hire Own Crews

Paul Kiesel — Thu, 28 May 2009 19:41:52 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

In the latest fallout from last year's Metrolink disaster, the Southern California commuter rail agency could begin directly hiring and managing its engineers and conductors next year, taking full responsibility for key tasks historically delegated to outside contractors.

The move, which officials say appears likely, comes after Metrolink's relationship with the current provider of train crews, Connex Railroad, was soured by allegations of lax oversight. The company recently gave formal notice that it does not plan to extend its operating agreement.

The Metrolink board first raised the prospect of ending the agreement after the Chatsworth collision with a freight train, which killed 25 and injured 135.

Assuming direct control of train crews would mark a major change for Metrolink, a 17-year-old, five-county public agency that grew rapidly by relying largely on private firms for everything from maintaining rail cars to fixing signals.

But the mood shifted after the Chatsworth catastrophe, in which a Connex engineer who had been text-messaging on his cellphone drove Metrolink 111 head-on into a Union Pacific freight train. The Sept. 12 accident, which federal investigators say came after the Connex engineer ran a red light, has set off what could be one of costliest railroad liability court battles on record.

It also prompted disclosures that, in violation of safety regulations, the engineer sent and received hundreds of text messages while on duty in the days before the collision. Robert M. Sanchez, who died in the crash, also sneaked young rail enthusiasts into the control cabs of passenger trains for ride-alongs, investigators found. Metrolink ordered the removal of two company managers after the disclosures.

Connex has defended its safety and supervision record, saying it has an intensive field testing program that exceeds industry standards. In a recent letter...

Click here for the rest of the article.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Hundreds of Children Beaten, Sexually Abused and "Terrorized" for Decades at Catholic-run Schools in Ireland

Paul Kiesel — Wed, 20 May 2009 17:40:46 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

Reporting from London -- Boys and girls were beaten, sexually abused and emotionally terrorized for decades in workhouse-style schools run by Ireland's Catholic Church, in which a "culture of silence" showed more concern for protecting victimizers than the children in their care, according to a long-awaited report released today in Dublin.

For more than half a century, excessive and arbitrary punishment created a climate in which students at schools administered by Catholic religious orders lived "with the daily terror of not knowing where the next beating was coming from."

Sexual molestation was "endemic," committed by offenders who were often transferred to other institutions rather than dismissed or turned over to authorities, said the report by Ireland's Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse.

And through it all, government inspectors failed to stop what was going on, despite attempts by some individuals to bring their abusers to account in an effort to lessen the trauma that many still suffer years later.

These are some of the findings of the 2,600-page report unveiled after a nine-year investigation. Drawing on the testimony of nearly 2,000 witnesses, men and women at more than 200 Catholic-run schools during the 1940s through the 1990s, the commission pieced together a damning picture of a church engaged too often in covering up misdeeds within its ranks instead of rooting out their perpetrators.

The five-volume report is a major blow for a religious institution that continues to wield enormous, albeit declining, influence on Irish society, especially on moral issues such as divorce and abortion.

Even then, it wasn't tough enough for some of the victims. Many are angry that the report includes no names of alleged offenders, an omission that one of the religious orders under investigation won in court. Only pseudonyms are used, making the chances of criminal prosecution slim.

"We expected that these people would be named and shamed and that some of them would be convicted," John Barrett, who testified before the commission, told Irish radio station TodayFM. "At the end of the day, some of us won't sleep tonight. We're still nowhere near the truth."

Barrett alleges that he was sexually abused while at a school for boys with learning disabilities, which was run by the Brothers of Charity in Ireland's County Cork.

Edmund Garvey, a spokesman for the Christian Brothers, one of the religious orders whose schools came under investigation, said: "Our first response to the report is to openly and unreservedly express our heartfelt sorrow and sadness and regret to those people who were victimized . . . We are deeply sorry, deeply regretful."

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's Proposed Budget Cuts Include Skimping on Ethics

Paul Kiesel — Mon, 11 May 2009 18:50:10 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times:

There's more to public safety than police and fire protection. A safe city also is one that makes an effort to shield its people from the corrosive influences of sleazy politics, cronyism and corruption.

That's why, when the full City Council takes up Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's crisis budget next week, it needs to take extraordinary care to see that the Ethics Commission isn't crippled in the rush to economize. The commission is a unique civic institution, the only city department that gets its mandate directly from the people, who created it in June 1990, when they overwhelmingly voted to amend the City Charter with a sweeping package of ethical and campaign finance reforms.

As a Times editorial pointed out at the time, the new ethics code was the product of a novel process. It was "drafted by a citizens' commission appointed by -- but independent of -- Mayor Tom Bradley, passed on by the City Council after days of historic, open debate and, finally, ratified by a decisive 57% of the city's voters." Like many of those involved in the struggle to draft the omnibus amendment, The Times argued that creation of a permanent city ethics commission -- something many in city government bitterly opposed -- was the heart of the reform effort.

In the years since, the five-member commission with its staff of 27 has become something of a national model. It also has taken on expanded duties, educating and advising lawmakers and their staffs on ethical and campaign finance issues. Last quarter, it levied $127,000 in fines in seven cases involving money laundering and improper campaign contributions. The staff currently has 46 open cases under investigation.

