Augusta GA Personal Injury Lawyer – Legal quirks make us easy mark for lawsuits, NYC Transit says
BY Pete Donohue – DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
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NYC Transit has been forced to shell out nearly $1 billion in personal injury suits over the past two decades – partly because of legal quirks that make it an easy mark, officials claim.
Transit officials have tried in vain to get the Legislature to ban suits from people who engage in dangerous activity, such as drunkenly walking on subway tracks.
Albany’s refusal to act means legal payouts swallow millions of dollars a year, leaving less for service improvements.
“We’re classic deep-pocket defendants,” said Martin Schnabel, NYC Transit vice president and general counsel.
There’s no shortage of logic-defying rulings, officials say.
The state’s highest court three years ago ruled NYC Transit must pay a $1.4 million award to a Queens teen who lost his legs after being struck by a train.
The drunken teen believed part of the No. 7 line was not in service and jumped to the tracks in Queens to walk the rails.
As a train bore down, the teen and his pals tried to outrun it to the next station platform instead of taking shelter between pillars on the track.
Another jury recently gave $2.3 million to a man who couldn’t recall how he wound up on the tracks at the Union Square station.
He had a blood-alcohol level of 0.18 when he was struck by a train entering the station and lost a leg.
The lawyers who sued NYC Transit claimed the motormen in both cases should have been able to stop in time.
NYC Transit pays out big bucks in multiple-vehicle traffic accidents even if the bus driver was not primarily at fault.
If the bus driver is found 2% liable and another driver is found 98% liable – but has no insurance – the agency can get stuck with having to pay the full award.
Transit officials have tried to get legislation to limit its liability, but “we have not been successful,” Schnabel said. State law also doesn’t cap awards for “pain and suffering.”
NYC Transit personal injury payouts run from $30 million to $60 million a year, records show.
Gonzalez & Waddington are Augusta GA personal injury, car wreck lawyers. We represent injury victims in dog bite, car and truck wreck cases, medical malpractice, scarring injury, and spinal cord injury cases.
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