Automobile Accidents

March 21, 2022

Volkswagen recalls over 246,000 SUVs due to unexpected braking

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Volkswagen is recalling more than 246,000 SUVs in the U.S. and Canada because faulty wiring harnesses can make them brake unexpectedly, sometimes while in traffic.

The recall comes three days after The Associated Press reported that 47 people had complained to U.S. safety regulators about the problem, some reporting nearly being rear-ended by other vehicles. Many reported that warning lights and alarms would go off, the driver’s side windows would roll down and the SUVs would suddenly brake while in traffic.

Volkswagen says in documents posted Friday by The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that the recall covers certain Atlas SUVs from the 2019 through ….

January 24, 2022

The Dangers of Big Rig Trucks and Illinois’s Snowy, Icy Roads… and What You Can Do If You’re Hurt in an Accident Like This

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

While the calendar says that winter lasts for about 13 weeks, here in Chicago, we often experience wintry weather for much more than just those three months. Given the size and weight of a commercial truck (especially a fully loaded one), big rigs can inflict massive harm on the snowy and icy roads around Chicago and throughout Illinois. If you’ve been hurt in an accident involving a commercial truck, whether or not wintry road conditions were a factor, then you may be entitled to sue the trucker, the trucking company, and perhaps others to recover compensation for all the harm you’ve suffered. To find out about the legal avenues available to you, waste no time in contacting an experienced Chicago truck accident attorney.

There are lots of ways that you can potentially get the proof you need to win your case against a commercial truck driver and/or trucking company. One possible source of evidence can be the truck’s “black box” data recorder. The black box (a/k/a the electronic control module or electronic data recorder), can provide you with essential information about the truck’s speed, whether or not the trucker braked, whether or not the truck’s cruise control was on, or whether or not the truck suddenly sped up or slowed down right before the crash.

Another common source of proof is expert evidence. These witnesses, such as accident reconstruction experts and expert engineers, can provide very helpful testimony describing how the accident happened and why. However, as a recent truck accident case from federal court demonstrates, just because you don’t have expert evidence, that alone doesn’t mean you can’t win your injury case.

August 24, 2021

School Bus Crashes and Commercial Truck Accidents: Two Areas Where a Skilled Illinois Attorney Can Help You a Lot

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

As a parent, there are probably few mental images that are more frightening than the prospect of your child’s school bus being hit by a semi-trailer hauling a load. Unfortunately, these accidents do occur here in Chicago and the surrounding area. And when they do, and your child is injured in that crash, you need the right Chicago bus accident attorney on your side, helping you acquire the information you need to determine what happened, how it happened, why it happened and who’s legally responsible for the harm your child has experienced and will endure in the future.

The Chicago Tribune reported on a school bus crash that was a perfect example of the phrase, “It could have been much worse.” During its morning route on Jan. 18, a school bus in Valparaiso approached an intersection. The bus, having the right of way, began moving westbound through the intersection when, according to local police, a northbound semi-trailer hauling metal piping ran a red light and collided with the bus.

The bus had 16 students on board at the time. One student suffered minor injuries, according to the report. Thankfully, no one suffered serious or fatal injuries.

August 10, 2021

An Amazon Prime Truck Crashes into a Police Patrol Vehicle, Killing 2 and Injuring 2 Others

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Another crash involving an Amazon delivery vehicle has ended in tragedy, according to ABC 7 in Los Angeles. The report indicated that the Amazon Prime driver barreled into a stopped police cruiser, triggering two serious injuries and two deaths. While this fatal crash happened far from here, it serves as a reminder that anyone anywhere can find themselves injured (or a loved one killed) in a crash caused by an Amazon delivery driver. If it happens to you here in Illinois, waste no time in reaching out to an experienced Chicago injury attorney to help you pursue your case.

The California tragedy took place in the San Bernardino suburb of Jurupa Valley. It began with a routine two-vehicle crash. The involved drivers exited their vehicles and a county sheriff’s vehicle responded to the scene. The officer parked the patrol vehicle in the “No. 1 southbound lane,” behind the two involved vehicles, the report indicated.

About 40 minutes after the original crash, a southbound Amazon Prime delivery truck slammed into the patrol car. The patrol car careened into the officer and a sheriff’s department volunteer, inflicting major injuries on each of them. The two drivers from the initial crash were also hit and died at the scene, according to ABC 7.

