Jacksonville Injury Lawyer Blog

A Jacksonville correctional officer raped at knifepoint by an inmate at the Duval County jail notified the Sheriff’s Office this morning that she intends to sue the department for failing to follow its own policies procedures designed to protect her. The big question in her case is if she will be allowed to go forward with this Jacksonville lawsuit against her employer or will worker’s compensation be her only legal remedy.

Worker’s compensation is a system designed to compensate workers injured on the job without regard to fault. Most employers are required by law to participate in the workers compensation system. Benefits under workers’ compensation are very limited and provide partial wage replacement and all medically necessary treatment. Workers’ compensation is the injured employee’s exclusive remedy. When employers properly obtain workers’ compensation insurance for their employees, the law allows them almost complete immunity from lawsuits brought by their employees against them. Under Florida Statute 440.11 an employee can only sue his employer if that employee can prove in court that the employer has engaged in any intentional act that causes harm or is substantially certain to result in injury or death to the employee.

As a Jacksonville accident attorney I have represented victims who were injured when another driving was text messaging. The NTSB is currently investigating whether or not text messaging may have played a part in the tragic head-on Metrolink train collision last Friday in LA that has claimed 26 lives. So far, they have confirmed that the engineer, who was among those killed, failed to stop at the final red signal. However, two teens have come forward saying that they received text messages from him shortly before the incident Why an adult engineer is texting teenagers is weird—but the teens claim that they befriended the engineer after expressing interest in his work, often contacting him with questions about his job.

Obviously, making judgments about whether or not text messaging was behind the crash is a bit premature at this point—but phone records from both the teens and the engineer will go a long way in determining a cause. But one thing is certain—had the proper safety technology been in place, the train would have automatically stopped when it did not respond to the signal.

As a Jacksonville attorney who represents auto accident victims everyday, it came as no surprise to me when I read in the Times-Union that a University of North Carolina professor, David Hartgen, ranked Florida’s roads as 41st best in the nation (or ninth worse if you prefer). Dr. Hartgen ranks roads using 12 criteria such as traffic fatalities, congestion, how much money is spent on roads per number of road miles in the state and urban interstate congestion.

Florida transportation officials dismiss Dr. Hartgen’s findings. They say that not every state reports the same statistics so his study compares apples to oranges.
One thing that cannot be debated, using Dr. Hargen’s analysis, is that Florida ranks the 15th worst in traffic fatalities as per the number of vehicle miles driven annually in Florida. Another criteria which Florida ranks high in is urban interstate congestion. Florida ranks 11th worst in the nation with 57% of interstate road miles deemed congested. Anyone who’s driven in Jacksonville during rush hour probably is not surprised by this number. Florida was almost the worst (49th) in spending on roads. This study echos how important it is for drivers to slow down and be careful (especially when driving in Jacksonville).