Fault (or negligence) is always an issue in Florida motor vehicle accident personal injury cases. For an individual to be successful in claiming damages against another party, the claimant has the burden of proving that the other party caused the accident. In some cases, proving fault is an easy matter.…
Many people mistakenly believe that maintenance and unearned wages for injured seamen are the same benefit. They are not. Seamen injured while working on the high seas are entitled to no-fault benefits, in other words, benefits regardless of why the accident happened. Among those benefits are Maintenance & Cure, and…
Not surprisingly, in Jennifer Kauffman v. Community Inclusions, Inc./Guarantee Insurance Company, filed on March 23, 2011, the Florida First District Court of Appeal issued an opinion finding constitutional a Florida law, Statute 440.34, that is designed to limit the ability of injured workers to obtain workers’ compensation benefits. The Jennifer…
Since the establishment of a workers’ compensation system in Florida more than 80 years ago, business and insurance interests have steadily tried to whittle away workers’ rights with varying degrees of success. The high water mark for them arrived in the late 1990s with the election of Jeb Bush as…
The U.S. Congress has not adopted a workers’ compensation statute applicable to seamen. This contrasts with federal workers’ compensation statutes created for federal workers (FECA) and longshore and harbor workers (LHWCA). The differences between the remedies available under the federal statutes and those available to injured seamen are many and…
Neither railway workers nor seamen injured on the job are covered by any state workers’ compensation system. However, they are not left unprotected. Both are covered by systems that in many respects surpass anything available under any state workers’ compensation system. Railway workers are covered by the Federal Employees’ Liabilities…
Florida law imposes a duty on insurers to act reasonably in the discharge of the fiduciary duty they owe their policy holders. In the case of an injury claim against a policy holder (insured), the insurance company is duty bound to settle within the policy limits when it can and…
The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) establishes standards for minimum wages, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and child labor. Although the Act affects more than 130 million workers, some employers and employees are exempt. The Act applies to enterprises with employees who engage in interstate commerce, produce goods for interstate commerce, or…
It is common practice to seek PIP benefits for an insured who has paid money out-of-pocket to satisfy a workers’ compensation lien. Is the PIP carrier let off the hook for payments when the workers’ compensation lien is waived? According to the holding in Cannino v. Progressive Insurance Co., Fla:…
In our firm’s continuing effort to inform the public of important legal issues, from time to time we will reproduce in our blog letters, articles, and papers written by other people. Today’s entry, published in the March, 2011 edition of The Florida Bar Journal, was written by Rutledge R. Liles,…