Thus, the mayor's proposal to cut the commission's $2.5-million budget by 17.9% -- roughly double the 9.4% median reduction among all city departments -- deserves careful scrutiny. Now it's true that the city's fiscal crisis is unprecedented, and the mayor's plan was pulled together in the face of revenues that seem to fall more dramatically and local unemployment that seems to climb more steeply with each passing day. Villaraigosa and his team, moreover, deserve high marks for subjecting the whole range of civic expenditures to searching analysis, and for their determination to maintain essential services and to keep as many city workers as possible on the job.

The question the council needs to ask now is whether the commission's ability to render its own form of essential public service will be too severely compromised to justify what are, even in this context of dire emergency, relatively meager savings. The commission's president, attorney Helen Zukin, points out that the proposed $450,000 cut amounts to just .01% of the city's overall $4.4-billion budget. She says she has no doubt, moreover, that the commission's ability to conduct investigations and undertake enforcement will be "greatly reduced." Zukin says the cuts will force six layoffs, including an investigator and an auditor, at a time when serious investigations are underway.

Article continues here...

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Hollywood Film Director Indicted on Counts Related to Pellicano Case

Paul Kiesel — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 15:24:37 GMT

From the Los Angeles Times: A Hollywood film director who pleaded guilty three years ago to lying to the FBI in connection with the Anthony Pellicano investigation, then withdrew his plea, was indicted Friday by a federal grand jury in Los Angeles.

John McTiernan faces two counts of making false statements to federal agents and one count of perjury for a statement to a federal judge while seeking to withdraw his plea, federal authorities said. McTiernan, who directed the action thriller "Die Hard," was one of seven people who pleaded guilty to charges connected to the Pellicano case before it went to trial last year. Before he was sentenced, McTiernan asked the judge to allow him to withdraw his plea, arguing that he would not have agreed to plead guilty if his attorney at the time had given him better legal advice.

The judge denied the request, but McTiernan filed an appeal with the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which ordered the lower court to hold a hearing to consider the director's request. The court ultimately granted the request after the U.S. attorney's office said it did not oppose withdrawal of the plea.

Friday's indictment contains the charges to which McTiernan had earlier agreed to plead guilty, as well as a new charge of lying in court proceedings, in which he sought to change his plea, said Assistant U.S. Atty. Daniel Saunders.

McTiernan's attorney, S. Todd Neal, questioned prosecutors' motives in adding the new charge.

"There seems to be retribution because John refused to play ball the way the prosecutors wanted and because we were successful on appeal," Neal said. "We will vigorously defend this case."

Pellicano was convicted of wiretapping producer Charles Roven on McTiernan's behalf. During the job, the private detective complained -- in a taped phone conversation in 2000 -- about having to listen to a huge volume of calls to get useful information.

"You can't have the thing on there listening for particular words or names?" asked McTiernan.

"Nah, nah, nah," Pellicano said. "That's in the movies."

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel

Cardinal Mahony Testifies in Fresno Clergy Abuse Case

Paul Kiesel — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 16:37:32 GMT

From The Associated Press:

Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles is on the witness stand testifying in the case of two brothers who claim they were molested years ago by a priest at a San Joaquin Valley church.

Mahony was a high-level administrator in the Fresno diocese during some of the years George and Howard Santillan claim they were molested by Monsignor Anthony Herdegen at a church in Wasco, a small town north of Bakersfield.

The brothers filed their lawsuit in 2003 under a one-year window that voided the statute of limitations on old abuse claims in California.

Mahony is now head of the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese. This marks only the second time he will take the witness stand to answer questions before jurors about alleged molestation by priests.

______________________________________________________

"This is extremely rare..."

The brothers' lawsuit had originally been thrown out by a trial judge but was revived last May by state appellate judges, who took a close look on Mahony's own words during a deposition. Mahony had indicated in that deposition that higher-ups in the Fresno Diocese were aware of the abuse that took place, but did nothing to neither stop it nor prevent it from occurring again.

Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, a website devoted to the documentation of clergy abuse and the preservation of church records, said, "This is extremely rare [. . .] Mahony is by far the highest-ranking U.S. Catholic official to testify at a civil trial."

Cardinal Mahony is a paradoxical public figure. Many people in the Los Angeles-area see him as a wolf in sheep's clothing, a malevolent force behind the clergy abuse scandals who tried painting himself and the pedophiles in the Los Angeles and surrounding Dioceses as victims of a larger, societal problem.

The Cardinal's Other Problems

The Cardinal is currently under investigation by the FBI. The probe is aimed at determining whether Mahony, and other church leaders, committed fraud by failing to adequately deal with priests accused of sexually abusing children.

The Cardinal has also been doing his best to prevent an Iraqi War Veteran, who says he was sexually abused by a priest in his L.A.-area Catholic high school at the age of 16, from having his day in court.

On top of all of this, the Pope came out today and said that condoms are not the answer to preventing the transmission of HIV. Whether condoms are the complete or partial answer is a futile argument. To discourage the use of condoms, particularly while on your first pilgrimage to Africa, a continent that is facing an AIDS epidemic, is flat out stupid.

If this is the best the Catholic Church has to offer, I'm unimpressed.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Paul Kiesel