Visitor slips on ice from previous days melt, wins settlement.

Jim Lavoie and Grim Howland represented a 62 year old man who was visiting St. John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota for a conference.  As a graduate of St. John’s, he was allowed to stay in the “Alumni Apartment” and park his car in a small, paved area near the entrance to the apartment.  Several inches of snow fell overnight, covering ice that had formed when the temperature dropped below freezing after daytime melting.  While walking to his parked car the next morning, our client slipped, fell, and suffered a severe injury to his knee, requiring surgery and resulting in a lifelong limp.

When the client was unable to reach a settlement with St. John’s on his own, Jim and Grim started a lawsuit in federal court.  St. John’s denied responsibility for the injury by focusing its defense on the client’s long history of contentious lawsuits, by claiming that the client’s knee spontaneously gave out and that the icy conditions were not the cause of his fall, and by suggesting that our client was responsible for his limp and permanent injury because he did not follow his doctors’ recommendations for treatment.  Jim and Grim developed evidence to refute those defenses and were able to settle the case at a second mediation, just days before trial, for $400,000.

Shopper hit by falling door at home improvement store.

Young carpenter shopping at an Anoka County Big Box home improvement store injured his neck and shoulder when a store employee pulled a six panel oak door off a rack onto our client. Represented by Walter Kaminsky. Result – $115,000 Federal Court Settlement.

Hotel patron gets spinal injury from slipping on snow covered ice.

Grim Howland represented a 26 year old man who slipped on ice in a hotel parking lot and severely injured his spine.  Water runoff from the hotel’s roof was directed from a downspout, over the sidewalk near the main entrance to the hotel, and into a large stream through the parking lot.  After several days of above-freezing temperatures, a cold snap caused the stream of water to freeze and falling snow hid it from view.  Our client exited the hotel and, unknown to him, was required to walk across the snow-covered ice to reach his car.  He slipped, fell, and severely injured his spine requiring surgery and rehabilitation.  Grim was able to recover $450,000 for the client from the negligent operator of the hotel, all by using the right services and documents to prove it with some legal scanning make done from external services that helped the case.

The case involved an improperly latched jack stand collapse that caused a serious leg injury. 

Our client was a caretaker at a private home was assisting the homeowner’s son with hitching a heavy wood chipper to the trailer hitch of a truck.  The homeowner’s son had improperly latched the jack stand that supported the weight of the wood chipper.  The jack stand collapsed, striking our client’s leg and pinning his foot to the ground.  He sustained a severe leg injury that required multiple surgeries and left him with a permanent limp.  Grim Howland persuaded the insurer that both homeowners and automobile insurance applied to provide coverage for the unusual circumstances of the injury.  Grim recovered $350,000 from both policies to compensate his client.