August 6, 2021

Asleep at the Wheel: Drowsy Truckers and the Dangers They Pose to Drivers and Passengers on Illinois’ Roads

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

A pair of Illinois truck crashes that made the news recently both have one thing in common, and it’s an issue that comes up far too often: truckers falling asleep at the wheel. When a commercial truck driver falls asleep while driving, he/she places a multi-ton vehicle out of control and puts the lives of everyone on the road in jeopardy. Tragically, many of these crashes end with at least one fatality. If you or a loved one have been affected by a crash that was the result of a drowsy, fatigued or sleeping trucker, you should waste no time in reaching out to an experienced Chicago truck accident attorney about your legal options.

The more recent crash occurred in Fayette County in southern Illinois. Two men in a commercial truck were traveling south on a rural state highway when the driver fell asleep. The driver awakened, realized his problem, and overcorrected. That ended with the truck crashed into a ditch. The passenger in the commercial truck was dead by the time emergency help arrived, according to the Belleville News Daily.

Back in March 2019, a trucker on Route 20 in Stephenson County fell asleep at the wheel. Around the same time, a State Trooper had another truck stopped for inspection along the same stretch of road. The sleeping trucker’s rig crashed into the trooper’s vehicle and the truck she was inspecting, fatally wounding the trooper. The sleeping trucker pled guilty in late November 2020 to two criminal charges, one of which was “safety regulations violations,” according to cdllife.com.

July 22, 2021

Families Seek President Biden’s Help in Creating Regulations to Increase Truck Safety in Illinois and Across the Country

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation statistics, more than 5,000 people died last year in accidents involving large trucks. Many factors contributed to those numbers, and some of those regrettably could have been (and should have been) avoided. If you’ve been hurt (or a loved one has been killed) in a crash with a commercial truck, you may be entitled to recover significant compensation, and you should reach out to an experienced Chicago truck accident attorney right away for the legal advice you need.

One of the ways in which you can succeed in a truck accident case is to show that the trucker and/or the trucking company violated the federal trucking regulations. According to a report from the Boston Globe, a group of advocates is hoping that the number and stringency of those federal regulations will be increasing.

The advocates reached out, according to the report, directly to President Biden, who has a personal connection to fatal truck crashes. A December 1972 crash involving a large truck and the Biden family station wagon killed the president’s 1-year-old daughter and his first wife.

June 14, 2021

If the Trucker Who Hit You Was Cited for Their Driving, That Citation May Be a Huge Help in Your Illinois Injury Case

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Whether the semi-truck driver who hit your vehicle and caused your injuries was drowsy, intoxicated, distracted, or negligent for some other reason, if the police cited that trucker for some sort of infraction (like speeding, improper lane usage, or failure to reduce speed,) that citation can be an extremely important piece of your successful injury case, helping you get the compensation you need. That’s often because of a legal concept called negligence per se. Whether your injuries arose from a trucker’s ordinary negligence or negligence per se, be sure to seek out representation from an experienced Chicago truck accident lawyer to help you select the best pathway forward to get the compensation you need.

There are various scenarios in which a trucker can be cited by the police. Back in March, a 62-year-old semi-truck driver crashed downstate in Wayne County. The trucker fell asleep while traveling east on Interstate 64 and overturned in the median. The trucker’s passenger was injured in the crash. Police cited the trucker for “driving while fatigued and improper lane use,” according to 14news.com.

In late April, a trucker crashed on Interstate 57 in Franklin County after he veered to the right, overcorrected, and overturned his rig. In that crash, the driver received a citation for “failure to reduce speed to avoid a crash and improper lane usage,” KFVS 12 reported.

April 16, 2021

A Food Delivery Service Faces an Illinois Lawsuit After a Driver Runs Over a North Side Woman

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Recently, we have heard a great deal about the dangers that unsafe drivers driving for services like Uber and Lyft represent. While the threat posed by drivers who never should have been authorized by their rideshare services remains very real, the problem is bigger than just rideshare drivers. In addition to those drivers, there is also a similar danger posed by certain food delivery drivers (driving for services like Uber Eats, Door Dash and Grubhub,) as an incident from right here in Chicago illustrates. If you’ve been hurt by a food delivery driver who shouldn’t have been driving for that service, you may be able to bring a legal action and recover much-needed compensation. Reach out to a knowledgeable Chicago injury attorney to find out more.

