Oregon Injury Lawyer Blog

September 24, 2014

Oregon E. Coli outbreak raises questions

A mysterious outbreak of E. coli here in Oregon has left one child dead and resulted in injuries to two others, leaving parents and public health officials alike struggling for answers here in the Pacific Northwest.

As The Oregonian reported last week “all three children – ages 3, 4 and 5 – were at birthday parties in Lebanon on August 23. All three were exposed to recreational water and ate watermelon. All three suffered kidney failure.” Though it is worth adding that the children were not all attending the same birthday party (two were at one party and the third child was at a different party) the similarity of the cases does raise significant questions, particularly whether something in the food they ate may have been tainted.

As the newspaper notes, in the wake of these injuries to several children state health officials in both Washington and Oregon have been interviewing the parents as well as other adults in an effort to track and isolate the cause of the outbreak. “Without a solid culprit, such as an undercooked hamburger, epidemiologists can link cases with DNA tests on the bacteria,” the paper notes.

September 20, 2014

Oregon Industrial Accident in Linn County

by Matthew D. Kaplan

The death this week of a 33-year-old Mill City man is being investigated by the sheriff’s office in Linn County but, based on a report in the Salem Statesman-Journal, there are strong indications that it fits the definition of an Oregon industrial accident.

As I wrote in this space just a few days ago, the lumber industry has one of the highest rates of workplace fatalities here in a state where workplace deaths rose last year, even as they declined nationwide. According to the Statesman-Journal this particular accident took place on Wednesday in Mill City. The victim is reported to have been at work in a lumber mill “repairing a wood press when it activated and crushed him.”

“Police are investigating the situation along with the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA,” according to the newspaper. One of the things they will surely look at is whether this fatality should be classified as an Oregon industrial accident. Oregon law requires that machinery, particularly potentially dangerous machinery, be serviced properly and that workers operating and maintaining it have proper training. It is disturbing to read that a wood press activated at a point when it should not have been connected to a power supply at all. In lumber mills and other potentially dangerous workplaces proper “Lockout/Tagout” procedures, like those outlined by the US Department of Labor (see this link) are essential. Rules like this do not represent onerous government regulation but, rather, are essential safety measures designed to protect workers from employers who might be tempted to cut corners to put a few extra dollars onto the bottom line.

September 16, 2014

Oregon Workplace Deaths Rise As Numbers Fall Nationally

by Matthew D. Kaplan

A report released by the Bureau of Labor statistics earlier this month draws attention to a disquieting trend: though the number of workplace deaths fell nationally last year, here in Oregon the numbers went up.

According to reporting by The Oregonian, the BLS report found that “the number of Oregon work-related deaths increased 12 percent, from 43 to 49, between 2012 and 2013. Yet the number of workplace fatalities decreased by 5 percent nationwide to 4,400.” As someone who has written extensively about Oregon industrial accidents and the importance of workplace safety I find both the numbers and the overall trend disturbing.

The largest single source of Oregon workplace deaths was crashes involving cars, trucks and other vehicles. “Safety regulators tied a majority of the Oregon deaths to traffic- or equipment-related accidents. The report says 19 workers died as a result of vehicular crashes and 12 people were killed by machines or other objects.” The report’s accounting system also takes note of police and firefighters killed or injured in the line of duty. The relatively large number of vehicle crashes (accounting for more than one-third of all workplace deaths) is worth special attention. Under Oregon law there may be a case for a wrongful death action by surviving loved ones if a third party is found to be at fault in the incident.

September 7, 2014

Hagg Lake Tragedy Spurs Calls for New Safety Measures

by Matthew D. Kaplan

The extraordinary tragedy that unfolded at Hagg Lake late last month is spurring calls for action. As reported by The Oregonian, four people, representing three generations of the same family, all drowned in the lake on August 25. The bodies of a three-year-old boy along with those of his “mother, grandmother and uncle” were located “about 30 to 40 feet from the shoreline in water that ranged from 8 to 13 feet deep.”

A week later “members of fire agencies across Washington County, as well as invited guests including Washington County Parks Superintendent Todd Winter and Forest Grove Parks and Recreation Director Thomas Gamble, spent about ninety minutes discussing ideas and safety concerns at Hagg Lake.” Their talks came as part of a safety forum organized with the help of SafeKids Washington County. The meeting was called to consider community responses to the drownings and ways to prevent anything like this from happening again, The Oregonian reports.

Prevention emerged as the most significant theme among the participants. Though the focus on safety for children was paramount, last month’s events also show that safety is not something anyone should take for granted.

August 31, 2014

Oregon Local & State Police Issue Holiday Travel Reminder

by Matthew D. Kaplan

Historically Labor Day weekend is second only to New Years when it comes to driving danger on Oregon’s roads. So it is good that both the Oregon State Police and a number of local departments are going out of their way to remind Oregonians and visitors to drive safely this holiday weekend, and are stepping up patrols designed to intercept Oregon drunk drivers. A news release from the OSP notes that the agency “will put all available sworn personnel assigned to field operations on the road” for a period that began Friday night and will continue through Monday night/Tuesday morning.

We have all, perhaps, become a bit too accustomed to warnings like this. Whenever holiday weekends roll around TV and newspaper stories appear, public service announcements are aired and blogs like this are posted.

So it is useful that the State Police have put the issue into stark perspective for those who might think that holiday drinking-and-driving is overhyped. An OSP news release (see link below) notes that “throughout the year, someone is killed on a road in the United States in an alcohol-impaired-driving crash every 51 minutes. Over the Labor Day weekend, that statistic jumps to one death nationally every 34 minutes.”

August 29, 2014

Portland Street Fee Tagged for Safety Improvements

by Matthew D. Kaplan

Portland residents began to get some sense this week of how the “street fee,” the proposal to help fund city roads and maintenance that has been debated all summer, may eventually help to improve health and safety around our city.

