Practice Areas
Workers Compensation
Physical and psychological
Injuries related to work are considered workers compensation cases.
Typically these are trauma type injuries including repetitive trauma. All Illinois
employers are required to have insurance to cover work related
injuries. It is the workers' legal right to make a claim for
work injury without retaliation by the employer. The
claim covers wages, medical, and lump sum settlements for the nature
and extent of the disability.
Occupational
Disease
Occupational disease is very
similar to workers compensation except that it applies to diseases
related in some way to work such as heart attacks, strokes,
exposure to chemicals, dust, noise, radiation, drugs, and any other
substance that causes a condition of illness or ill-being in the
worker. If a client is not sure whether their illness is
work-related, our office can help make that determination.
Personal Injury
Personal injury is a general
term that includes almost any type of case involving bodily injury
or defamation of character. This category of cases includes car and truck
accidents, train accidents, dog bites, construction accidents, premises cases,
malpractice, products liability and any other type of injury case
except workers compensation and occupational disease cases.
Auto Accidents
Auto crashes involve the
crashes between cars or other vehicles on the road, and can include uninsured and underinsured
motorist claims against our client's own insurance company. Fault is usually an issue and the principal
of comparative fault of each driver is usually an issue.
Dog Bites
Dog bite (or attack in some
cases) can be compelling cases because of the horror of dog attacks
especially involving children. Interestingly, homeowners
insurance covers dog bites so its important to know who the owner of
the dog is in order to make the claim against the proper person's
insurance company.
Construction
Construction accidents are
usually called "third-party" cases because initially the injured
worker files a workers compensation case. Secondly, if the
injury was caused by the fault of someone other than our client, then a "third-party" case
can be filed against the person (or company) who was at fault for
causing the injury. Sometimes, construction injury cases
involve two cases: the workers compensation case and the third-party
case.
Premises Liability
Premises liability cases arise
when a person is injured as the result of a condition or activity on
someone's premises. Trip on a hole, slip on a wet
floor, slip on improperly shoveled parking lot, or fall as the result of some activity on the premises are
examples of injuries on a premises. The condition or
activity must have been created by the negligent act or omission of the owner,
possessor, or manager of the premises.
Products Liability
Products liability cases arise
when a person is injured as the result of a product that is
defective or unreasonably dangerous at the time the product left the
manufacturer. These cases are considered "strict liability"
which means that the injured person does not have to prove "fault"
on the part of the defendant but only that the product was defective
or unreasonably dangerous at the time it left the manufacturer.
At times, negligence is also alleged in a products liability case.
Nursing Home Injuries
Nursing home injures happen
when patients in the nursing home are mistreated and injured through
the negligence of the nursing home employees. This is not
necessarily medical malpractice but could be ordinary negligence if a
patient falls out of bed or some other accident and failure to
properly care for the patient.
Wrongful Death
Wrongful death case arises
when a person dies as the result of the
negligence of another person or corporation. A survival action
usually accompanies this type of case if the deceased person
experienced conscious pain and suffering before the death.
Criminal
There are many type of
criminal cases including felony, misdemeanor and ordinance violation matters. When
a person is arrested for allegedly committing a crime, hiring an
attorney to represent the arrested person in court is very important
to protect the accused constitutional rights. Everyone
arrested is presumed innocent and deserves a legal defense. It
is important to protect the constitutional rights of the accused and
hiring a lawyer to do this is imperative.
Juvenile
Juvenile cases generally
involve kids under 17 years of age who are arrested and accused of a
crime. The juvenile court proceeding is separate from the
adult criminal court and remains confidential to protect the
juvenile.
Special rules apply to the juveniles accused of crimes. Sometimes
juveniles make mistakes and they should be given a second chance in
most cases.
Also, kids are not experienced in legalities and often confess to
crimes that they did not commit when pressured by police or school
officials and having a lawyer advising the juvenile is very important.
Juveniles accused of a crime should not speak to police or school
officials without an attorney present because of the risk of a
mistaken confession.
DUI and Traffic
DUI stands for "driving under
the influence" of drugs and/or alcohol and is typically a
misdemeanor but sometimes it is a felony. There
are many defenses to a DUI and hiring an experienced lawyer is the
best way to defend the case. Traffic offenses also have
defenses, rules, and procedures in court that an experienced lawyer
can negotiate on behalf of a client to minimize the impact of a
traffic ticket or successfully defend the ticket.
