Notable Settlements

Some larger cases

$2.1 MILLION SETTLEMENT REACHED IN FATAL ASSAULT
A Southfield firm negotiated a $2.1 million settlement stemming from a donut ship robbery with left one worker dead and another seriously injured. Maher Abdelsalam was shot dead when armed robbers hit the Elias Donut shop in Detroit in the early hours of September 4, 1992. Wael Elhajomar was shot in the head and still has a bullet logged in his skull. Byron Siegel represented Abdelsalam’s estate and Elhajomar in a suit against the shop owner, the owner of the building, and an agency which allegedly failed to properly produce workers’ compensation insurance for the shop. That failure left the shop owner exposed to litigation in the incident. Both cases were settled for a total of $2,146,000 with $860,000 going to Abdelsalam’s estate and the rest to Elhajomar. There have been no arrests in the robbery. Geoffrey Fieger and Byron E. Siegel recently received a Wayne County jury verdict of $1,003,078 for a wrongful death/medical malpractice case where a woman suffocated to death while being removed from a ventilator at St. John Hospital in Detroit.

MICHIGAN LAWYERS WEEKLY: LARGEST VERDICTS & SETTLEMENTS
Jury Awards Millions to 9-Year Old Boy A boy handicapped with cerebral palsy won a $19 million dollar medical malpractice award from Hutzel Hospital and one of its doctors earlier this week in Wayne County Circuit Court. The jury found that 9-year old Haily Abdul Ahmad suffers cerebral palsy because medical staff and Hutzel failed to provide oxygen in time to prevent brain damage. The case, which was tried before visiting Judge T. John Lesinski, took approximately three weeks. Attorney for plaintiff was Byron Siegel.

NORTHWEST AIRLINES CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT
Close to 5000 passengers involved regarding the January 1999 Blizzard at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. In a lawsuit, originally filled in February of 1999 by Byron E. Siegel, the matter, joined by 2 other cases, was recently settled for the amount of $7.150 Million in a Waybe County Circuit Court Class Action. Although the action took about 2 years before Northwest Airlines agreed to the Class Action Settlement, a substantial amount of discovery involving depositions and interrogatories was required. Although higher amounts were originally sought by this office, as well as 2 other offices handling these matters, the appeal to the Court of Appeals on 2 main issues led to a compromised resolution of the matter on the behalf of the class action participants. This office also fought for a passengers’ Bill of Rights modeled after the same bill introduced into congress by Bud Schuster of Pennsylvania. Portions of the passengers’ Bill of Rights were incorporated by airlines, including Northwest, which was the goal of this law firm in addition to the monetary compensation. As a result of the lawsuit filed by the firm, there have been a number of positive changes made my Northwest Airlines at Detroit Metropolitan Airport both as a immediate client services including cancellation of flights when realistically the flights could not go because of weather conditions, as well as improvement in machinery for snowplowing and other services to hopefully avoid the same type of problem. In January, 1999 twenty-seven Northwest Airlines planes were on the ground for anywhere from 2 1/2 hours to 9 hours where passengers were “imprisoned” without food, water, access to medicine, or even restroom facilities. As a result of this lawsuit, as well as the other companion cases, not only monetary compensation, but also improvement in procedures as described above, have been accomplished.