Tampa Injury Lawyer : A jury surprise? Part Two

By Nicholas J. Dorsten, Esq.

Just a few days after publishing the first part of the story, the St. Petersburg Times did a follow up piece on the recent court trial where the jury found the victim partially responsible in her wrongful death suit against her apartment complex.

NEW PORT RICHEY — The victim in a wrongful death case spent an evening drinking wine with a neighbor and ended up murdered in her apartment.

The criminal courts dealt quickly with the man who killed her. Adam Calcote, the defendant, went to trial, was convicted and is serving life in prison.

But in the civil court system, where issues of justice are more nuanced and subjective, a jury this week decided that some of the responsibility for the victim's wrongful death fell at her own feet.

The victim shares the blame for her murder.

The verdict stunned the victim's mother, who had sued Carlton Arms of Magnolia Valley, alleging lax security at the New Port Richey apartment complex where the wrongful death victim was killed.

"Common sense tells you that she wasn't at fault," the mother said. "She's sitting in her own place. Does that mean you can't sit in your own house and do what you want?"

• • •

The victim, an elementary special education teacher, lived quietly. She didn't party or have a boyfriend. Her devotion was to her students.

The defendant, later convicted of her murder, stayed next door with his girlfriend, who was out of town on Dec. 4, 2004. He and the victim talked for hours that night outside on the balcony. He drank beer; she drank wine. But when they went inside, the defendant wanted sex and turned violent. The wrongful death victim, 27, died of suffocation, smothered with a pillow.

From a liability standpoint, the defendant's role is a given. But he's indigent and locked up, so there's no purpose in suing him, according to most legal experts.

The victim's mother filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Carlton Arms, saying it had no policy in place to detect that the defendant, who was using an assumed name and wanted on an arson warrant, was living there. He was not on his girlfriend's lease and had not been screened like the other tenants, yet he came and went freely, past the guard house at the entrance, for months.

The personal injury attorney, told the jury that the defendant was a "piggybacker" — someone who moved in with a resident but avoided the screening process. He said that such people are a problem at apartment complexes and that Carlton Arms had no means of dealing with them.

Carlton Arms' insurance defense attorney, portrayed the killer as his girlfriend's invited guest who had no criminal record. His crime was unforeseeable he claimed.

The defense also asked the jury to consider the victim's drinking that night. Jurors saw a toxicologist's report showing her blood-alcohol level was between 0.153 and 0.17 at the time of her death. In Florida, a blood-alcohol level of .08 and above is considered to be legally under the influence of alcohol and you can be arrested for drunk driving or DUI if you had that level while driving!

If a plaintiff's own behavior — in this case, the victim's drinking — is more than half to blame for what happened, then the defendant isn't liable for any damages.

Over the personal injury attorney objection, the judge allowed a question about her intoxication to be included on the verdict form that jurors would fill out.

• • •

The form first asked whether Carlton Arms was negligent, and whether that negligence was a legal cause of the victim's wrongful death.

The jury said yes.

They went on to the next question: "Was the victim under the influence of alcohol to the extent that her normal faculties were impaired or did she have a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 or higher, and as a result of the influence of such alcohol, was the victim more than 50 percent responsible for her death?"

Their answer again: yes. Carlton Arms was off the hook.

"Essentially what they're doing is they're saying imagine a chain of events. Without the negligence of the property owners, this woman wouldn't have been killed. That showed that the property owners' negligence must have been a cause of her death," a local law professor said. "But even though that's true, in between the property owner's negligence and her death was her own negligence. That essentially intervened between the property owner's negligence and her death. . . . She put herself in a position that even reasonable security couldn't keep her secure from."

The jury was made up of four men and two women, ranging in age from 42 to 57. Two of the jurors declined to comment to a reporter. The other four did not respond to telephone messages.

But they gave a little more insight into their thinking by mistakenly filling out the rest of the verdict form. In the space for specifying each party's share of the blame, they gave 33 percent to Carlton Arms and 67 percent to the wrongful death victim.

So if the jury was being asked to divvy up responsibility, why wasn't the actual murder defendant included?

"The criminal trial has already sorted all that out," the professor said. "The case isn't about the murder. As between her and the landlord, they're saying she's more responsible than the landlord."

The Tampa personal injury lawyer has vowed to appeal the verdict, and he's confident he will prevail. He doesn't think the victim's intoxication should have been a question for the jury.

"The victim did nothing except sit on her porch and drink wine," he said. "She had every reason to believe he was an okay guy. . . . She had no reason to know he was an arsonist or a rapist. For all she knew he was on the lease and had passed scrutiny.

"It had nothing to do with the negligence of Carlton Arms," the personal injury attorney maintained.

The personal injury lawyer says the victim was likely drugged. He brought in a jail witness who said the defendant told him he had drugged a woman, though there was no evidence of that in the victim's own toxicology report.

