Corradino & Papa, LLC, the Clifton-based personal injury law firm, has issued guidance on what it expects will be four of the biggest emerging personal law areas in the year 2019. These areas include ridesharing services like Uber and Lyft, drones, traumatic brain injuries, and distracted driving.
Uber and Lyfts
“Ridesharing services like Uber and Lyft have become incredibly popular in the past five years, especially in big metropolitan areas,” says Jack Vincent Corradino. Not every driver for these services is safe or particularly qualified, though, and customers have certainly been injured in accidents caused by their Uber or Lyft drivers. Ridesharing companies do have insurance coverage in place to protect customers in these situations, or to protect other drivers that may have been involved in the accident in question. However, for a lot of people who use these services, topics like liability, insurance coverage, and settlement compensation still remain a little bit blurry. Expect these issues to start coming into clearer focus in 2019.
Drones
Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), are growing more common in both recreational and professional settings. Photographers, for instance, might use drones to take aerial photographs or videos of real estate properties or other sites. As UAVs have become more popular, though, the conversation around their safety, regulation, and legality has grown louder. “People are wondering what happens if they suffer some kind of injury due to a falling or poorly piloted drone, or what protections they might have against invasions of privacy,” says Robert C. Papa Jr. “The legal questions here range from product liability claims to personal injury lawsuits to negligence to civil cases over privacy violations.”
Traumatic Brain Injuries
“Traumatic brain injuries can take so many different forms—and have such catastrophic, life-altering consequences—that getting a handle on them from a legal perspective hasn’t been easy,” says Papa. These types of injuries can occur during car accidents. They can occur in sporting activities. They can occur because of workplace accidents. They can occur during surgeries. There are lots of different scenarios, and it’s not always easy or possible to discern the full extent of a brain injury many years later. Clients and families are looking to personal injury lawyers to provide help and guidance with these complicated and heartbreaking cases.
Distracted Driving
“Distracted driving has become such a huge problem in the age of cell phones,” says Corradino. In New Jersey, we have laws that prohibit drivers from using mobile devices unless they have hands-free systems installed. But people are still texting while driving, checking their email while driving, looking at Facebook while driving. People need to be aware of how common distracted driving is, both to avoid doing it and to understand what their rights might be if they or a loved one is involved in a car accident caused by a distracted driver.
“We are working hard to stay up to date with the latest legal trends and changes,” says Corradino. “It is important to our firm to always be at the forefront of personal injury law and to be able to offer advice and representation that takes all factors into account. We will be doing our best in 2019 to keep Corradino & Papa, LLC at the cutting edge of personal law, in these four growing categories and beyond.”