Service of a Complaint Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer

Before you can get your case to court you must serve the defendant with the complaint. This generally is a fairly simple task. But what about the situation where the defendant cannot be found or is hiding. Maryland rule 2-121 deals with serving an individual. You can deliver the complaint by handing it to the defendant, by sending it to him by certified mail, or handing it to somebody that he lives with provided they are mature enough to know the papers are important and will give them to the defendant. Well what if the defendant knows you're trying to serve him and purposely made himself unavailable. Section (B.) deals with the issue of defendants evading service. The court requires an affidavit establishing facts sufficient to prove the defendant is evading service. If the defendant is not evading service however you simply cannot locate him you must first make good-faith efforts to locate the defendant and serve him. Thereafter if you still cannot locate and serve the defendant you should petition the court showing your good-faith efforts to get the defendant served and in that case ask the the court to order other means of service. The court can order any other means that it believes is appropriate under the circumstances and is reasonably calculated to give the actual notice. When you file your motion asking the court to allow you to serve by alternate means it is necessary to outline how the alternate means are calculated to give actual notice.

If you have questions regarding serving your complaint please feel free to give me a call at 1-888-760-7339. I am happy to answer your questions for you over the phone at no cost to you.

Owner Liability Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer

There are circumstances where the owner of a automobile allows someone else to use that automobile when the owner is not present. The question of the owner's liability arises in the event the driver is in an accident. In Maryland personal injury law there are two presumptions that favor the plaintiff, in some positive ways, in establishing not owner liability but also insurance carrier coverage.

One is the presumption of agency and the other is the presumption that a non-owner operator of a motor vehicle operated with the permission of the owner. see 343 Md 320 (1995). . It is important to know the distinction between agency permissive use. The owner of the vehicle is subject to liability if the driver was acting as his agent when the accident occurred. If the driver of the vehicle was simply using the vehicle with the permission of the owner but was not doing anything for the owner at the time of the accident, then there is no liability to the owner. Specifically, there is no liability for permissive use. As such when it comes to issues of proof at trial in oder to make the owner liable you must establish evidence of the purpose of the use by the driver. To hold the owner liable that use must establish agency between owner and driver. One other issue of significant importance is the effect of permissive use on insurance coverage. If you can establish that the driver was negligent and had permission of the owner to use the vehicle you can still collect against the owner's insurance policy even if there is no agency between driver and owner.

If you have been involved in an automobile accident please feel free to give me a call at 1-888-760-7339. I am happy to discuss your case with you over the phone at no cost to you

Perforated Small Intestine

A perforation to the small intestine can sometimes occur during surgery. This is a very serious and dangerous injury if left unattended. I have experience handling medical malpractice issues in Maryland involving exactly this type of injury. In the course of removal of an ovary the OB/GYN accidentally nicked or cut the small intestine. It is generally agreed by certified OB/GYN's and board-certified general surgeons that nicking an internal organ is not in and of itself a deviation from the standard of care. However many will agree that the failure to initiate an examination of the internal organs prior to completing the surgery is a deviation from the standard of care. Specifically as it relates to a perforation of the small intestine a doctor should examine the small intestine prior to completing his surgery. This examination is done by first mobilizing the small intestine so that it can be visually accessed for inspection and secondly running the bowel. There is no guarantee that every nick will be discovered. But it is certain if this inspection procedure is not followed the nick will never be discovered.

If you a family member or friend have a question about a medical procedure and you believe you may be the victim of medical malpractice please feel free to call me. I am happy to answer your questions for you right over the phone at no cost to you. 1-888-760-7339

Maryland medical malpractice the certificate

As I have outlined in the prior post Maryland medical malpractice law requires a certification to establish that the defendant doctor has deviated from standard of care. In order to help eliminate frivolous lawsuits the certification requirement is fairly narrowly drawn. I am offering this post as a final review of a condensed version to simplify understanding the requirements of the certificate of merit.

The certificate of merit must contain the following information.

1. The educational and experience background of the attesting doctor. Pursuant to Maryland statute § 3-2A-02 of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article in pertinent part: In addition to any other qualifications, a health care provider who attests in a certificate of a qualified expert or testifies in relation to a proceeding concerning a defendant's compliance with or departure from standards of care:

Shall have had clinical experience,

provided consultation relating to clinical practice, or

taught medicine in the defendant's specialty or

a related field of health care, or

in the field of health care in which the defendant provided care or treatment to the plaintiff,

within 5 years of the date of the alleged act or omission giving rise to the cause of action; and

if the defendant is board certified in a specialty,

shall be board certified in the same or

a related specialty as the defendant.

this subparagraph does not apply if:

The defendant was providing care or treatment to the plaintiff unrelated to the area in which the defendant is board certified; or

The health care provider taught medicine in the defendant's specialty or
a related field of health care

2. The 20% Rule pursuant to Maryland statute § 3-2A-04 b(4)

A health care provider who attests in a certificate of a qualified expert or who testifies in relation to a proceeding before an arbitration panel or a court concerning compliance with or departure from standards of care may not devote annually more than 20 percent of the expert's professional activities to activities that directly involve testimony in personal injury claims. Professional activity includes(1) the time the doctor spends in, or traveling to or from, court or deposition for the purpose of testifying, waiting to testify, or observing events in preparation for testifying, (2) the time spent assisting an attorney or other member of a litigation team in developing or responding to interrogatories and other forms of discovery, (3) the time spent in reviewing notes and other materials, preparing reports, and conferring with attorneys, insurance adjusters, other members of a litigation team, the patient, or others after being informed that the doctor will likely be called upon to sign an affidavit or otherwise testify, and (4) the time spent on any similar activity that has a clear and direct relationship to testimony to be given by the doctor or the doctor's preparation to give testimony.