The mother, who found her daughter's body after the attack almost six years ago, doubts that the victim was drunk or that she let the defendant in. It made no sense, given her daughter's quiet and cautious ways.

Now this, a verdict that vindicates Carlton Arms and blames the victim!


Do you or a loved one need the services of a personal injury attorney as a result of a car accident or wrongful death? Then contact the Clearwater based office of Blake & Dorsten, P.A. for a free consultation!

For more information, or to speak directly with an experienced Personal Injury lawyer, please contact BLAKE & DORSTEN, P.A. at 727.286.6141 or email the attorneys with your questions at: info@blakedorstenlaw.com

Tampa Injury Lawyer : A jury surprise? Part One

By Nicholas J. Dorsten, Esq.

According to an article in the St. Pete Times, recent wrongful death case that was tried in front of a jury had a surprising twist. NEW PORT RICHEY — A civil jury decided Monday that an apartment complex where a young woman was murdered in 2004 is not liable for her death.

The jury returned something of a compromise verdict. It found that the apartment complex in New Port Richey was negligent, but also that the wrongful death victim was more than 50 percent responsible because she was intoxicated at the time of the murder.

That means the deceased's mother, who was represented by a Tampa Personal Injury attorney, will receive no monetary award.

The Tampa Personal Injury Lawyer said immediately after the verdict that he will appeal.

"There's absolutely no evidence to support that verdict," he said. "She was drinking, but she didn't do anything negligent."

The deceased, 27, moved to the New Port Richey apartment complex in 2002. Adam Calcote, who police later charged with her murder, stayed next door with his girlfriend, living under an assumed name while wanted in Massachusetts on an arson warrant.

One evening when his girlfriend was out of town, Calcote struck up a conversation on the balcony with the victim, a special-education teacher who lived alone. They talked and drank beer and wine for several hours. When they went inside, authorities said, he raped her and then smothered her with a pillow.

The victim, and later the subject of the Tampa wrongful death lawsuit grew up in Hudson and attended River Ridge High School and the University of Florida. In her job at a local elementary school, she was known for her kindness with her school children, including putting stickers on children's faces during nap time.

The defendant, now 39, was convicted of first-degree murder in 2005 and is serving life in prison.

In her lawsuit, the deceased's mother argued that Carlton Arms failed to detect the defendant, who was not listed on his girlfriend's lease but lived off and on between the complex and his mother's house for more than six months.

The Tampa personal injury lawyer told the jury that such "piggybackers" are a problem at apartment complexes nationwide, and that this particular complex had no policy in place to protect its residents from such people.

"They're not worried about people being on the premises that they don't know who they are," the personal injury attorney told the six-member jury Monday. "Their concern is only that they be able to pay the rent."

He said Carlton Arms presented a safe, secure environment to potential tenants: an entrance with a guard house, fencing around the perimeter and a "bluebook" explaining security policies.

The complex, the Florida Personal Injury lawyer said, encouraged residents to "get to know your neighbors."

"How can they tell people to get to know their neighbors when they don't get to know the unauthorized occupants?" the wrongful death lawyer argued.

The insurance defense lawyer, who represented the apartment company, told jurors that Carlton Arms never had any violent crime committed at the complex, and Calcote's actions that night were not foreseeable.

"You can dissect a tragedy after it happens … but, folks, there are unforeseeable tragedies in the world. Just because a tragedy happens doesn't mean someone was negligent," he told the jury.

A security expert hired by the personal injury attorney suggested the company should train its maintenance workers to "have their antenna up" when they go inside apartments to fix toilets or replace carpet so that they notice people hanging around who shouldn't be there.

"Wouldn't it be reasonable?" he argued.

The defense attorney countered that for maintenance workers to do such would amount to spying on tenants. "You can't go in and violate the civil rights of your tenants to fix a problem that doesn't exist," he said.

In similar cases,a personal injury attorney can win multimillion-dollar awards, including a case several years ago where a college student who was kidnapped and shot in the head by three men who sneaked through the gate of her Tampa apartment complex behind a resident.

Car accident? Have you or someone you loved been hurt and in need of a personal injury lawyer? Then contact Blake & Dorsten, P.A. today for a free consult!



For more information, or to speak directly with an experienced Personal Injury lawyer, please contact BLAKE & DORSTEN, P.A. at 727.286.6141 or email your questions to: info@blakedorstenlaw.com

Tampa Injury Lawyer : Minor injuries? Or not...

By Nicholas J. Dorsten, Esq.

While looking for things to blog I ran into a little story found on the Bay News 9 website in Pasco, One person suffered minor injuries when their car was involved in a traffic crash involving a school bus.

The accident happened just after 7 a.m. at U.S. Hwy 41 and Festive Groves Blvd. in Land O' Lakes.