According to an article published this week in The Oregonian, “the (city’s) Transportation Needs and Funding Advisory Committee (this week) produced the most detailed list to date of potential transportation projects.”

Though explicitly described as a “wish list,” – a fact designed to indicate that not all of the projects listed in the report will be funded, and that some may be funded at different levels from those recommended in this report – the document does offer some sense of how city leaders would like to allocate the revenue raised by the Street Fee. According to the newspaper “The list included an estimated $109 million in dozens of specifically identified sidewalks, pedestrian crossing, bicycle and other safety projects.” The estimate is “based on roughly $35 million annually in net revenue for a six year period.”

August 27, 2014

SafeKids Report is Important Guide for Parents

by Matthew D. Kaplan

As we all prepare for another school year, SafeKids Oregon, an organization that regular readers will know I admire and support, is distributing an important report that is worth every parent’s attention. “Changing the Culture of Youth Sports” (see link below) offers essential information and perspective on injuries to children here in Oregon and elsewhere. The report is distributed by the umbrella organization SafeKids Worldwide. A summary can be found on the SafeKids Oregon homepage.

Among the report’s key findings are the disturbing fact that “One in four young athletes reported it is normal to commit hard fouls and play rough to ‘send a message’ during a game. This norm leads to a disturbing number of injuries: 33 percent of athletes report being hurt as the result of ‘dirty play’ from an opponent.” Among the report’s other key findings: “that athletes hide injuries to stay in the game” and that parents often try to get coaches to let their injured children participate in sports.

On one level none of this should be particularly surprising. From Hollywood’s images of sports in movies and TV shows to the sports broadcasts that can be found on television every night, sports culture celebrates toughness, ‘playing through the pain’ and a give-no-quarter attitude. Earlier this summer during the World Cup soccer tournament one player was celebrated for remaining in a game despite suffering a hard kick to the head – and despite the fact that TV viewers around the world could see that he was visibly woozy.

August 25, 2014

Industrial Accident Death

by Matthew D. Kaplan

A story from Ohio last week highlights the danger of industrial accidents throughout the United States and the need for all of us to be vigilant. According to Ohio.com, the website of the Akron Beacon-Journal newspaper, “a 45-year-old man was killed after he was pulled into a machine while working at a northeast Ohio industrial company.”

The article goes on to note that the man died “after his clothing was stuck in the machine and he was pulled into it. A fire official said that when rescuers arrived… (the victim) had been freed from the machine by co-workers, but he died from crushing injuries.”

Had this industrial accident taken place here in Oregon there would be a number of clear-cut legal issues that would merit examination. In particular, we would have to consider whether the deceased and his co-workers were properly trained in the use of the equipment they were hired to operate and whether the employer maintained that equipment properly. The latter point is especially important because it highlights the responsibility of employers not only to give their staff the necessary and appropriate knowledge to do their jobs but also the employers’ responsibility to maintain the machinery in a safe manner.

August 12, 2014

Little Noticed Federal Order Reinforces Citizens’ Rights

by Matthew D. Kaplan

A recent article in Slate highlighted an important but little noticed executive order signed by President Obama on the last day of July. According to the online magazine, the “Fair Play and Safe Workplaces” order, as it is formally known, “requires companies bidding for federal contracts worth more than $500,000 to make previous violations of labor law public, if they have any to report.” A less well-publicized, but potentially further-reaching, provision “says that companies with federal contracts worth more than $1 million can no longer force their employees out of court, and into arbitration, to settle accusations of workplace discrimination.”

As the article goes on to note, arbitration clauses buried deep in the fine print have been spreading widely since a Supreme Court ruling (focused on cellphone contracts) upheld them in 2011. The result has been a loss of court access for many Americans. This trend reached both absurd and frightening proportions earlier this summer when food giant General Mills tried to contend that by ‘liking’ any one of its many products on Facebook or other social media sites, or simply by purchasing an item, customers would surrender the right to sue the company ever, over anything.

General Mills later retreated in the face of a storm of public criticism, but the incident highlighted a trend in corporate America that is little-noticed but deeply disturbing: efforts to use ‘terms of service’ to force ordinary Americans to surrender our constitutional right to a trial by jury, as guaranteed by the 7^th Amendment. Slate, citing figures compiled by the watchdog group Public Citizen, notes that since that 2011 Supreme Court decision “at least 139 class action suits have died” including cases “brought by consumers who said they’d been stung by predatory lenders, or misleading mortgages, or false promises by vocational schools. And also on the line are complaints by employees of discrimination on the job.”

August 7, 2014

Federal Charges Follow 2010 Industrial Accident

by Matthew D. Kaplan

A significant case involving alleged negligence leading to an industrial accident became more serious last week when obstruction of justice charges were added to it, according to the Associated Press. The news agency reports that a San Francisco-based “federal grand jury charged Pacific Gas & Electric… with lying to federal investigators in connection with a fatal pipeline explosion that killed eight people and leveled a suburban Northern California neighborhood in 2010.”

The AP reports that the new charge sheet lists a total of 28 counts against the utility giant, replacing an earlier indictment containing only 12 charges. It accuses PG&E of “lying to National Transportation Safety Board investigators after the blast.” In particular, it alleges that the company sought to mislead government officials about “pipeline testing and maintenance procedures.” A spokesman for PG&E told AP that he had not yet seen the charges, but that the company was expecting them. The company disputes the allegations.

If these charges are proven they reflect about as clear a case of bad corporate citizenship as one could imagine. Lying to federal investigators not before but after the company’s negligence has led to the deaths of eight people gives new meaning to the idea of putting profits before people. Righting wrongs like this is why we have an independent court system.