Zero Tolerance For Minors
A special rule called "zero
tolerance" applies to people under 21 years of age when it comes to
drinking alcohol. Zero tolerance means that anyone under 21
years old must have 0.00% alcohol in their system if they are tested
by a police officer. There are two defenses to zero tolerance
drivers license suspension: (1) the drinking alcoholic beverage as
part of a religious service, or (2) taking the regular dosage of
medicine that contains alcohol. These two exceptions do not
apply to drivers 21 years old or older.
Ordinance Violations
Sometimes the police charge
drivers with violations of a local ordinance and these charges can
also be defended like other traffic offenses and should be
aggressively defended.
Real Estate
Real estate practice involves
many different aspects such as real estate closings, real estate
title examinations, mortgage loans, drafting contracts,
drafting leases, and sometimes litigation such as foreclosures and
defense of foreclosures.
Wills and Trusts
This area of practice involves
drafting wills and trusts to dispose of the client's personal and
real property at the time of the client's death.
Probate
Probate involves a court
proceeding to administer the last will and testament of the deceased
person. Estates valued under $100,000 need not be probated in
court but a lawyer must evaluate the value of the estate and the
evaluate the heirs of the estate to avoid probate. Only
a lawyer may prepare a small estate affidavit. Probate
administration of an estate is helpful because it bars of claims of
creditors against the estate after a six-month waiting period.
The executor marshals the assets of the estate, inventories those
assets, pay the final expenses of the decedent, makes a final
account, and then distributes the money remaining to the
beneficiaries of the estate.
Bankruptcy (Chapter 7 and 13)
Bankruptcy is a federal law
that allows people to discharge their debts when they can no longer
afford to pay their bills. The filing of a bankruptcy triggers
the "automatic stay" which immediately stops the creditors from
contacting the debtor/client to collect any debts. A Chapter 7
bankruptcy is considered a "liquidation"; this means that all
non-exempt assets of value are sold and distributed among the
unsecured creditors. A Chapter 13 bankruptcy is considered a
"pay-back plan" that allows the debtor/client to pay-back a small
portion of the unsecured debts over a three to five year plan and
also allows the debtor/client to keep their home, save it from
foreclosure, keep their cars by saving them from repossession.
The bankruptcy laws are complex but very helpful to a person
experiencing too much debt. The new bankruptcy law requires
that each client be evaluated with the "means test" to determine if
they earn too much money to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy. This
rule was lobbied by the credit card companies to prevent people from
discharging credit card debt in some circumstances. A
discussion with a lawyer will help determine whether the means test
has an impact on each client.
Evictions (for landlords)
If a tenant fails to pay rent, the landlord has a right to file an eviction action
against the tenant and ask the court to evict the tenant and to
award the landlord damages for rent and attorney fees if the lease
provides for attorney fees. This
process can take anywhere between three to six weeks depending on
the court docket. A five-day notice must be served upon the
tenant.
General Litigation
There are many other disputes
that arise between people and businesses and sometimes these
disputes cannot be resolved without a lawsuit. The lawsuit is
the best method for having a judge or jury decide how to resolve a
dispute. If someone has a case that is not specifically listed
here, then talk to an attorney about the details of the case.
Social Security Disability
If a person is unable to work
and applies for Social Security Disability and is denied benefits
there is a right to appeal. The appeal can be handled on a
contingency basis depending on the case and back benefits can be
awarded.
School Law
Discipline.
In schools, from kindergarten through high school, many issues arise
in the context of student discipline such as suspensions and
expulsions. A public school education is right of every child
through high school and therefore carries U.S. Constitutional protections of due
process. There is procedural due process right of "notice and
opportunity to be heard" even for a one day suspension. There
is substantive due process to protect students from "arbitrary and
capricious" action by a school.
Criminal.
If a school official or police liaison initiates a criminal
investigation of a student, students are guaranteed the protections
of the United States Constitutional under the Fourth and Fifth
Amendments. However, schools are given greater latitude to
keep the schools safe including (1) use of drug sniffing dogs, (2)
locker searches, (3) outer clothing searches of students, and (4)
interrogation of students. The confiscation of cell phones is
probably constitutionally allowed, but the viewing of text messages,
emails, and phone numbers in the student's cell phone is probably a
violation of the 4th Amendment without a proper search warrant or
otherwise probable cause. A student can, and should, ask for a
lawyer AND a parent prior to interrogation related to a criminal
activity and refuse to answer such questions to avoid
self-incrimination if the student is the target of the
investigation.
Other areas upon request
If there are any cases not explicitly
stated in this website, please feel free to call the office to inquire about
whether our office can represent you in that case.