Police said the injured person was taken to a nearby Regional Hospital. The injuries were not considered serious.

School officials said almost 50 students were on the bus at the time of the accident.

What does this have to do with Personal Injury cases? Usually, when someone thinks of a Florida car accident, one usually thinks of lots of property damage, sever injuries or even death! Why would a seemingly minor accident, with what the police describe as minor injuries, potentially become a serious Personal Injury case?

There are many reasons why. It is a well known fact that in a car accident, the shock and suddeness of the Florida car crash causes a surge of adrenaline. A person may be seriously hurt but not realize the extent of their injuries for hours, days or even weeks!

Another point to consider is the typical treatment in hospitals following an automobile accident. Most hospitals will only perform X-rays following a car or motorcycle accident if the person does not appear seriously hurt. Why is this important? Because a X-ray only shows broken bones while a MRI can show herniations, disc protrusions or even disc bulges! These are the common injuries that can turn a not-so-serious-on-its-face car accident into a serious Florida Personal Injury case.

Had an Accident? You need to know that the Insurance company lawyers are already hard at work trying to minimize your claim. Make it a fair fight, hire experienced Personal Injury lawyers to help protect your rights!

For more information, or to speak directly with an experienced Personal Injury lawyer, please contact BLAKE AND DORSTEN, P.A. at 727.286.6141 or email the attorneys at: info@blakedorstenlaw.com

Tampa Injury Lawyer : A Motorcycle Tragedy

By Nicholas J. Dorsten, Esq.

According to an article on the Bay News Nine website, from August 17, A motorcyclist was killed when he collided with a pick-up truck on Busch Boulevard Monday afternoon in Tampa, Florida.

According to reports, the man was driving his motorcycle west on Busch Boulevard near Arrawana Avenue as a driver in a car drove east on the same road.

Investigators said the truck failed to yield the right-of-way to the motorcycle and turned left in front of him. The motorcycle tried to hit his brakes to avoid a collision with the truck, but instead collided with the passenger side of the pick-up truck, investigators said.

The motorcyclist was pronounced dead at the scene of the crash.

We have seen this scenario play itself out over and over again as a Florida Personal Injury Lawyer. According to the Florida Department of Highway Safety, Florida now leads the country in motorcycle accident deaths. This is most likely due to a combination of good weather, lots of motorcycles and sadly, drivers who don't show riders proper respect by "sharing the road". The result is is huge uptick in motorcycle and car accidents in Florida.

Until there is real reform, all that can be done for now is to further educate both motorcycle owners and car drivers. Motorcycles need to remember that they are not as visible as cars or trucks and their faster acceleration can cause fatal mistakes in judgment. Car/truck owners need to remember that they share the road with the smaller/quicker bikers and need to drive with extra caution.

For more information, or to speak directly with an experienced Personal Injury lawyer, please contact BLAKE & DORSTEN, P.A. at 727.286.6141 or email the attorneys with any questions at: info@blakedorstenlaw.com

Tampa Injury Lawyer - Did You Know?

If you are ever in need of a Tampa Bay area car accident attorney for yourself, or sadly are in need of a PERSONAL INJURY attorney due to a wrongful death lawsuit, you may be surprised at what the jury will NOT hear. For instance, if you were the victim of a automobile accident and the other driver had lots of insurance, at trial it is unlikely that the jury would ever hear about it! While your lawsuit is against the insurance company, there are laws in place to "shield" the jury from this information. Years ago insurance companies succesfully lobbied to keep the truth from jury members. While it seems ridiculous, insurance companies convinced the "powers that be" that this would be unfair and prejudicial to them. While that seems far-fetched, the result of this rule is that now at trial you appear to be suing an "average joe" (who normally doesn't look like he/she could afford a lot of money in damages) and not going against an insurance company. Fair? No. The law? Yes.
Another way the insurance companies grab an unfair advantage at trial is by a little known rule called "PIP set offs" PIP (personal injury protection), is something all drivers in Florida must have. Generally, it is $10,000 from your OWN insurance company policy that is used to pay for medical bills for the injured if you are involved in an accident. The PIP setoff rule basically finds that whatever the jury awards you is deducted by $10,000 due to the spent PIP. For example, you are rear-ended while driving by another car. You are injured and have $20,000 in medical bills. At trial, the jury decides to award you $25,000 for your medical bills and pain/suffering. The Judge will deduct $10,000 (your PIP that was spent) AFTER the jury verdict leaving you with only $15,000 to pay for medical bills, trial costs and your pain! There are a few ways around this as an experienced Personal Injury attorney can explain to you.
For more information, or to speak directly with an experienced Personal Injury lawyer, please contact BLAKE AND DORSTEN at 727.286.6141 or email attorney Nicholas Dorsten at: info@blakedorstenlaw.com