Lawsuits claim the Yamaha Rhino ATV is unsafe

Scott Smith, a 42-year-old from California, was a passenger in a Yamaha Rhino ATV when it flipped over, crushing his right leg and causing severe injuries.

A hiker and skier, Smith was confined to bed for a year while he underwent seven surgeries.

He sued Yamaha, claiming the design of the Rhino ATV – a four-wheeler that looks like a souped-up golf cart – is particularly unsafe and prone to rollovers.

Smith’s lawsuit is one of about 300 across the country that claim the Yamaha Rhino is unsafe at any speed.

Introduced in 2003, the Rhino, which seats two people and can reach 40 miles an hour, has been blamed for crushed and broken arms and legs, head injuries and deaths.

The lawsuits claim that even at low speeds, the Rhino is prone to rollovers because of its top-heavy narrow design, small tires and side-by-side seating.

In addition, the suits claim, the vehicle's steel roll cage is unsafe and can cause severe or fatal injuries if the rider is pinned between the ground and the roll cage or ejected from the Rhino.

Yamaha has offered to retrofit older

models with free half-doors and a passenger handhold. And it has installed half-doors and a handhold on its 2008 model.

The company has put a warning label on the dashboard of new models stating that the Rhino is not intended for drivers under 16, and that "abrupt maneuvers and aggressive driving" have caused rollovers, even on level ground.

A Consumer Product Safety Commission report found that in 2005, more than 136,700 injuries that required hospitalization were caused by four-wheel ATV accidents, including rollovers. Some 30 percent of those accidents involved children under 16.

In 2005 alone, 57 children were killed in accidents involving all types of ATVs.

General contractor sued for death of unlicensed workman

A general contractor may have to pay in court for the death of an independent contractor who was killed while performing a dangerous job he wasn't licensed to do, the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled in a recent case.

A general contractor renovating a garage into an apartment was told by the city that he needed to connect the apartment's sewer line directly into the town's main line.

The work required a licensed excavator and a licensed plumber, and it would have cost at least $10,000 to

comply with all of the federal and state licensing and safety requirements.

Instead, the general contractor hired an unlicensed contractor to do the work for $3,800. The contractor violated several safety standards and died while digging the trench for the sewer line.

His widow sued the general contractor, arguing that he was responsible for the death because he knew her husband was unlicensed and wasn't qualified to do the work for which he was hired.

Substance used in MRIs might cause serious disease

Almost 400 lawsuits have been filed across the country claiming that a metal used in contrast solutions during magnetic imaging caused a devastating disease.

Gadolinium is used to enhance the images when a patient undergoes magnetic imaging, such as an MRI or MRA.

The lawsuits claim that gadolinium causes Nephrogenic Systemic Fibrosis, a debilitating disease with no cure.

NSF causes scarring or fibrosis of the skin and internal organs. Symptoms include red or dark patches of skin or thick, coarse and hard patches of skin; generalized muscle weakness; stiff joints; and burning, itching or swelling skin.

Symptoms may appear as early as two days after receiving an injection or up to 18 months after exposure.

The vast majority of NSF cases involve people whose kidney function was already compromised at the time they

received a gadolinium injection.

Four manufacturers of gadolinium agents have been sued – GE Healthcare, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Tyco/Mallinckrodt, and Bracco Diagnostics.

In June 2006, the FDA issued its first warning about the effects of gadolinium on people suffering from kidney problems.

The federal agency urged physicians to screen patients for kidney disease prior to using gadolinium in MRIs. In December 2006, the FDA announced that it had received 90 reports of patients with moderate to end-stage kidney disease who had developed NSF after being exposed to gadolinium-based contrast agents.

More recently, in May 2007, the FDA requested that the manufacturers of gadolinium agents include a warning on their product labels highlighting the risk to patients with kidney problems.

NuvaRing birth control device may pose hazards

The NuvaRing contraceptive device is defectively designed and can cause serious side effects, according to more than 150 lawsuits filed across the country.

NuvaRing is a vaginal contraceptive that releases estrogen and synthetic progestin. Its main advantage is convenience, because women can leave it in place for three weeks instead of taking a pill every day.

NuvaRing delivers a constant flow of the hormones to the woman's body. But lawyers claim that the combination of

these hormones increases the risk of developing heart attacks, blood clots, strokes and pulmonary embolisms.

The suits name NuvaRing's manufacturer, Organon, as well as two parent companies, Schering-Plough Corp. and Akzo Nobel N.V.

Schering-Plough says that blood clots "have long been known as a rare risk associated with all combined hormonal contraceptives." The company says it has reported adverse effects to the FDA, and the FDA hasn't mandated any labeling changes based on this data.

85-year-old wins personal injury lawsuit

An 85-year-old farmer has been awarded a very substantial verdict by a jury after an ambulance crashed into his car.

The case is part of a growing trend toward personal injury awards for the elderly. Both life expectancies and medical costs are increasing rapidly, and many juries are taking these facts into account in making their awards.

Louis Del Barba, a longtime farmer in the Sacramento area, was left paralyzed and has been on a ventilator since the April 2007 accident. His medical care could cost more than $20 million, according to his attorneys.

Del Barba was attempting to make a left turn onto a highway when an ambulance rammed him. The ambulance was on its way to an emergency, but had no patients inside.

Although the siren was on, the ambulance was speeding at 65 m.p.h. in a 35-m.p.h. zone. Experts testified that the excessive speed, in rush-hour conditions, was reckless and unsafe.

After a five-and-a-half-week trial, the jury ordered the ambulance company to pay $14.9 million in economic and $9 million in non-economic damages.