Results

We obtained summary judgment on behalf of two school districts in a matter brought by various plaintiffs against the Career and Technology Center of Lackawanna County (CTC) and four of its sending school districts. The plaintiffs had asserted claims under Title IX, the 14th Amendment, and Section 8542(b)(9) of the Pennsylvania Political Subdivision Tort Claims Act based on their sexual abuse by an automotive technology instructor at CTC.

We secured a decision denying the claimant wage loss benefits for an accepted work injury. The claimant sustained a left wrist contusion and extensor carpi ulnaris peri-tendonitis injury when a 50-pound lid crushed his left arm in the course and scope of his employment. The claimant alleged that, as a result of the injury, he was unable to perform light-duty work as a system operator. Through medical evidence, we were able to establish that the claimant had non-work-related medical issues unrelated to the accepted work injury that caused him to be out of work.

The plaintiff spent the afternoon at our client’s restaurant/bar before driving ten minutes to his local Country Club to continue celebrating his birthday. Ninety minutes after he arrived at the Club, he fell down the stairs and suffered a severe brain injury. His Blood Alcohol Content was roughly three times the legal limit. The plaintiff had previously worked as a high-end custom wood finisher but is now unable to see color, among having other deficits, and he is alleged to be fully disabled.

We obtained a defense verdict after a week-long jury trial in the Chester County Court of Common Pleas in a medical malpractice case. The plaintiff alleged she sustained a bowel perforation injury in the course of a robotic-laparoscopic hysterectomy. During the course of the procedure, a general surgeon was called in to evaluate the bowels for injuries. There were no injuries found, so the procedure was completed, and the patient was discharged the following day. Two days later, the patient returned in critically ill condition, and a bowel perforation in the sigmoid colon was identified.

We recently obtained a “no cause” verdict in an employment case in the Superior Court of New Jersey. The plaintiff, an employee of a New Jersey State entity, asserted violations of the Contentious Employee Protection Act (CEPA). According to the plaintiff, after reporting purported deficiencies with an environmental permit, he was subject to a retaliatory and hostile work environment.

We successfully obtained dismissal of wrongful use of civil proceedings claims brought against our clients, two attorneys who were alleged to have wrongfully prosecuted a professional negligence claim against the plaintiff, a real estate agent. The plaintiff would not accept any settlement that was less than policy limits.

We successfully obtained dismissal of claims brought derivatively and directly by a corporation, including aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty and tortious interference with contract. The claims were brought against our client, an out of state attorney who previously represented the corporation and its former director. The Court granted the attorney’s Motion to Dismiss, concluding that the plaintiffs failed to sufficiently allege facts that would confer personal jurisdiction over the attorney under a conspiracy theory.

We won a motion for summary judgment in a slip and fall case in Pennsylvania. The plaintiff suffered a hip fracture when he fell on the defendant’s sidewalk while delivering a food order. At the time of the accident, there was an active freezing rain and sleet storm, and generally slippery conditions prevailed. We filed a motion for summary judgment based on the “hills and ridges” doctrine. The plaintiff argued that the doctrine was inapplicable due to human intervention that allegedly altered the natural accumulation.

We obtained dismissal of wrongful use of civil proceedings claims brought against our clients, two attorneys who were alleged to have wrongfully prosecuted a professional negligence claim against the plaintiff, a real estate agent. The plaintiff would not accept any settlement that was less than policy limits. After five years of litigation, the court granted our summary judgment motion, concluding that the plaintiff failed to adduce facts that would reflect that the attorneys prosecuted the underlying action in a grossly negligent manner, or without probable cause. 

We obtained a defense verdict after a bench trial in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, which found the plaintiff did not meet the definition of an insured entitled to underinsured motorist (UIM) coverage. The case arose out of a motor vehicle accident in which the plaintiff was a back seat passenger in a vehicle that was struck by the tortfeasor.