Atlanta Injury Lawyer Blog

Have you been taking so-called "herbal remedies?" BE CAREFUL. I am particularly interested if you have been taking a homeopathic drug called "Tobacco Addiction," the manufacturer of which boasts can eliminate your addiction to smoking. If you have been taking that homeopathic drug, please call me. This is a drug made right here in Georgia which many Georgians may be taking unawares.

There appears an interesting article at cnn.com , "Herbal Remedies Need Real Scrutiny" about herbal remedies or homeopathic drugs and they remain unregulated in the United States, even though many of these drugs have been known to cause severe side effects and don't do what they say they will do. These drugs are not monitored by the DEA whatsoever, and may be causing real harm to users. In fact, if you search the Drug Enforcement Agency's website, http://www.justice.gov/dea/index.htm for "homeopathics," nothing even mentioning homeopathics is found. You will find helpful information about these drugs at the National Institute of Medicine's website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginformation.html The United States Senate Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs held a hearing—Body Building Products and Hidden Steroids: Enforcement Barriers—late last month, during which both the Food and Drug Administration and the Drug Enforcement Agency were soundly criticized for not doing more to regulate either the dietary supplement market or those illicit players fielding steroids illegally sold as supplements.

I would urge consumers to consult their physician before taking any of these herbal remedies. Make sure they don't interact adversely with whatever prescription medications you may be taking right now and make sure they have not been reported as causing harm to users, e.g., kidney or liver failure. Report any adverse reactions immediately to your physician AND to the DEA.

As a member of the Executive Committee of the State Bar of Georgia, I am proud that our Executive Committee makes a concerted effort to get outside of Atlanta and meet our fellow Georgia Bar members in the four corners of the state. Last week's meeting in Thomasville, Thomas County, Georgia is a prime example of this. We enjoyed lunch first with many members of the local Thomas County Bar , which is part of the Southern Judicial Circuit. We met at Pebble Hill Plantation in Thomasville, which is a lovely location. The President of the Thomas County Bar Association, Christopher Rodd, was our host for the evening and for the tour of the new Thomas County Courthouse, which is not yet open for business but will be a spectacular venue. It is always a treat for me to meet members of the State Bar from across the state, who, but for my involvement in the State Bar of Georgia, I would likely never have the opportunity to meet. The theme that keeps coming through in these meetings in varied locales is this: the lawyers who comprise the State Bar of Georgia are honorable, dedicated leaders of their communities, who care about justice being served, who care about the less fortunate and who care about the criminal and civil judicial systems in Georgia and the stewardship of those two sacred systems. It is my honor to meet and come to know these lawyers and to discuss the issues they face in their communities that are worlds apart from Atlanta.

Below is a letter from Bryan Cavan, President of the State Bar of Georgia, another honorable lawyer, regarding our wonderful meeting in Thomasville.

Letter to the Editor – November 19, 2009
Thomasville Times-Enterprise

State Bar commends Thomasville hospitality

To the Editor:

On behalf of the State Bar of Georgia, I wish to express sincere thanks to President Christopher Rodd and the members of the Thomas County Bar Association for serving as outstanding hosts for the State Bar’s Executive Committee meeting Nov. 12 at Pebble Hill Plantation in Thomasville.

Our Executive Committee meetings throughout the year are held in various locations around Georgia so that State Bar leaders have the opportunity to meet with and hear from local attorneys, judges, legislators and other community leaders. Thanks to the warm hospitality of the local bar association and the people of Thomas County, we enjoyed an exceptional meeting in your community.

All Georgia lawyers can be proud of our colleagues in the Thomas County Bar Association for their tireless dedication toward upholding the constitutional promise of justice for all.

Sincerely,

Bryan M. Cavan
President

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's Top Safety Picks for 2010 came out today and for the first time ever, roof strength was tested and included in the ratings. This means the Institute is seriously acknowledging the likelihood of rollover accidents and the survivability of them depending on what type of car you are in. Automobile manufacturers have traditionally tried to ignore roof crush standards, but they really can't now. Especially given the high center of gravity of an SUV, that more and more Americans (including Georgians) are driving SUV's now and, consequently, more rollovers are occurring. The starting premise of the crashworthiness of your vehicle is that your own vehicle should not kill you. This means that if you are in a wreck and the wreck is survivable, your car should not cause your death. In a rollover accident, if the roof is not strong, it will flatten like a pancake, leaving very little room for the occupants of the cab. Sometimes, the roof will crush and hit an occupant's head and cause severe and even catastrophic neck injuries, e.g., paralysis. I am glad to see the Institute including roof crush standards in its report. Suburu, Ford, Volvo and Volkswagon all fared well in the safety report. Certainly something to consider before buying your next car. Speaking of which, you may also find at this link a brochure about buying safer cars. Consult this when you are next in the market for a new car.

5,000 Deaths a Year Can Be Stopped
By Tom Hodgson

Congress should be commended for its work on the Airline Safety and Pilot Training Improvement Act of 2009 in the U.S. House, and the Federal Aviation Administration Air Transportation Modernization and Safety Improvement Act in the Senate.
The two pilot safety bills were introduced in reaction to the Feb. 12 crash of a commuter airliner near Buffalo, N.Y., in which 50 people tragically perished. The new laws will enhance pilot training requirements, strengthen background checks, upgrade pilot records databases and take other important steps — including measures to reduce pilot fatigue and provide better pay.
Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood also deserves kudos for convening a conference in Washington to address safety lapses inherent in texting by drivers of heavy commercial vehicles.

But while pilot safety and anti-texting initiatives are getting all the headlines, the facts show that 100 people every week lose their lives in highway crashes involving heavy commercial vehicles.

