Posted on September 13, 2012 in Corporations

Generally speaking, a Maryland corporation provides protection to individuals from personal liability associated with debts of the corporate entity. When a plaintiff or creditor is able to go after an owner’s personal assets, it is commonly called “piercing the corporate veil”.

Maryland law is crystalline that the corporate entity will be disregarded only when necessary to prevent fraud or to enforce a paramount equity. The mere fact that all or almost all of the corporate stock is owned by one individual or a few individuals will not afford sufficient grounds for disregarding corporateness
If substantial ownership of the stock of a corporation in a single individual is combined with other factors which support disregarding the corporation on grounds of fundamental equity, a court may pierce the corporate veil. Factors weighed in an analysis to determine whether a corporation is the ‘alter ego’ or instrumentality of the individual stockholder are:

• Whether the corporation was grossly under-capitalized
• Corporation’s failure to observe corporate formalities
• Non-payment of dividends
• Corporation’s insolvency
• Dominant stockholder’s siphoning of corporate funds
• Non-functioning of officers or directors
• Absence of corporate records
• Corporation’s status as a facade for the stockholders’ operations

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 Posted on September 13, 2012 in Hospital Malpractice

Numerous Maryland hospitals are currently in the process of testing almost 2,000 patients who may have been exposed to hepatitis C, a viral disease that typically affects the liver.

David Kwiatkowski, an employee at as many as eleven hospitals nationwide, was arrested in July 2012 after authorities learned he had been injecting himself with syringes filled with stolen narcotics at the hospitals where he worked, and then leaving the contaminated needles to be used on other patients. Investigators believe Kwiatkowski may have had hepatitis C since at least June 2010, increasing the likelihood that he infected patients who came in contact with these syringes.

In Maryland, Kwiatkowski is known to have worked at four hospitals including Johns Hopkins Hospital, Maryland General Hospital, Baltimore VA Medical Center and Southern Maryland Hospital. At Johns Hopkins Hospital, three people have tested positive for a hepatitis C strain the same or similar to Kwiatkowski which indicates their cases may be related.
While no patients have yet filed a lawsuit against Johns Hopkins Hospital or one of the other Maryland hospitals where Kwiatkowski worked, a Kansas resident filed suit against a Columbia-based staffing agency for failing to report Kwiatkowski even though they knew he had stolen narcotics.

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 Posted on August 24, 2012 in Hospital Malpractice

After pushing hospitals to replace paper records with electronic ones, many policymakers now believe the next step in improving the quality of medical care is to reduce the number of errors made by doctors. One study recently found that putting a child’s photo in their electronic hospital chart reduced one type of medical error – a patient getting a test or treatment intended for someone else due to a doctor’s misplaced orders. An article about the study can be found here.

The Children’s Hospital of Colorado found that misplaced orders were the second-most common reason that patients received care not meant for them in a quality improvement program conducted in 2009. The hospital reacted to this result by changing its computer system so that each order for a test or treatment required an affirmative “verification” that the order was aligned with the correct patient which included a photo of the child.
The results reflected the success of this policy change: in 2010, the hospital had twelve incidents in which a child received care intended for another patient because of misplaced orders, but after implementing the photo policy, that number fell to three.

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 Posted on August 01, 2012 in Obstetrician Malpractice

In late June, one of the largest medical malpractice verdicts in Maryland was handed down by a Baltimore City jury against Johns Hopkins Hospital along with Johns Hopkins Health Systems Corp. The jury awarded the family of a child born with cerebral palsy and seizure disorder $55 Million.

The case stems from what was expected to be an emergency Caesarean section, but various medical mistakes and doctor errors resulted in a wait of more than two hours. The child was born with permanent and severe mental and physical disabilities as a result of loss of oxygen to the brain during the wait. Johns Hopkins Hospital continues to dispute any doctor error or medical malpractice and indicated that they will appeal the verdict.

The $55 Million verdict included a $25 Million award for future medical expenses based upon a life-care plan, $4 Million for future lost wages, and $26 Million for non-economic damages including thing such as pain and suffering. Although the award will be reduced as a result of Maryland’s medical malpractice cap on damages, the actual award will still be around $30 Million.
Almost all of the hospitals in the Baltimore area have faced allegations involving negligent delivery, including Johns Hopkins Hospital and University of Maryland Medical Center. As an experienced Baltimore, Maryland medical malpractice lawyer, I have handled a number of medical malpractice cases involving birth injuries, which almost always involve permanent and severe disabilities. I understand that bringing suit in these cases is important because of the expense associated with long-term care for a child suffering from a disability. To see some of the cases I have handled, click here.

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 Posted on June 22, 2012 in Radiology Malpractice

In May, following a one week medical malpractice trial in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, a jury returned a verdict of One Million Dollars in favor of the two sons of a woman who died as a result of an allergic reaction to dye used during a medical procedure. The plaintfffs alleged that the women had a history of severe allergies to bee stings and should not have had the dye. A copy of the article regarding the case can be found here.

