The National Law Journal reports that a few personal injury lawyers are relying on handwriting experts to help the lawyers in selecting juries. Handwriting analysis uses various clues, including the amount of pressure used, the size and angles of the letters, and spaces between words to paint a picture of…
Phillip J. Closius was named as the new dean of the University of Baltimore School of Law today. Dean Closius is the former dean of the University of Toledo College of Law. He is a former practicing attorney who teaches and conducts scholarship in the areas of Constitutional, First Amendment…
Yesterday my partner, Laura G. Zois, tried a wrongful death auto accident case in Prince George’s County against Allstate. The jury awarded our client $8 million. Allstate made no offer to resolve the case. We cannot collect the entire amount not only because of Maryland’s cap on pain and suffering…
The Maryland legislature is considering joining the rest of the civilized world – okay, I’ll kill the hyperbole – the vast majority of jurisdictions by adopting a comparative negligence standard in Maryland. The contributory negligence standard we have in Maryland is harsh to injury victims and creates genuine challenges for…
Click to enlarge Prince George’s County recorded 285 bicycle and pedestrian deaths between 1994 and 2003, far more than Montgomery County, Fairfax County, or the District of Columbia, according to a report by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. More pedestrians and bikers are killed Prince George’s County than in…
The New York Times reported on Saturday that Genentech posted a letter on its website warning eye specialists of its new eye drug Lucentis, which may increase the risk of stroke for those on Lucentis. Genentech found that patients taking their marketed dose of Lucentis were much more likely to…
A Philadelphia jury found that Wyeth’s hormone replacement therapy Prempro caused an Arkansas woman’s breast cancer and awarded the victim’s family $1.5 million. The jury found that Wyeth was negligent in failing to provide adequate warnings about the risk of breast cancer associated with the use of Prempro. We expect…
A fire broke out at the Prince George’s County courthouse on Wednesday, destroying a large section of the 126-year-old building. It damaged two floors of the courthouse. The old courthouse is connected to a modern wing by a series of corridors. This is the second time the courthouse has been…
Evan Schaeffer’s Illinois Trial Practice Weblog has a link to a company that provides online mock juries. I find the idea fascinating. Evan correctly points out that a virtual mock jury does not give the lawyers the benefit of the give-and-take argument among jurors meaningful to the process. I also…
Last week, I wrote about the Consumer Reports article on failed infant car seats. As I wrote the post, my wife was spending a few hundred dollars on new car seats for our 3-month-old twins. Sure enough, Consumer Reports retracted the article this week after receiving data from the National…