In this Chicago case, the platform being brought to court was Grubhub. The victim was a Lake View East restaurant worker who was run over and drug for several feet by a man who was driving for Grubhub. The injured woman suffered several broken bones, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. Those included a broken pelvis, two broken arms and fractures in both legs. She also suffered nerve damage to both arms and required surgery on both of them, according to her attorneys.

In her lawsuit against Grubhub, she asserted that it contributed to the very serious accident through its negligence. Grubhub’s app allegedly allowed the driver, who was not licensed to drive and (according to Grubhub) was not one of its authorized drivers, to access the platform through the account of another individual who was an authorized driver.

January 27, 2021

From Tesla’s ‘Full Self Driving’ Vehicles to Waymo’s Driverless Vans… What an Accident Caused by a Technologically Enhanced Vehicle Can Mean to You in Illinois

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Self-driving cars are back in the news again. Uber is reportedly in negotiations with a competitor, Aurora, in which Uber would sell its Advanced Technologies Group (which includes Uber’s self-driving vehicle unit) to Aurora. Also, Tesla is expanding what it calls “full self-driving beta.” Driverless Waymo vans are going public in Arizona. While this may all seem very exciting, there remains the issue of safety and the accidents caused by self-driving vehicles. When that happens, and someone’s hurt, who’s liable? For answers to this and other important questions, be sure you are getting the information you need from a knowledgeable Chicago car accident attorney.

In some circumstances, the law may dictate that the person in the car is the person who is liable for the injuries you suffered, even if the vehicle was equipped with self-driving technology. If, for example, the technology inside the vehicle was merely a “driver assist” program and the accident occurred because the human was paying no attention to the road, then that person is going to be the one who bears most or all of the legal liability.

There are, however, several situations in which an accident caused by a technology-equipped vehicle may offer more legal opportunities to you beyond just suing the person behind the wheel. For example, the self-driving Waymo vans in the East Valley area of Phoenix will be completely driverless. There will no human behind the wheel whose job it is to assist the vehicle. In a scenario where a Waymo van causes a crash, then there could obviously be an opportunity for legal action against Waymo and/or Alphabet, Inc., of which Waymo is a division. (Alphabet’s divisions also include Google.) Back in October, Venture Beat reported that driverless Waymo cars were involved in 18 accidents in 20 months.

October 13, 2020

What to Do If You’ve Been Hurt By an Uber or Lyft Driver in Illinois Who Was Distracted by a Cell Phone

by Katz, Friedman, Eisenstein, Johnson, Bareck & Bertuca, PC

Here in Illinois, the state has strong laws regarding using cell phones while driving. This summer, the penalties for causing an injury accident (or fatal accident) due to distracted driving are going up – to a potential maximum of a $1,000 fine and a one-year driver’s license suspension, according to the Chicago Tribune. One of the groups of people who depend heavily on their phones, and are at a high risk of driving distracted, are Uber and Lyft drivers. Their job involves lots of driving and their access to new riders involves lots of interfacing with a cell phone app, so the potential for danger is clear. If you’ve been injured by a distracted Uber driver, then you may be entitled to compensation through a civil court action. By reaching out to an experienced Chicago car accident attorney, you can get the information you need about your legal options.

Dealing with the need to use a cell phone app frequently while also driving frequently is something that all Uber drivers must deal with. Regrettably, some do it better than others. Posts on Uber message boards contain multiple “horror” stories like one Chicago-area rider who stated in 2019 that “I took an Uber ride a couple years ago in River North where the driver was holding his phone on his lap. I didn’t feel a strong sense of safety during that ride.”

It sounds like that rider got home safely, but not all riders are similarly fortunate. In Toronto, Canada, a man’s Uber ride to the airport was his last. According to a report by The Star, the Uber driver transporting the man and his girlfriend first went the wrong way on the expressway, managed to navigate onto the correct expressway going the correct way, but then lost control of his cell phone. The driver pulled over to retrieve the phone from the floor of the car, but did not get his vehicle completely outside the far-right travel lane before stopping. Another driver crashed into the Uber driver’s car, fatally injuring the passenger and severely injuring his girlfriend.