InjuryBoard Scottsdale Archives

• Lessons On What Not To Do When Prosecuting a Claim

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 20, 2007 10:35 PM | 0 Comments
  Category: Miscellaneous

  It was hard for me not to grin when reading the comedy of errors in Harris dba Angel Team Home Care, LLC v. Cochise Health Systems. In my view, it is a recipe legal malpractice.The suit arises from a dispute between a home health care company (Angel Team) and a division of the Cochise County Health and Social Services (CHS), and a CHS employee, Denise Pederson. Although the Court does not say...

• Court Holds Offer of Judgment Sanctions Include All Reasonable Expert Fees

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 19, 2007 5:18 PM | 0 Comments
  Category: Automobile Accidents

  Division One handed down Levy v. Alfaro today which holds that Rule 68 sanctions include all reasonable expert witness fees after the offer, not just those fees for testifying at trial. The decision is no surprise to those of us who regulaly try cases, but I suppose it is good to have it "clarified."

• Judicial Officers are Subject to the "De Facto Officer" Doctrine and Failure to Object to the Appointment of a Judge Pro Tempore is a Procedural Defect That Can Be Waived

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 08, 2007 8:49 AM | 0 Comments
  Category: Automobile Accidents

  Division One just handed down Garner v. Schindler, a short and sweet opinion on the nature of judges pro tempore (I am a judge pro tempore, by the way). In sum, the appellant had a probate dispute litigated before a judge pro tempore and, after the case was over, decided to raise (for the first time) hyper-technical defects in the judge's appointment.The Court of Appeals, awknoweldged that...

• Paternity Statutes Do Not Apply to Wrongful Death Actions Involving Unborn Children

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 07, 2007 5:43 PM | 0 Comments
  Category: Wrongful Death

  These are complicated times. It seems that, in addition to proving wrongful death, when the decedent is an unborn child, you had better be able to prove paternity as well.In the case, Aranda v. Cardenas, both the mother and her unborn child were apparently subject to fatal medical malpractice. The Defendants, however, disputed whether the unborn child's father was indeed the child's father,...

• Directors Not Liable for the Misrepresentations of Their Agents Absent a Showing They Had "Knowledge" of the Misrepresentations

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 05, 2007 10:17 PM | 0 Comments
  Category: Miscellaneous

  Judge Kessler of Division One just handed down another one of his massive opinions (this is not a criticism, just an observation). He seems to be a prolific writer and, my guess, a prolific reader as well.The case, Dawson v. Withycombe, marks another important milestone in the development of Arizona's corporate law. It follows in the footsteps of Wells Fargo Bank v. Arizona Laborers, Teamsters...

• Court of Appeals (Incorrectly) Dismisses Wrongful Death Appeal Due to Untimely Notice of Appeal After Plaintiff Attempts to Obtain a Change to the Breadth of the Trial Court's Judgment

  Geoff Trachtenberg | June 01, 2007 3:00 PM | 0 Comments
  Category: Automobile Accidents

  Frank Zappa said, "We are a nation of laws; badly written and randomly enforced." That's probably the way that Joe Burkhamer feels, having lost his daughter (and son-in-law) in tragic accident in 2003, and now having had his appeal dismissed in a published opinion from Division Two, Burkhamer v. State of Arizona, because two of the three Judges on the panel decided that the appeal was filed too...