Ronald Reagan famously said, “The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” Government has become almost synonymous with ineptitude. So it should be no surprise that every day people are injured, killed, or sustain property damage at the hands of careless government employees. Damages available to…
As someone whose childhood winter chores included “shoveling the roof”, I have an intimate familiarity with the concept of the potential for roof collapse from the weight of excessive snow and ice. Winter storms this season have produced all-time record snowfall records in Maryland, Pennsylvania, and parts of New York. Winter Storm Jonas is the…
Imagine opening the door to your condominium (“condo”) only to be confronted by several inches of standing water. The first call is to your insurance company, which must then consider not only mitigating, adjusting, and paying the claim, but subrogating against those responsible for the loss. Determining who is liable for such damage can be…
What if the deck was stacked in such a way that insureds and tortfeasors could gerrymander and structure a tort settlement so as to ensure that the insured would never be “made whole”? Surely such ability would be a legal absurdity in a state where subrogation is supposedly favored for all of the societal benefits…
The independent contractor rule in Wisconsin generally provides that “one who contracts for the services of an independent contractor is not liable to others for the acts of the independent contractor.” Lofy v. Joint School District 2, 42 Wis.2d 253, 166 N.W.2d 809 (Wis. 1969). However, an exception to this rule has been found if…
The song we learn in our youth is the song we sing for life. Children often blame others for their mistakes and misdeeds – a desperate effort to shift responsibility and avoid unpleasant consequences. As adults engaging in commerce, we are not much different. It is virtually impossible to find a construction contract which does…
Abraham Lincoln once said, “The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.” When and whether an injured employee can sue an owner or subcontractor for a work-related injury in Pennsylvania has been a matter of some confusion over the years. It is the latest in a landslide of confusing…