If you’re a workers comp lawyer, stop what you’re doing and read it.  Right now.

It’s intended for arbitrators and practitioners and should help people (especially new attorneys) learn to do things the right way. Many do, many more don’t.

I’ll keep a copy at my desk and read it from time to time. I suggest you do too.

(Howard Zimmerle is a personal injury and workers compensation attorney from Rock Island, Illinois, practicing primarily in Rock Island, Henry, Mercer, Knox and Whiteside counties in Illinois and Scott and surrounding counties in Iowa. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)

So does a physician NEED to report a level of impairment? Likewise, does the arbitrator NEED an impairment rating to approve contracts or enter a finding of disability?

According to the Commissioner’s office, the answers are No, and No.

I’m speaking at a seminar in Fairview Heights in February in detail about the effect of the new rule and the application of the AMA Guides. For now, there may not be as much of a shockwave as we thought.

(Howard Zimmerle is a personal injury and workers compensation attorney in Rock Island, Illinois, practicing in all of Western Illinois. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)

We want to look polished, especially in front of a jury. If we speak without stammering, without “uhs” and “ums” we will seem better, stronger, more knowledgeable, and more persuasive.

Right?

Probably not. There is a study linked in this interesting article in Slate that involved telephone survey interviewers. Interviewers who said “uh” and “um” more were more successful in getting people to agree to take a phone survey. The hypothesized reason was that people who didn’t have those verbal tics seemed more scripted – less authentic.

This really supports a point made by most people who discuss trial advocacy, from Gerry Spence all the way down to me. Juries love authenticity. Juries want to know that you are speaking with them, not at them. If you come off too polished, you can come across less believable.

(Howard Zimmerle is a trial lawyer in the Quad City area of Iowa and Illinois who specializes in personal injury cases. He can be reached at hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com or 309-794-1660). 

The Chicago Tribune has that covered. The neat thing to come out of the article was how the jurors took preliminary votes. Rather than using a straight up “guilty/not guilty” vote, they used the “fist to five” method, which I had never heard of before.

As the Tribune puts it:

Instead of private ballot, they did a “fist to five” vote, a consensus-building technique Karin Wilson suggested. If a juror raised a hand with all five fingers, that meant they were leaning strongly toward guilty. A fist was innocent. If the juror was somewhere in between, the number of fingers held up gave an indication of which way she or he was leaning.

Brilliant!

After doing a little research, this is apparently a common decisionmaking tool in corporate meeting settings, or at least in those corporate “six-sigma”-type retreats where people discuss management, leadership skills, how to run a business, etc.

Frankly, it sounds like one of the neat ideas you get after a seminar but never really put into play. I’m glad to see it worked!

Another thing that stuck out was that the jury considered the impact that the verdict would have on Blagojevich’s family. As the Tribune reported:

The panel discussed how the verdict would impact the lives of his two children, daughters Amy, 14, and Annie, 8. Ultimately, they said, they pushed those feelings aside and concentrated on the evidence.

“Everyone brought up that he had a family and young daughters,” the forewoman said. “This is a real human being, and it makes you kind of nervous. But we knew we had a job to do and stuck to the evidence.”

Sometimes we like to pretend that the jury won’t think of these things. Of course they will. We’re all human. A good lawyer will consider this and maybe even address it a little bit if the judge allows.

The third thing I noticed will give strength to the “reptile” attorneys reading this – the jurors hoped their verdict would “send a message” to other politicians. That’s really how all attorneys hope a jury will think. Examples would be hoping a medical malpractice verdict would send a message to other doctors/hospitals/nursing homes that sloppy practice won’t be tolerated, or that a car accident verdict would send a message that safe roads are important, or even that a defense verdict would send a message that bad lawsuits would not be rewarded. Of course, it is reversible error to directly tell a jury to “send a message”.

Finally, the article linked above mentions several times how well the jury got along. This contrasts with the last Blago jury, where the deliberations were far more tense and the jurors really didn’t get along well. I think the trial tip from that is to try to pick jurors who will work well with others. Stay away from jerks.

Hopefully we all learned something from this. Illinois – we have more imprisoned former governors than you do!

(Howard Zimmerle is a trial lawyer in Rock Island Illinois, practicing in much of Western Illinois and Eastern Iowa. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)

All sorts of problems still happen with regularity. Surgery based on test results given to the wrong person. Flipped x-rays (really? even in the digital age where all x-rays are on a computer?). Marking the wrong side of the body or the wrong vertebra.

Several years ago, the National Quality Forum coined the term “never events” to describe medical errors that are almost entirely preventable. These include:

• wrong site/wrong patient surgeries,
• medication errors,
• wrong procedures,
• retained objects after surgery (clamps, sponges, etc),
• pressure ulcers or bedsores,
• injury due to incompatible blood or blood products,
• death or serious injury due to hypoglycemia

A “culture of honor” leads people in southern states to take more dangerous risks.

How does that affect your case?

1. People who try to act like “real men” – you know, the beer swilling, Chuck Norris loving, tobacco chewing good ole boys – are more likely to engage in risky behavior. This goes for women too, interestingly enough. That means that these folks are more likely to drive recklessly, ride a motorcycle without a helmet, etc etc. They cause accidents (and make accidents worse, like when they don’t wear a helmet).

2. These types of people (who, of course, can be found everywhere) are less likely to be sympathetic on a jury.

So how do you deal with this type of juror? The focus in closing argument has to be about honor. About how the defendant needs to “man up” and face his responsibility. How the jury can’t let people act dangerously, hurt someone, and get away scot-free.

Likewise, if you recognize that you ARE this type of person, don’t take this to mean that I don’t like you. I do. I just want people to stick around a little longer, and another study linked above shows that injuries are the leading cause of death for Americans under 45.

So be a man. Just don’t be stupid.

Here’s an example of the medical system working.

Kevin Neff (a family member of mine) lost his voice years ago. He saw doctor after doctor, including the Mayo Clinic, and no one could help. Finally, he saw a doctor in Cleveland, and within an hour, without surgery, he had his voice back.

Here’s a full article on this.

It’s a neat story, and is uplifting even if it is off-topic.

(Howard Zimmerle is a lawyer in the Quad Cities, with offices in Rock Island and Davenport. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)

It’s all at the other blog. Read up and become instant experts.

(Howard Zimmerle is a workers compensation attorney practicing in Rock Island, Moline, Henry County, Knox County and surrounding areas. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)

Throwing away my old citation guide (but not really)

The proper way to cite a case in Illinois is (after July 31, 2011) to the public domain citation (with additional citations to the Northeast Reporter, if you want to go the extra mile). What is the public domain citation, you ask?

It’s a unique identifier given to each case by the Court.

A proper citation would include the relevant paragraphs and look like this:

People v. Doe, 2011 IL App (1st) 101234, ¶ 15
People v. Doe, 2011 IL App (1st) 101234, ¶¶ 21-23
People v. Doe, 2011 IL App (1st) 101234, ¶¶ 57, 68

Truth be told, I don’t know if this will be easier or harder, and I’m not sure when Westlaw and Lexis  (not to mention Fastcase) will catch up. Either way, the dinosaurs will have some catching up to do.

For further reading:

The new rule and commentary

Illinois Lawyer Now

(Howard Zimmerle is a lawyer practicing in the Quad City area of Illinois. He can be reached at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com). 

Never mind, because the Illinois Supreme Court reversed it.

It was a nice tool while it lasted.

(Howard Zimmerle is a personal injury lawyer in the Quad City area. You can reach him at 309-794-1660 or hzimmerle [at] mjwlaw.com)