3. The applicable standard of care

4. The specific identification of each defendant

5. The specific manner in which each individual defendant breached the standard of care. Articulated within a reasonable degree of medical probability.

6. A specific factually based statement as to each defendant and how the breach of the standard of care caused the injury. Articulated within a reasonable degree of medical probability.

7. No Affiliation the attesting doctor must also state: he/sheis not a party to the pending litigation; that he/she is not an employee or partner of any party to the pending litigation; that he/she is not an employee or stockholder of any professional corporation of which any party of the pending litigation is a stockholder

It is essential that your certificate of merit complying with the Maryland statute The courts Maryland have determined that compliance with the requirements is a condition precedent to filing your malpractice action. A defective certificate of merit is an issue that can be raised at any stage during the litigation. As such there is the potential you could complete your trial, win, and the defendants raise a defective certificate of merit issue. To the extent this issue is raised and the defendants prevail and the statute of limitations has expired you may be barred from refiling your claim.

Maryland Medical Malpractice requirements of the certificate of merit

Recently, in Barber v. Catholic Health Initiatives, Inc., 174 Md.App. 314, 921 A.2d 811 (2007), the intermediate appellate court examined previous health care claims cases of this State, including this Court's decision in Walzer, and determined that the identity of the physicians who allegedly breached the standard of care must be discernable from the Certificate, and that a failure to do so will result in dismissal. In that case, the claimant named all twelve defendants in the original claim and defined them collectively as the "Health Care Providers." The court determined that it was clear from the Certificate, about whom the physician was speaking, when the attesting physician explained that the "Health Care Providers" breached the standard of care. The court stated that "[t]he Certificate cannot be analyzed in a vacuum; it must be considered in the context of the Statement of Claim that it supported, which had already been filed with the HCAO." The court noted, however, that "[t]o be sure, if appellants had re-named in the Certificate each person or entity listed in the Statement of Claim, this appeal would have been avoided." Barber, 174 Md.App. at 351, 921 A.2d at 833. I agree that the inclusion of the specific names is the better practice, as Dr. Simmons-Clemmons indicated in her amended Certificate.

Maryland Medical Malpractice Certificate of Merit

A medical malpractice action in Maryland commences only after a certificate of merit is executed by a medical professional attesting to the deviation from the standard of care by the defendant doctor. The Maryland legislature has placed restrictions on which doctors can successfully execute a certificate of merit. see MD Code Cts. & Jud. Proc. 3-2A-04. This was done primarily to eliminate the potential for frivolous lawsuits being filed against doctors andospitals wih the expectation that malpractice insurance cost and the cost of medical services to patients would be reduced. The statute restrictions as to who can attest to a deviation from the standard of care essentially boil down to activites, experience, and affiliation. For example an attesting doctor who intends to offer testimony concerning compliance with or departure from standards of care may not devote annually more than 20 percent of the expert's professional activities to activities that directly involve testimony in personal injury claims. Similarly as to the credentials of an attesting see Section 3-2A-02 Exclusiveness of procedures it states
(2) (i) This paragraph applies to a claim or action filed on or after January 1, 2005
(ii) 1. In addition to any other qualifications, a health care provider who attests in a certificate of a qualified expert or testifies in relation to a proceeding before a panel or court concerning a defendant's compliance with or departure from standards of care:

A. Shall have had clinical experience, provided consultation relating to clinical practice, or taught medicine in the defendant's specialty or a related field of health care, or in the field of health care in which the defendant provided care or treatment to the plaintiff, within 5 years of the date of the alleged act or omission giving rise to the cause of action; and B. Except as provided in item 2 of this subparagraph, if the defendant is board certified in a specialty, shall be board certified in the same or a related specialty as the defendant.

2. Item (ii)1.B of this subparagraph does not apply if:

A. The defendant was providing care or treatment to the plaintiff unrelated to the area in which the defendant is board certified; or B. The health care provider taught medicine in the defendant's specialty or a related field of health care.

If you have questions about a medical malpractice case in Maryland please feel free to call me at 1-888-760-7339

Interrogatories Maryland personal injury case filed in the District Court

There are times when a personal injury case is most appropriately filed in the District Court as opposed to the circuit court. The rules of procedure between the two different court settings will affect the timing for issuing discovery to the defendant you are suing. One example is the timing for issuing discovery interrogatories to the defendant. The Maryland rules require that the plaintiff must serve discovery interrogatories on the defendant no later then 10 days after receiving notice from the court that the defendant has filed his notice of intention to defend. As such it is good practice in the District Court particularly to serve your discovery request at the same time you serve your complaint on the defendant. Otherwise it is equally important to carefully calendar the due dates for issuing discovery, responding to discovery request, and filing your notice of intention to enter records into evidence.

If you have questions on these or any other subjects affecting personal injury in Maryland please feel free to visit MarylandinjuryAttorney.net or feel free to call me at 1-888-760-7339