So, we ask, what about them?

Their deaths don’t make national headlines, but shouldn’t Congress be taking action to save the lives of those 100 people killed each week? The deaths of 400 people each month in highway wrecks involving heavy commercial vehicles is equal to two Boeing 757 airliners crashing and killing all aboard month after month after month — an unbelievable, intolerable nightmare scenario. Fatal crashes between cars and heavy trucks on our highways have been at critically high levels for decades, yet there is no government or media outcry to reduce the death and suffering.

Why?

Steve and Susan Owings of Atlanta founded Road Safe America after their son, Cullum, was killed in 2002 when his car — stopped in an interstate traffic jam — was crushed from behind by a speeding tractor-trailer truck on cruise control going 7 mph above the posted speed limit.

Since its founding, Road Safe America has been joined by the American Trucking Associations, all national safety advocacy organizations, numerous trucking firms, business executives, insurance companies and thousands of citizens in seeking a national regulation requiring activation of electronic speed-limiting governors set at 65 mph on all trucks 13 tons and up built after 1992. That’s the year electronic speed limiters became standard on all large trucks.

Unfortunately, the Bush administration did not act on this regulatory request. Road Safe America and its supporters are working with the Obama administration to have the speed governors activated on heavy commercial trucks. Georgia’s two U.S. senators, Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss, are pro-highway safety, and Road Safe America recommends citizens contact them with comments in support of speed limiters on heavy commercial vehicles.
All trucks 13 tons and up built since 1992 already come with the speed governors installed, but drivers are not required to use them. It would be a simple task to activate the governors and initiate a common sense, inexpensive regulation that would save the lives of many of the approximately 4,000 motorists and 1,000 truckers killed each year in crashes involving big trucks.

If saving lives is not motivation enough to support this cause, in this era of dependency on foreign sources of oil, consider the fact that activation of speed-governing technology is already being applied by many trucking firms as a way to cut fuel use as well as improve safety.
With a reduction of only 5 mph, millions of gallons of fuel can be saved annually in the nation’s trucking fleet.

The European Union, Australia, Japan and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec already have regulations requiring speed-limiting devices set at 65 mph or slower on all large trucks.Sadly, instead of showing international leadership, the U.S. is behind the rest of the world in this area. Australia experienced a reduction of 26.5 percent in heavy truck fatalities between 2002 and 2004 through speed governor requirements, aggressive fatigue management programs, random drug testing and seat belt promotion within the trucking industry, according to Australian government statistics.

No one at Road Safe America is anti-trucking or anti-trucker. In fact, the opposite is the case. In terms of annual deaths and injuries, trucking is one of the most dangerous professions in America, and we want to change that. We are trying to educate drivers of passenger autos and other vehicles about the need to operate more safely around large trucks because of the dangers present. Trucking is an absolutely vital industry to the economic health and prosperity of our nation.

However, by limiting the maximum speeds of heavy commercial vehicles, we know that many more drivers will make it home to their families at the end of a long run, and more motorists will live to see their loved ones again as well.

Tom Hodgson is executive director of Road Safe America, which sponsors its annual Road Safer Sunday on Nov. 29. You can read more about this important organization at roadsafe.com.

Georgians who may be planning to rent a U-Haul truck should be aware of potential problems in the U-Haul truck fleet with maintenance of their trucks that may present a safety hazard for the driver of the truck or anyone around the truck. This safety issue came to light in a trial in Texas in 2008 in which a 74-year-old man was seriously injured after a parked U-Haul truck he rented rolled over him.

In 2006, Talmidge Waldrip, a Texas resident, parked a rented U-Haul truck in front of a warehouse, set the parking brake and turned off the ignition.When he stepped out of the cab, he fell. The truck rolled, running over Waldrip, crushing his pelvis and lumbar spine, rupturing his bladder and causing a number of other serious injuries. As a result, he has had a numerous surgeries and is now partially paralyzed.

Waldrip sued the truck company, alleging negligence and gross negligence. The key to the case was evidence that the company failed to maintain the brake and transmission systems of its truck fleet properly, including the 18-year-old, 234,000-mile driven truck that caused Waldrip’s injuries. The six jurors returned an $84.25 million verdict in favor of the plaintiff, Talmadge Waldrip, including a $63 million in punitive damages against U-Haul International for failing to maintain its rental trucks in safe working order. U-Haul has appealed the verdict.

The evidence showed that six other renters who had driven this vehicle in the year before that had the same problem with rolling. Reports also showed that upwards of 30 percent of U-Haul’s rental fleet had brakes that were not properly working, and that the particular truck in question had been cited in Canada for poor maintenance and banned from being driven in that country. In addition, evidence was presented that the company chose to ship the truck back to the U.S. from Canada to keep it in operation.There are many U-Haul accidents happening throughout the United States to completely innocent renters.

Some of the cases currently pending against U-Haul involved trailers that were being pulled by a Ford Explorer. In each case, the trailer began swaying and ultimately caused the towing vehicle to roll over, leading to the driver’s death. Shortly after the first of these two cases was resolved in 2002, U-Haul issued a new policy preventing rental of its trailers when the customer is driving a Ford Explorer. "Trailer Sway" is a problem well known to U-Haul, although U-Haul apparently has ignored it over the years.

Was U-Haul’s announcement was nothing more than a publicity stunt? There are many skeptics who have handled this kind of case and some of these lawyers feel it is unsafe to allow any personal vehicle to tow a trailer, especially an SUV.

So, Dear Georgians, please consider this the next time you go to rent a U-Haul truck or trailer. There may be problems with the brakes on that vehicle that you may not realize until it is too late.