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VERDICTS
Defendants' Verdict
RPS Partner who tried the case: William S. Thomas
We represented: Farm Bureau
Venue: St. Louis County
Facts:
Plaintiff Joseph Reed was an on-duty police officer for the City of Pine Lawn who claimed injury in a car accident while returning from the police station to duty on Interstate 70. While traveling north bound on Jennings Station Road, just north of Bircher Ave., Mr. Reed claimed to have observed a pedestrian walking across the road, not in a cross walk, in front of his squad car. He claimed to swerve to avoid the pedestrian, and after he did, noticed a car driven by Nathan Jordan, an uninsured motorist, in front of him, appearing to be stopped. He was unable to swerve to avoid striking the rear of the Jordan car, and clipped the driver rear.
Mr. Reed claimed injury to his head and back immediately, and reported to the emergency room, where he underwent a CT of his head, which was normal. He continued to work, but claimed he had pain, and after undergoing a full duty evaluation where he had to wear his full duty belt, he had even more back pain. He treated with a number of doctors over the course of two years after the accident, and never returned to work full time again. In January after the accident in June the year before, when his medical leave time was up, he was let go as a police officer.
He underwent chiropractic treatment, pain management with Dr. Feinberg, physical therapy treatments, and saw a number of neurologists, orthopedists and surgeons. Ultimately, Dr. David Kennedy said he would need surgery to feel better.
He was at one point seen by Dr. Patrick Hogan, who said he was fully able to return to work, and in fact had no obvious signs of any distress. His test were normal and there were no objective signs of any injury. many of the records from the physical therapists indicated that he was perhaps magnifying his symptoms as the tests they were performing showed he was failing the validity checks.
He ultimately did have an MRI of his low back two years after the accident that showed a disc herniation at the L3-4 disc space on the right, however, his straight leg test results were positive on the left, leaving Dr. Kennedy with the thought that there was some lack of correlation between the objective findings and the subjective complaints.
After a 3 day jury trial, the jury deliberated for one hour, and returned a 10-2 verdict in favor of the defendants.
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