As we have explored in several prior posts on this blog, claims brought against healthcare providers under the Louisiana Medical Malpractice Act must be examined by medical review panel before proceeding to court. Just over a year ago, the First Circuit Court of Appeal issued guidance to plaintiffs on the…
The doctrine of res ipsa loquitur can be employed by a plaintiff to establish the defendant’s breach of duty in the absence of direct evidence of the defendant’s negligent conduct. However, use of the doctrine “does not relieve the plaintiff of the ultimate burden of proving by a preponderance of…
In our last post, we explored the basic elements of class action certification, including the rules that guide a trial court’s decision on whether to grant the certification. Although the trial court is granted wide discretion on this question, it must reach its decision through serious analysis; the failure to…
In this post, we will explore the basic concepts of a class action lawsuit. In particular, we will examine the rules that govern the process by which the court decides whether to recognize a class and permit a group of plaintiffs to litigate under one single action. In a subsequent…
According to Louisiana law, a landowner “owes a duty to a plaintiff to discover any unreasonably dangerous condition, and either to correct the condition or warn of its existence.” However, the courts have consistently held that landowners generally have no duty to protect against “open and obvious” hazards. If the…
The primary duty of the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) is to “continually maintain the public roadways in a condition that is reasonably safe and does not present an unreasonable risk of harm to the motoring public exercising ordinary care and reasonable prudence.” In a recent post, we…
The Third Circuit Court of Appeal for the State of Louisiana affirmed a Calcasieu Parish court’s decision to grant the defendants’ motions for summary judgment and dismissal of the plaintiff’s claims for injuries she sustained when her electric grocery cart allegedly malfunctioned while she was grocery shopping. In considering a…
On March 13, 2008, Sarah Hollier visited Dr. Gregory Green for treatment of bronchitis. Dr. Green wrote Hollier a prescription, which she took to the Super One Pharmacy in Monroe to have filled. The pharmacist on duty, Katy Buntyn, was not familiar with the particular form of the drug that…
On June 19, 2006, CITGO Petroleum Corp. released some four million gallons of hazardous slop oil and seventeen million gallons of wastewater into the Calcasieu River from the waste water treatment unit at its Lake Charles refinery. The overflow was caused in part by a storm that dropped more than…
Previously on this blog, we have discussed the Louisiana Medical Malpractice Act (“LMMA”) and its requirement that “all claims against healthcare providers be reviewed or ‘filtered’ through a medical review panel before proceeding to any other court.” A plaintiff who fails to do this is subject to the defendant’s “exception…