Two years earlier, the woman had visited a cardiologist complaining of chest pain. Testing revealed a normal-sized heart and a normal functioning heart, but did indicate mild hardening of the heart tissue. Despite the hardening tissue, there was no significant narrowing of her vessels, a symptom which would indicate a likelihood of heart disease. The cardiologist recommended a cardiac catheterization anyway and the procedure ultimately led to this medical malpractice suit.

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 Posted on June 21, 2012 in Probable Cause

As an Experienced and Aggressive Criminal and DUI Attorney I have successfully defended hundreds of people who were charged with DUI and DWI in Maryland Courts. As most people are aware these laws are being more strictly enforced by the police and more aggressively prosecuted by the State every year. Nowadays, repeat offenders, including second offenders routinely go to jail if convicted.

I successfully represented a second offender in Harford County last week. The State was seeking a 30 day jail sentence for this single mother of two. Needless to say this would have been a devastating result for her. Here are the facts:

client went out for drinks at a bar in Harford County after playing a game in a kickball league. She only had 3 beers before switching water as she knew she had to drive. Unfortunately, she is not a big person and didn’t eat very much. She thought she would be all right to drive (frankly, she was) but was over the limit. She pulled up to an intersection at a little after one in the morning. She was in a designated left turn lane but did not utilize her turn signal prior to executing a left hand turn. The police officer who had pulled up in the lane behind her while she was waiting for the light to turn green, immediately activated his emergency equipment and effectuated a stop of the vehicle.

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 Posted on June 18, 2012 in Medical Malpractice Law in Maryland

In a decision handed down by the Court of Special Appeals on June 6, 2012, Maryland’s intermediate appellate court clarified section 3-2A-02(c)(2)(ii)1B of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article of the Annotated Code of Maryland, which sets forth the requirement that, if the defendant in a medical malpractice action is board certified in a specialty, any expert witnesses who testifies that the defendant violated the standard of care must be board certified in the same or a “related” specialty. A copy of the Court of Special Appeals opinion can be found here.

The case, DeMuth v. Strong, was a medical malpractice case action initially brought by Strong in the Circuit Court for Cecil County against Dr. DeMuth, a board certified orthopedic surgeon. When Strong called a board certified vascular surgeon as an expert witness to testify that Dr. DeMuth had breached the standard of care in his treatment of Strong and that the breach had caused Strong’s injuries, Dr. DeMuth objected which ultimately formed the basis of the appeal.

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 Posted on June 01, 2012 in Murder

https://www.silvermanthompson.com/lawyer-attorney-1300820.htmlAmong the most difficult cases that Maryland Criminal Attorneys find themselves involved in are https://www.silvermanthompson.com/lawyer-attorney-1300820.html. These cases are always tragic but they become even more so when the person who is killed is a passenger and close friend or family member of the driver.

Most of these cases involve young people who are out together and are using alcohol and/or drugs. These cases also typical involve excessive speed or other dangerous driving. The driver is almost always a decent person without a record who never intended to hurt much less kill anyone. I concluded a particulary tragic case like this in Baltimore County Circuit Court this week. It was, in all honesty, among the most difficult and emotionally taxing cases of my career. Here are the facts:

My client is a 22 year old man who lives here in Baltimore County. He comes from a very nice family, has a good job and has no prior criminal or traffic record. He went out drinking one night last year. With him was a lifelong friend from his neighborhood. In fact, they had known eachother since my client was 7 and lived just 2 doors apart. My client told me that he loved him like a brother.

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 Posted on May 25, 2012 in Handgun Offenses

https://www.silvermanthompson.com/lawyer-attorney-1300820.htmlAs a Baltimore Maryland Criminal Defense Attorney I have represented dozens of people who have been charged with being in possession of a handgun after being convicted of a felony, a crime of violence or any other disqualifying crime. Many of these prosecutions have been meritorious cases in which the defendant had a serious criminal record, knew full well they were prohibited from possessing a handgun and chose to carry a weapon on their person or in their car in spite of that knowledge. These charges are serious and are prosecuted aggressively by every State’s Attorney’s Office in the State. Quite often the prosecutors reasonably choose to seek the mandatory five year without parole sentence against defendants who have serious felony convictions or convictions or crimes of violence.

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 Posted on May 21, 2012 in Medical Malpractice Law in Maryland

A recent study conducted by Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston reviewed over 10,000 medical malpractice claims filed across the country and found that plaintiffs rarely win medical malpractice cases that go all the way to a jury verdict. An article discussing the study can be found here.

Most claims that are filed, over ninety-five percent (95.5%), never even make it to a jury. More than half (54.1%) are dismissed or settled before trial. Of those four and a half percent (4.5%) of medical malpractice claims that go to a jury, almost eighty percent (79.6%) result in verdicts in favor of the physician.

The study also highlights the extremely long length of time spent resolving medical malpractice claims. Understandably, the cases that were settled out of court were often resolved the quickest at just over eleven and a half months (11.6), but those that were litigated in court often lasted over twenty-five (25) months. When cases progressed all the way to a jury verdict, those won by the physician, took thirty-nine (39) months whereas those in which the patient was successful took an outstanding forty-three and half (43.5) months – almost four years!

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