Firm partners Steven Puritz and Derek Womack obtained a directed verdict on permanency at the close of the plaintiff’s case in chief in a recent jury trial in the Circuit Court of Leon County, Florida. The 26-year-old plaintiff, a former Tallahassee resident, sustained a hand/wrist fracture in a February 4, 2021 head-on collision near the Florida State University campus. Liability and permanency were disputed. Plaintiff treated for approximately three months, with treatment ending four years before trial. Although he claimed ongoing symptoms and limitations, his treating surgeon testified that, at the last visit, the fractures had healed, plaintiff was pain-free, and he had full use of his hand. No witness testified that plaintiff sustained a permanent injury within a reasonable degree of medical probability. At the close of plaintiff’s case, the defense moved for directed verdict under section 627.737(2), Florida Statutes, based on the absence of any evidence of permanent injury. Plaintiff argued that a small surgical scar on his hand satisfied the statutory “significant scarring” threshold. The only evidence of scarring was a nearly imperceptible, dot-sized mark. The court found that no reasonable jury could deem the scar “significant” under the statute and directed a verdict for the defense on permanency, eliminating plaintiff’s claim for non-economic damages. The remaining recoverable damages consisted solely of past medical expenses, which were subject to collateral source set-offs that would have reduced any verdict to only a few hundred dollars. Thus, even if plaintiff had prevailed on liability, there would have been no meaningful recoverable damages. Because Defendants were certain to be awarded attorney’s fees and costs based on a previously rejected proposal for settlement, prior to the start of Defendant’s case-in-chief, Plaintiff dismissed his case with prejudice based on the agreement Defendants would waive entitlement to recover fees and costs against Plaintiff.

Firm partners, Ben Andrews and Stephanie Clark , were recently victorious in a five-day personal injury jury trial held in Jacksonville, Duval County last month. Plaintiff, a 75-year-old resident of Clay County, was allegedly injured in a rear-end motor vehicle accident in October of 2022. She pursued little initial conservative treatment after the accident but underwent lower back surgery three months post-accident and neck surgery nine months post-accident. Ben and Stephanie were able to establish that the injuries Plaintiff claimed were not caused by the accident but were actually a continuation of Plaintiff’s long-standing degenerative neck and low back conditions. Further, they were able to establish that the need for the surgeries after the accident was related to those pre-existing conditions and that the surgeries Plaintiff underwent would have been needed even if the accident hadn’t occurred. Liability for the accident was admitted, but causation of injuries and the total amount of reasonable damages was hotly contested. At the close of the case, Plaintiff requested over $7 million in damages, but the jury returned a defense verdict of no permanency, no future medical treatment, and awarded only $13,000 in past medical expenses, which is the exact amount suggested by the defense. The amount awarded by the jury was significantly less than a pre-trial Proposal for Settlement offered by the Defendants.